HISTORY LECTURE COURSE GSD 4355

ARCHITECTURE, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY:

18th CENTURY-PRESENT

Antoine Picon

Fall 2007

GENERAL THEME AND ORGANIZATION OF THE COURSE

Since the first industrial revolution, science and technology have constantly challenged architecture. Technology in particular has represented a powerful source of change for architecture. New materials and structural types have emerged, inducing dramatic changes in the definition of the architectural discipline. From iron construction to digital architecture, from Viollet-le-Duc's structural rationalism to Archigram's technological eclecticism and beyond, the course will study important episodes in this two centuries history. The lectures will not only deal with the practical consequences of the intercourse between architecture, science and technology, like the development of concrete construction or the 20th century quest for three dimensional structures, but also with their cultural dimension. Theoretical issues, such as the relations between architectural aesthetics and mechanization or the influence exerted by the social sciences, from history to sociology, will be evoked. For science and technology have not only fostered changes in building techniques. They have shaped architectural culture. Regular attendance to the lectures, as well as an active participation to the discussion held at the end of each presentation, are required. Students enrolled will have to produce a paper related to the field covered in the course at the end of the term.

PROGRAM AND READINGS

Meeting 1, September 17

ARCHITECTURE SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY, AN INTRODUCTION Vesely D., Architecture in the Age of Divided Representation: The Question of Creativity in the Shadow of Production, Cambridge, Massachusetts, MIT Press, 2004, Chapter 6, "Creativity in the Shadow of Modern Technology", pp. 281-315. THE VITRUVIAN TRADITION Evans R., The Projective Cast. Architecture and its Three Geometries, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1995, new edition Cambridge, Massachusetts, MIT Press, 2000, Chapter 6, "The Trouble with Numbers", pp. 241-271.

Meeting 2, September 24 NEW ATTITUDES AND IDEALS, FROM THE COLONNADE OF THE LOUVRE TO THE PANTHEON Middleton R., "The Abb de Cordemoy and the Graeco-Gothic Ideal," in Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXV, 1962, XXVI, 1963, pp. 278320, 90-123. EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY BRIDGE BUILDING AND THE SPLIT BETWEEN ARCHITECTS AND ENGINEERS Picon A., French Architects and Engineers in the Age of the Enlightenment, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1992, Chapter 9, "A Productive Countryside," pp. 211-255.

Meeting 3, October 1 NINETEENTH-CENTURY IRON CONSTRUCTION I. FROM IRONBRIDGE TO CRYSTAL PALACE

Peters T.-F., Building the Nineteenth Century, Cambridge, Massachusetts, The M.I.T. Press, 1996, Chapter 6, "Patterns of Technological Thought: Buildings from the Sayn Foundry to the Galerie des Machines," pp. 205-279. THE LIFE AND WORK OF GUSTAVE EIFFEL Pfammatter U., The Making of the Modern Architect and Engineer. The Origins and Development of a Scientific and Industrially Oriented Education, Basel, Boston, Berlin, Birkhuser, 2000, "The Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures in Paris," pp. 103-205.

Meeting 4, October 15 ARCHITECTURE, HISTORY AND THE SCIENCES IN THE NINETEENTHCENTURY Bressani M., "Viollet-le-Duc's Optic", in A. Picon, A. Ponte (ed.), Architecture and the Sciences. Exchanging Metaphors, New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 2003, pp. 119-139. Van Eck C., Organicism in Nineteenth-Century Architecture. An Inquiry into its theoretical and Philosophical Background, Amsterdan, Architectura et Natura Press, 1992, Chapter 7,"Scientific Organicism", pp. 216-255. BUILDING TECHNOLOGIES IN THE INDUSTRIAL AGE Elliot C.-D., Technics and architecture. The Development of materials systems for buildings, Cambridge Massachusetts, Londres, The M.I.T. Press, 1992, Chapter 9, "Sanitation," pp. 215-230.. Wermiel S., The Fireproof Building. Technology and Public Safety in the Nineteenth-Century American City, Baltimore, London, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000, pp. 73-103.

Meeting 5, October 22 NINETEENTH-CENTURY IRON CONSTRUCTION II. FROM IRON TO STEEL Condit C., The Chicago School of Architecture. A History of Commercial and Public Building, Chicago, The University of Chicago Press, 1964, Chapter 4, "Jenney and the New Structural Technique," pp. 79-94. Larson G. R., Geraniotis R. M., "Towards a Better Understanding of the Evolution of the Iron Skeleton Frame in Chicago," in Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, vol. XLVI, 1987, pp. 39-48.

THE INDUSTRIAL CHALLENGE: IN ENGLAND FROM RUSKIN TO THE ARTS AND CRAFTS Brooks M. W., John Ruskin and Victorian Architecture, London, Thames and Hudson, 1989, Chapter 2, "John Ruskin, C.R. Cockerell, and the Proportions of Architecture," Chapter 6, "Ruskinism and the Spirit of the Age," pp. 18-32, pp. 97111. Saint A., "The Fate of Pugin's True Principles", in P. Atterbury, Clive (ed.), Pugin. A Gothic Passion, New Haven and Londen, Yale University Press, The Victoria and Albert Museum, 1994, pp. 272-282

Meeting 6, October 29 FROM LIME TO CONCRETE: THE EMERGENCE OF A NEW MATERIAL, Guest presentation by Cyrille Simonnet, University of Geneva. Guillerme A., "From Lime to cement : The Industrial revolution in French civil engineering (1770-1850)," in History and technology, vol.3, 1986, pp. 25-85. Slaton A., Reinforced Concrete and the Modernization of American Building, 1900-1930, Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001, Chapter 5, "What "Modern"Meant: Reinforced Concrete and the Social History of Functionalist Design", pp. 168-187.

