American Architecture Research Articles

Walter Gropius, history of the IV CIAM Congress, the Charter of Athens and some of its results

The history of the emergence of the idea of multi-story housing construction is described, starting with the project of the experimental settlement of Spandau-Haselhorst by Walter Gropius and the subsequent report of Gropius to the third CIAM congress. The conditions under which the IV CIAM Congress met are shown - the world economic crisis, the strengthening of authoritarianism in the world, the absence of German, American and Soviet architects, as well as opponents of Le Corbusier in other delegations. The history of the IV Congress and the appearance, ten years after it, of two versions of the Athens Charter are described. The differences between José Luis Sert's version and Le Corbusier's version are presented, as well as some results of its implementation. The implementation of ideas, both different from the Athens Charter and its followers, in Great Britain and the place that the construction of multi-storey housing eventually took in the country is described. An example of construction regulation in Germany is given, which makes the construction of multi-story housing economically unprofitable.

An Analysis of American Gothic Revival Architecture - Exemplified by the Work of Alexander Jackson Davis

American Gothic Revival architecture, as an architectural style with deep historical and cultural connotations, occupied a prominent position in the field of American architecture in the 19th century. The purpose of this study is to explore how Davis' architectural work influenced the development of Gothic Revival architecture in the United States and to reveal its unique place in American culture. Through an indepth analysis of Davis s representative architectural works, this paper shows how he fused Gothic elements with modern design concepts to create an architectural art that is both historical and modern. These works not only show the aesthetic value of architecture, but also reflect the cultural trends and values of American society at that time.

At the Death of Architecture: Frank Lloyd Wright's Dreams of America in Japan

In 1832, French writer Victor Hugo declares the death of the edifice as a result of the totalizing popularity of Gutenberg’s printing press since the fifteenth century. American architect Frank Lloyd Wright would echo this sentiment to an intrigued Chicago audience almost 70 years later in his 1901 lecture, “The Art and Craft of the Machine.” The argument went that architecture, chief among the arts, would employ ornament, applied art, and symbolic meaning to capture and spread lasting imprints of human thought before the book usurped this position on account of its greater efficiency in accomplishing the same ends. While many architects of his time were finding ways to circumvent use of machine technology in architecture, citing worsening qualities of industrial life among other ills, Wright sought instead to make a return to the very force that had killed architecture centuries earlier. Wright attempts to revive this once-central artform by inventing an original didactic architecture along with a prescribed almost spiritual set of values meant to be inherent to the United States and symbiotic with the machine.

Soft Power in Hard Concrete: the Berlin Congress Hall, the Cold War and the Building of Transatlantic Relations

Summary The opening of the Congress Hall in Berlin-Tiergarten in 1957 took place during the heyday of the Cold War. Designed by American architect Hugh Stubbins, the building became a focal point in East–West confrontations. Against this backdrop, the article explores the role of architecture in national soft power by taking the example of the Berlin Congress Hall. Commencing with a discussion of architecture as a component of soft power along five criteria, it goes on to examine the planning of the Congress Hall and the significance of its unique design vocabulary. The article concludes that the building, strategically located near the sector borders separating East and West, represents a concrete embodiment of US soft power. Although not an official representational building, the Congress Hall has thus served as a political, cultural and ideational ‘embassy’ of the United States and a major building block in German–American relations up to the present.

Lebbeus – A Postmodernist? Early Scenes of Shopping and Dwelling

AbstractVivid colours, commedia dell’arte, collage and hypergraphics, and villae jutting out of the cliffsides designed for the unknown dwellers – are these projects postmodern? American art, architecture and design critic Aaron Betsky investigates this question and its context, focusing on the V.I.P. Center Shopping Mall, an unbuilt scheme that was to win Lebbeus Woods his first professional acknowledgement under the auspices of the Progressive Architecture Award.

