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2) 19th Century Theory: Concepts of Viollet Le Duc, John Ruskin, Quatramere de Quincy and Gottfried Semper

The document provides information on architectural theory and movements from the 18th to 19th centuries. It discusses key theorists such as Viollet-le-Duc and John Ruskin who emphasized honesty of materials and structural rationalism. Viollet-le-Duc is known for his restorations of Gothic buildings and innovative iron designs. Ruskin was an influential art critic and social thinker who defended the work of Turner and focused on connections between nature, art, and society. The document also outlines developments in public buildings and the emergence of new architectural styles during this period like High Victorian Gothic.

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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
94 views38 pages

2) 19th Century Theory: Concepts of Viollet Le Duc, John Ruskin, Quatramere de Quincy and Gottfried Semper

The document provides information on architectural theory and movements from the 18th to 19th centuries. It discusses key theorists such as Viollet-le-Duc and John Ruskin who emphasized honesty of materials and structural rationalism. Viollet-le-Duc is known for his restorations of Gothic buildings and innovative iron designs. Ruskin was an influential art critic and social thinker who defended the work of Turner and focused on connections between nature, art, and society. The document also outlines developments in public buildings and the emergence of new architectural styles during this period like High Victorian Gothic.

Uploaded by

Madhuri Gulabani
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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MODULE 1

Introduction to Theory in Antiquity: Marcus Vitruvius


and his multi-volume work entitled De Architectura.
Mayamata: Indian Treatise on Housing & Architecture.

Introduction to Theory in Renaissance: Leon Alberti,


Andrea Palladio – Jacques Francois Blondel and Claude
Perrault of French Academic Tradition.

1) 18th Century Theory: Ideas of Laugier, Boullee,


Ledoux

2) 19th Century Theory: Concepts of Viollet Le Duc,


John Ruskin, Quatramere de Quincy and Gottfried
Semper
19th century and Modern Movement

The 19th century (1801–1900) was a period in


history marked by the collapse of the Spanish,
Portuguese, Chinese, Holy Roman and Mughal
empires. This paved the way for the growing
influence of the British Empire, the German
Empire, the United States and the Empire of
Japan, spurring military conflicts but also
advances in science and exploration.

The Industrial Revolution, which began in England at about 1760, made radical changes in every
level of civilization all over the world. The heavy industry growth brought a flood of new building
materials, such as cast iron, steel, and glass, with which architects and engineers devised structures of
unimaginable size, form, and function.

In the second half of the 19th century dislocations brought about by the Industrial Revolution started
to be overwhelming. Many were frightened by the hideous new urban districts of factories and
workers' housing and the public taste of the newly rich. Architects were employed to build canals,
tunnels, bridges, and railroad stations
Public Buildings
• Exhibit architectural features from past styles.
• Classical Ordering
• design regularity
• Monumental Scale
• Lack of ornamentation
Eugene Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc (1814–1879)
• A French architect, theorist and French Socialist, atheist in outlook.

• He was famous for his interpretive "restorations" of medieval buildings.

• Born in Paris

• He refused to enter the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. Instead he opted in favour of


direct practical experience in the architectural offices of Jacques-Marie
Huvé and Achille-François-René Leclère.

• During the early 1830s, a popular sentiment for the restoration of medieval
buildings developed in France. Viollet-le-Duc, returning during 1835 from
study in Italy, was commissioned by Prosper Merimée to restore the
Romanesque abbey of Vézelay. This work was the first of a long series of
restorations. He turned out to be a great restorer.

• He was a majorly involved with gothic revival in France.

• His writings:
1. Rational dictionary of French architecture from 11 th century
to 16th century.
2. Entretiens Sur L’Architecture (Discussions on architecture)
1858.
Abbey
the building or buildings occupied by a community of monks or nuns.
Viollet-le-Duc's restorations at Notre Dame de Paris brought him national attention.

Mont St-Michel Carcassonne


Roquetaillade castle Pierrefonds
Viollet-le-Duc's "restorations" frequently combined historical fact with creative modification.

For example, under his supervision, Notre Dame was not only cleaned and restored but also "updated,"
gaining its distinctive third tower (a type of fleche) in addition to other smaller changes.

Flèche
a slender spire, typically over the intersection
of the nave and the transept of a church.

Basic intervention theories of historic


preservation have framed in the dualism
1. The retention of the status quo versus
2. A “restoration” that creates something that
never actually existed in the past.

Viollet le duc wrote


that restoration is a
means to re-establish (a
building) to a finished
state, which may in fact
never have actually
existed at any given
time. ”
• Viollet-le-Duc is considered by many to be the first theorist of modern architecture.
His architectural theory was largely based on finding the ideal forms for specific materials,
and using these forms to create buildings.

• His writings centered on the idea that materials should be used 'honestly'.

• He believed that the outward appearance of a building should reflect the rational
construction of the building.