FRANCOIS HENNEBIQUE AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF REINFORCED CONCRETE Delhumeau G., "Hennebique and building in reinforced concrete around 1900," in Rassegna, n 49, 1992, pp. 15-25.

Meeting 7, November 5 THE MODERN MOVEMENT AND TECHNOLOGY Anderson S., "Modern Architecture and Industry: Peter Behrens and the AEG Factories", in Oppositions Reader, New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 1998, pp. 521-551 Frampton K., Studies in tectonic architecture. The Poetics of construction in nineteenth and twentieth century architecture, Cambridge, Massachusetts, The M.I.T. Press, 1995, Introduction, "Reflections on the Scope of the Tectonic," pp. 1-27. Anker P., "The Bauhaus of Nature", in Modernism, vol. 12, n 2, 2005, pp. 229-251. TWENTIETH-CENTURY CONCRETE ENGINEERING: ROBERT MAILLART, EDUARDO TORROJA, FELIX CANDELA, EUGENE FREYSSINET Billington D.-P., The Tower and the bridge. The New art of structural engineering, 1983, new edition Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1985, "A New Tradition: Art in Engineering," pp. 3-24. Billington D.-P., Robert Maillart and the art of reinforced concrete, Cambridge, Massachusetts, M.I.T. Press, 1990, "Structural Art and Architecture", pp. 119-122; "Structure in Architecture," pp. 122-123.

Meeting 8, November 19

CONCRETE ARCHITECTURE, AUGUSTE PERRET, LE CORBUSIER, FRANK LLYOD WRIGHT, AND MARCEL BREUER Cohen J.-L., "Modern architecture and the saga of concrete", in J.-L. Cohen, G. Martin Moeller Jr. (ed.), Liquid Stone: New Architecture in Concrete, New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 2006, pp.20-33. TOWARDS THE THIRD DIMENSION: SPACE, TENSILE AND PNEUMATIC STRUCTURES Wachsmann K., The Turning Point of Building. Structure and Design, New York, Reinhold Publishing Corporation, 1961, pp. 170-232.

Meeting 9, November 26 JEAN PROUVE AND THE CONSTRUCTIVE IDEAL Jean Prouve, Paris, Galerie Jousse Seguin, Galerie Enrico Navarra, 1998, pp. 10-31. TOWARDS A DESIGN REVOLUTION: BUCKMINSTER FULLER'S LIFE AND WORK Pawley M., Buckminster Fuller, Londres, Trefoil, 1990, pp. 115-146. Lindy Roy, "Geometry as a Nervous System," in ANY, n 17, 1997, pp. 24-27.

Meeting 10, December 3 ARCHIGRAM AND TECHNOLOGICAL UTOPIA IN THE 1960'S Lobsinger M. L., "Cybernetic Theory and the Architecture of Performance: Cedric Price's Fun Palace," in S. Williams Goldhagen, R. Legault (ed.), Anxious Modernism. Experimentation in Postwar Architectural Culture, Cambridge,

Massachusetts, Canadian Centre for Architecture, The M.I.T. Press, 2000, pp. 119139. Violeau J. L., "Utopie in Acts," in M. Dessauce (ed.), The Inflatable Moment. Pneumatics and Protest in '68, New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 1999, pp. 37-59. THE HIGH TECH TEMPTATION Davies C., High Tech Architecture, New York, Rizzoli, 1988, "Introduction: High Tech A Tentative Definition," pp. 6-21.. Rice P., An Engineer imagines, Londres, Artemis, 1994, "The Role of the Engineer," pp. 71-80.

Meeting 11, December 10 NEW MATERIALS AND TECHNOLOGIES Berger H., Light structures, structures of light. The Art and engineering of tensile architecture, Basel, Boston, Birkhuser, 1996, "Introduction Building a Gentler Environment," pp. 1-5. Beukers A., Van Hinte E., Lightness: The Inevitable Renaissance of Minimum Energy Structures, "Bridging the Gap", Rotterdam, 1998, new edition Rotterdam, 010, 2001, pp. 115-127. Manzini E., The material of invention, Milan, 1986, English translation Cambridge, Massachusetts, M.I.T. Press, 1989, "Creating the Light and Resistant," pp. 89-115.

CONTEMPORARY ARCHITECTURE, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Balmond Cecil, Informal, Munich, Berlin, London, New York, Prestel, 2002, "Bordeaux Villa", pp. 19-44.

Calatrava S., "The Synthetic Power of Games and Metaphor," in Bridging the Gap. Rethinking the Relationship of Architect and Engineer, New York, Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1991, pp. 123-138. Lucan J. (ed.), A Matter of Art. Contemporary Architecture in Switzerland, Paris, Basel, Centre Culturel Suisse Paris, Birkhuser, 2001, "Obsessions. Conversation between Jacques Lucan and Martin Steinmann," pp. 8-25.

10