Double-coding in effect: the reception of the Piazza d’Italia

Architectural theorist Charles Jencks characterises post-modernism as double-coding in nature. Double-coding is an architectural scheme that seeks to communicate with both the general public and a concerned minority who care about architectural meanings, usually other architects, through the formulation of an inclusive building language. Given these parameters, Jencks considered the Piazza d’Italia, an iconic post-modern site created by American architect Charles Moore, ‘a monument of post-modern architecture’ and an epitome of his double-coding theory. Yet, the Piazza d’Italia was greatly controversial upon its completion in New Orleans in 1978. The local responses were mixed, and the site triggered debates in professional journals nationwide. This study considers the Piazza d’Italia in light of its mixed reception, supplemented by a contrast between Moore’s prospect of his design and my experience visiting the site. In comparing professional debates with public comments, this study sheds light on the roles and needs of architecture’s different audiences and re-evaluates post-modern architecture’s capability to communicate with them. Thereupon, I seek to illuminate the nature of double-coding and assess critically its promise and effect.

Influence and Untimeliness in Modern Architecture: A Conversation between Eeva-Liisa Pelkonen and Amanda Reeser Lawrence

A conversation between Eeva-Liisa Pelkonen and Amanda Reeser Lawrence recorded on November 13, 2023 at the Yale School of Architecture. The conversation focuses on their shared interest in twentieth-century American architecture culture, including architectural pedagogy marked by the use of architectural precedents as a generative design tool and the rise of art historical formalism as a dominant method of teaching architectural history. During the discussions the authors unpacked the key concepts and intellectual roots of their respective projects, “untimeliness” and the “usable past” (Pelkonen) and “influence” and “anachronism” (Lawrence) and shared notes on how they approach history teaching in a design school setting so as to make it an integral part of architectural thought.

“An African View”: The photography of Denise Scott Brown

AbstractThis article develops on the plenary paper we presented for the second Modern Heritage in the Anthropocene Symposium (MoHoA), held at the Bartlett School of Architecture(UCL) October 26–28, 2022. At the first MOHoA Symposium in Cape Town in 2021 titled Learning from Steinkopf, we invoked Learning from Las Vegas (by Robert Venturi, Denise Scott Brown and Steven Izneour, published in 1972) to consider South African architect Roelof Uytenbogaardt's award‐winning 1975 Steinkopf Community Centre building in the desert in South Africa. In the process of this research we pay attention to Scott Brown's multiple contributions beyond architecture and urban design. In this article we explore the extraordinary complexity and complicity of the life and work of Denise Scott Brown through her photography. She was born, brought up and educated in Africa, after which the major part of her career was in the United States, where she is known and celebrated as a great American architect. Our article follows her life and career through a consideration not of her architectural interventions nor buildings, but of her photographs, which have become the subject of more recent attention. As a woman who photographed at a time when the global field was almost completely dominated by men, her practice as a photographer spans many decades across the African and North American continents. Documenting her projects and sites, her photographs were intended as teaching materials for use in her lectures on architecture, planning, landscape and art history. We suggest that, viewed differently, her photographs speak to questions of societal modernity and inequalities that are also informed by her southern African experiences. In the 1990s Scott Brown claimed, “I have an African's view of Las Vegas.” From our location as an architect and a photographer working in Africa now, in this research we learn from Scott Brown's Las Vegas, her images of the city and desert and her photographic archive.

From the South: Exhibiting Architectural History

In 1983, the Museum of Modern Art in Bogotá established its Department of Architecture, a curatorial unit that was active until 1995. During that time, twenty exhibitions were presented, and eight of them were monographic shows. While at the start, the department focused on European architects, later on, more emphasis was placed on Colombian architecture. This emphasis echoed two significant events in Latin American architectural culture: first, the Seminars of Latin American Architecture, and second, the editorial series SomoSur. These two events encouraged exhibitions with a strong commitment to study, present, and celebrate Colombian architecture from diverse architectural traditions. Through archival research and interviews, this paper examines the intellectual reverberations between seminars, publications, and exhibitions. It highlights the use of monographic exhibitions and how they were channels for the continuous flow of ideas in the construction of Colombian architectural history.

