Review: Adolf Loos: Works and Projects, by Ralf Bock and Auguste Perret, die Architektur-debatte und die "Konservative Revolution" in Frankreich 1900–1930, by Christian Freigang

Abstract

Ralf Bock ; Adolf Loos: Works and Projects ; Milan: Skira, 2007, 302 pp., 462 color and b/w illus. $85 (cloth), ISBN 9788876246432 Christian Freigang ; Auguste Perret, die Architektur-debatte und die Konservative Revolution in Frankreich 1900––1930 ; Munich and Berlin: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2003, 381 pp., 204 b/w illus. €€29.95 (cloth), ISBN 9783422063471 Adolf Loos and Auguste Perret were born only a few years apart——Loos in 1870, Perret in 1874. Both men were the sons of stonemasons, and both belonged to the generation of European architects that emerged around the turn of the century, entering into the profession without having completed their formal university education. Both also relied on new structural technologies——in particular, the concrete frame——in the realization of their key buildings. And both retained a fealty to classicism, an ideological position that, in the years after World War I, would distance them from the discourses then shaping modern architecture. It is tempting to suggest that Perret was the Parisian Loos——or that Loos was the Viennese Perret——but, in fact, the comparison masks salient and important differences——differences that reach into the core of what each architect believed about the meanings and methods of building. Despite his broad philosophical view, Perret was first and foremost a constructeur : especially in his later years, he became increasingly fixated on the principles of structure and construction he had imbibed from his father and other teachers. He was heir to the grand tradition of French rationalism, of Eugeene-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, Julien Guadet, and Auguste Choisy, and of the precepts of structural logic they professed. Perret's aesthetic was a plea for tectonic refinement, material honesty, and meticulous execution. Loos shared Perret's respect for the material substance of building, but he regarded the constructive aspect of his work as secondary. Foremost for him was always the question of how to fashion affective space——to evoke a particular mood or impression. Even while he employed the newest methods of building, he endeavored to remain free of structural restraints, often cladding or concealing the constituent elements of his work according to Semperian reasoning, which stressed surface over construction. He always sought the most economical …