Research
Notes on the History of a Profession
From Bauhütte to Academie, Ecole and Polytechnique,
The history of the Profession is intertwined with institutions, who, again, are often responces to new political tasks and social questions that need answering. The profession is therefore tied to big historical events, such as the french revolution which led to the disbanding of the guilds, and the institution of new institutions. It formalised a brotherly profession: that of the engineer.
The Laws of Chance
Freedom, Creativity and the Coincidental in Art
The idea of chance became central for the Dadaists and Surrealists of the 1920s as a counterpoint to a controlled, even positivist modernity. Artists like Marcel Duchamp explored the creative principle of par hasard, letting threads fall freely to the floor in 1914, while the objet trouvé shaped art for decades. Chance was discovered as both an objective and subjective force, linked to the unconscious and materialized in art and to a lesser extend in architecture. It appeared liberating and revolutionary, defining the prototype of the avant-garde.
Strawberry Hill: Proto Surrealism
Breton saw an affinity in Horace Walpole’s Gothic castle.
André Breton considered Horace Walpole somewhat of a proto-surrealist. He recognized the affinities between Walpole’s Gothic Romanticism and Breton’s own Surrealism, noting that both seemed to emerge from a similar dreamlike sensibility. For Breton, Walpole’s imagination, with its fascination for the marvelous, prefigured the Surrealist exploration of the unconscious. In this way, there is a peculiar continuity between eighteenth-century aesthetics – sometimes said to have begun with Walpole’s Gothic mansion – and twentieth-century avant-garde experimentation.
Boring, Bland, Berlin
An excersice in criticism
A recurring criticism of “boringness” emerges from popular voices, especially loud in the 1960s and gaining traction again today. Some call for unity and do not hold the “chaos” of postmodern architecture in high regard. “Let us return to good detailing and forget the unnecessary games that leave cities in disarray,” they say. Such debates wax and wane. But is it possible to grasp their discursive patterns and make sense of it all? Are there timeless truths hidden in these utterances, or is it merely the flux of fashion?