Rogelio Salmona Award: a vision of latin american architecture?

In 2014 the Latin American Rogelio Salmona Award was launched in response to an international valuation system that used to marginalize Latin America architecture in competitions. Therefore, the award was an attempt to consider the Latin American territory by its own criteria with a selection of 60 buildings. Those buildings, however, also reproduced a relationship of domination between the center and the periphery. Considering the three editions promoted by the award, this paper discusses the center-periphery relationships into the region. Some buildings were analyzed by categories such as place, scale, use, and materials. As a result, one could perceive the sliding boundaries between the center and periphery, and also the significant role played by some buildings in the periphery.

Empire of Portland Cement, Concrete Blocks, and Specialty Shingles

Abstract The article examines the close collaboration between Protestant missionaries and expatriate American construction entrepreneurs in the early 1900s in Puerto Rico. The construction work done by the Czech American architect Antonin Nechodoma (1877–1928), the builder Frank Bond Hatch (1871–1925), and Protestant missionaries represent an instance of this collaboration, which led to the adoption of Portland cement products in the construction of church buildings (Beatriz del Cueto, 2016). Nechodoma’s contribution to the development of a religious architectural language on behalf of Protestant missionaries has been largely neglected. While Nechodoma’s figure has gathered popular attention of late, the aim of this article is to situate changes in the design and construction of ecclesiastic structures associated with Methodism within the larger context of American imperialist expansionism and political change in Puerto Rico. Examined collectively, the new religious buildings of the period 1898–c. 1927 reveal the implantation of a new religious colonialist architectural aesthetic.

The Politics of Antihero Aesthetics: Andy Warhol’s Thirteen Most Wanted Men at the 1964 World’s Fair

The current paper examines a series of portraits called Thirteen Most Wanted Men that the famous American Pop artist Andy Warhol created on the occasion of his participation in the World’s Fair that took place in New York in 1964. The paper explores the economic-political context of the 1964 World’s Fair and explains how and why Warhol’s work got it to the façade of the New York State Pavilion designed by the prominent American architect Philip Johnson. The paper reveals the ambiguous nature of the antihero representation of Thirteen Most Wanted Men and studies the contribution of one of Warhol's art dealers Ileana Sonnabend to the international circulation of these paintings in the aftermath of the 1964 World’s Fair.

ВІЗІЯ ІДЕАЛЬНОГО СВІТУ: КОНЦЕПЦІЯ «BROADACRE CITY» ФРЕНКА ЛЛОЙДА РАЙТА

In the first half of the 20th century, architects and urban planners actively sought alternative models of urban life, sought to rethink the anthropogenic environment. American architect F. Lloyd Wright proposed the «Broadacre City» concept, which was described in his book «The Disappearing City». This concept is a reflection of the author's utopian vision of improving the social system, ensuring the equality of citizens and moving away from overpopulated cities. The aim of this article is: to determine the main characteristics of F. Lloyd Wright's utopian concept «Broadacre city»; to highlight the architectural features of various types of buildings and structures; to compare his work with the works of utopians who could have an influence on the concept. F. Lloyd Wright proposes to give each citizen of the country a plot of 1 acre for housing and farming, and the rest of the territory to be evenly distributed among public buildings and structures, namely: airfields, power plants, hotels, offices, farms, factories, hospitals, public centers, schools and universities, shopping and entertainment centers and gas stations. The article highlighted the leading signs that demonstrate the utopian nature of the concept, namely: the presence of features of transcendentalism, egalitarianism, economic self-sufficiency of the proposed urban formations, decentralization and adaptability and flexibility of urban planning solutions. F. Lloyd Wright's work is compared with the works of utopians who could influence the concept of «Broadacre city»: R. Owen, S. Fourier, E. Cabet, E. Bellamy, W. Morris, E. Howard. This demonstrates that nominally this concept has all the features of a utopia, except for those that are not considered characteristic of architectural and urban development, namely: there is no clearly defined political ideology, no prediction of the behavioral habits of the inhabitants, and no carefully developed economic system.

Making Memorials to the Future

Abstract This article foregrounds the work of well-known American memorial architect, Maya Lin. She does not figure in International Relations (IR) knowledge lists, yet started her career by looking back at the American War in Vietnam from the perspective of a forward-looking aesthetic that wins the competition for a memorial in Washington, DC. Later, Lin launches future-oriented memorials that commemorate natural abundance increasingly threatened by that most dangerous war taking place against the planet. Like others contributing to making an academic field and political practice by thinking differently, I take my bearings these days from aesthetic journeys, in my case, to edgy war memorials first, and then to gentle landscape architectures that praise or kill no one, offer no massive focal point or built structure to interpret, and have no particular shooting war to commemorate. Both put viewers into disrupted present times that speak to concerns that could make fruitful futures.

Comparative effectiveness is the common denominator in health services research: experimental effects are promising, real-world effects are compelling.

Sir Archibald Cochrane and Sir Austin Bradford Hill requested 80 years ago answers to three questions (Can it work? Does it work? Is it worth it?) before a new intervention is implemented in day-to-day healthcare. A critical analysis of currently accepted answers identified a terminology conflict that inherits the risk of misleading interpretations and inappropriate decisions. For detection of the terminology problem and the development of the solutions was possible through three recommendations (the "Ulm heritage"): (1) Albert Einstein (*1879 in Ulm/Germany) predicted, "A problem cannot be solved with the way of thinking that caused it"; (2) The "hochschule für gestaltung ulm (Academy of Design, 1953-1968)" disseminated the rules of American designers and architects e.g., "Form Follows Function"; and (3) requested to "design not only individual but universally valid solutions with socio-political relevance". Our data confirms the power of the FFF rule, the pros and cons of value judgments, the complexity of healthcare decisions, the difference between scientific statements and political decisions, and the effects of interprofessional collaboration. "Efficacy" offers promising "Proofs of Principle (PoP)" while "effectiveness" describes "Real-World Effectiveness (RWE)". That is why the results obtained are always more important than hypotheses.

Modern trends in the architecture of mosques in Jordan

This study analyzes the features of historical and modern mosques in Jordan compared to that of Amman. The architecture of the Jordanian mosques reflects the images of great ancient empires and kingdoms of Europe and the Middle East. This has happened due to the geographical position of the country. From the studies of historians and archaeologists, comparative analysis of planning solutions, the use of plastics and decor of the facades of mosques, and the literature on the construction methods of the mosques allow us to conclude that age-old traditions have been preserved through the establishment of mosques in both the countries. Besides, the emergence of new features in constructing mosques has been observed. We find the influence of western architecture in the modern-day architectural designs of Jordanian religious establishments. Meanwhile, in the architecture of Amman mosques, a type of small temple is noticed, the volumetric-plastic composition of which is solved in an innovative way, not to resembling historical temples. In constructing mosques, Amman focuses on preserving the identity and spirituality of the mosques but adds new metaphors by ensuring multidimensionality of space and adopting the architectural designs of modern cities. Changes in the architecture of mosques happened due not only to new technologies and materials but, also to integrate with the processes of globalization and international cooperation of architects. We observe the construction of ancient mosques in both the countries combined both European and American architecture which reveals new images and possibilities of the architecture of the East.

Review: Alloys: American Sculpture and Architecture at Midcentury

Review: <i>Alloys: American Sculpture and Architecture at Midcentury</i>

New Universities for a New Nation: American Architects Redesign Higher Education for a Modern Pakistan

Indian Partition in 1947 left Pakistan without an educational infrastructure sufficient to transform itself into a modern nation. Pakistan inherited several universities from the British Raj that had been intended to train civil servants for a colonial territory, not leaders for an independent country. The predominantly Hindu faculty subsequently left for India. Seeking to build new universities on the American model, Pakistan turned to a number of prominent United States-based architects who, in collaboration with their Pakistani colleagues and with funding from US foreign aid programmes and international agencies, designed new universities for science, technology, and medicine. The University of Islamabad (later Quaid-i-Azam University), the East Pakistan Agricultural University (later Bangladesh Agricultural University), five polytechnics in East Pakistan, and the Aga Khan Hospital and Medical College in Karachi were all planned in the 1960s and early 1970s and completed by the 1980s. Each architect sought to design universities appropriate for a post-Partition and post-colonial state that would be at once Muslim and modern in their curricula and in their architectural designs. However, the universities could not heal the rupture that created them, and in some ways contributed to furthering it.

Naar een architectuur van vereenvoudiging?

The Belgian architect Victor Horta (1861-1947) spent most of the First World War in the United States. Over the course of three years, from December 1915 to January 1919, he explored how the American skyscrapers, standardized dwellings and ingenious urban planning might serve as a model for a modern, post-war Belgium.&#x0D; Yet Horta’s memoirs had very little to say about his discussion of American architecture or any influence his travels might have had on his post-war work. This article consequently breaks new ground in examining the various talks on the subject that Horta gave in the 1920s. Horta’s lectures actually provide a good picture of how he started to see American architecture as a model for the future. In American architectural practice, serial production, standardization and economies of scale facilitated a simplification of the design – a solution Horta also proposed for war-torn Belgium.&#x0D; By way of illustration, the article describes the affinity between Horta’s more classical formal language of the 1920s, as in his 1925 pavilion for the Exposition international des Arts décoratifs et industriels modernes, and the architecture of the United States. It also shows that Horta was an important proponent of American architecture in Belgium, and also played a pioneering role in the introduction of some of its defining features, such as high-rise construction.

ЛАТЕНТНІСТЬ ПРОТОДЕКОНСТРУКТИВІЗМУ В ПРОЕКТНОМУ КОНТЕНТІ ФРЕНКА ЛЛОЙДА РАЙТА

Analyzing the work of the most influential architects of the middle of the 20th century, including the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright, it is possible to declare the presence of ideas at that time, which were later designed and prescribed by trendy deconstructivist architects in the nineties and early 2000s. In the middle of the 20th century, F. Wright continued to develop the principles of organicity in architecture, supplementing them with avant-garde aesthetics. Comparison of the graphic and three-dimensional morphology of buildings, methods and means of expression of the content of the master of architecture of the 20th century Frank Lloyd Wright during the extreme period of his work with the pattern of trendy deconstructivists leads to conclusions about the presence of the aesthetics of proto-deconstructivism in his author's philosophy. In his seventies, Wright experiments with the forms and graphic language of bricolage, which naturally transform into his philosophy of organic architecture. The objects proposed to be attributed to the period of proto-deconstructivism were created by Wright over a period of almost twenty years between 1937 and 1959. By its inner essence, the graphoplastic language of the projects was sharply avant-garde, so it was not always understandable for contemporaries. Architectural historian, critic and publicist Rainer Behnem, in the introductory article to his book "A View of Modern Architecture: The Age of Masters", which was published during the postmodern era of the 80s, states the following "... in the last five years of his career, Wright created the meanest projects an old man could create” (Banham, 1975). Apologists of 20th century modernism Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, Le Corbusier and Frank Wright, about whom Rainer Behnem wrote, felt in advance the stylistic flow that formed together with the avant-garde current and was defined by postmodern deconstructivism. When analyzing Wright's projects from the point of view of the presence in them of the aesthetics of proto-deconstructivism, similarities with recognized characteristic patterns of architecture of this style are revealed. Wright's author's philosophy about the naturalness, that is, the organicity of architecture, was proto-deconstructivist and was formed in parallel with global metaphysical trends.