• In Entretiens sur l'architecture, Viollet-le-Duc praised the Greek temple for its rational
representation of its construction. For him, "Greek architecture served as a model for the
correspondence of structure and appearance. There is speculation that this philosophy was
heavily influenced by the writings of John Ruskin, who championed honesty of materials
as one of the seven main emphases of architecture.

• Viollet-le-Duc’s drawings of iron trusswork were innovative for the time. Many of his
designs emphasizing iron would later influence the Art Nouveau style, most noticeably in
the work of Hector Guimard.

Art Nouveau - it is considered now as an important transition between the historicism of


Neoclassicism and modernism
• In several unbuilt projects for new buildings, Viollet-le-
Duc applied the lessons he had derived from
Gothic architecture, applying its rational structural
systems to modern building materials such as cast iron.

• He also examined organic structures, such as leaves and


animal skeletons, for inspiration. He was especially
interested in the wings of bats, an influence represented
by his Assembly Hall project.

• 3000 people capacity.

• Stone walls for stability and insulation with polyhedral


skeletal iron structure rising from iron diagonal struts.

• This was modern architecture of future

• Passionately believed that new architecture was


required.
• Viollet advocated only the extraction of Gothic principles, not the regeneration of its forms,
writing
• “the principles and methods introduced by the lay Architecture of the late 12th century
adapt themselves, without effort, to the use of these new materials”
According to Viollet,
• The main structural element is stability.
• in both the Gothic and in ferrous construction, stability is achieved through tenuous
“Organic” configurations of independent parts.
• Modern designers could profit by studying how Gothic had achieved organic solutions with
stone, and then transferring the lessons gained into solutions in iron.
• These are “rational,” that is functional, in every detail, and it was only through a new, pure
“rationalism” that a new Architecture of iron and steel would be created.
• Viollet’s architectural theory was largely based on finding the ideal forms for specific
materials, and using these forms to create buildings. His writings centered on the idea that
materials should be used 'honestly'. He believed that the outward appearance of a building
should reflect the rational construction of the building.
• Viollet’s break with historicism amounted to the revival of a French theory that interpreted
the Gothic cathedrals not only symbolically, but in terms of their structural rationalism.
JOHN RUSKIN
John Ruskin (8 February 1819 – 20 January 1900)
• art critic, draughtsman, watercolourist, social thinker, poet
and philanthropist. Most important theorist during the
Victorian gothic.

• Ruskin’s work was vast, he has written 250 works on


subjects as varied as geology, architecture, myth,
ornithology, literature, education, botany and political
economy. His writing styles and literary forms were
equally varied. Ruskin also penned essays and treatises,
poetry and lectures, travel guides and manuals, letters and
even a fairy tale. The elaborate style that characterised his
earliest writing on art was later superseded by a preference
for plainer language designed to communicate his ideas
more effectively. In all of his writing, he emphasised the
connections between nature, art and society. He also made
detailed sketches and paintings of rocks, plants, birds,
landscapes, and architectural structures and
ornamentation.

• Ruskin first came to widespread attention with the first


volume of Modern Painters (1843), an extended essay in
defence of the work of J. M. W. Turner in which he argued
that the principal role of the artist is "truth to nature". His
work increasingly focused on social and political issues.
High Victorian gothic

• Radical functionalism formed the theoretical basis.

• Brought new ideas and different spirit, favouring a dynamic, open eclecticism.

• To an English gothic – stylistic core were added French, german, and Italianate
elements.

• Heterogeneity of materials, patterns, developed masonry into strongly plastic forms.

• Vivid new style

• John ruskin and William butterfield for high Victorian gothic.


Publications:

• Ruskin’s first published prose work came in 1834 – he began writing a series of articles for
London’s magazine of Natural History.

• In 1836-37, he wrote ‘The poetry of Architecture’, serialised in London’s Architectural


magazine. This was a study of cottages, villas and other dwellings which centred around
idea that buildings should be sympathetic to local environments, and should use local
materials.

• In 1839, he published, Transactions of the Meteorological society, his “remarks on the


present state of meteorological science”.

• He went on to publish the first volume of one of his major works, Modern painters, in
1843. This work argued that modern landscape were superior to the so- called “Old
Masters” of the post renaissance period. The second half of Modern Painters 1 consists of
detailed observations by Ruskin of exactly how clouds move, how seas appear at different
times of day, or how trees grow.

• Ruskin followed modern painters 1 with a second volume, developing his ideas on
symbolism in art.
JOHN RUSKIN - " THE SEVEN LAMPS OF ARCHITECTURE"

The essay was published in book form in May 1849 and is structured with eight chapters; an
introduction and one chapter for each of the seven 'Lamps', which represent the demands that good
architecture must meet, expressed as directions in which the association of ideas may take the observer:

1. Sacrifice – dedication of man's craft to God, as visible proofs of man's love and obedience

2. Truth – handcrafted and honest display of materials and structure. Truth to materials and honest
display of construction were bywords since the serious Gothic Revival had distanced itself from the
whimsical "Gothic" of the 18th century; it had been often elaborated by Pugin and others.

3. Power – buildings should be thought of in terms of their massing and reach towards the sublimity of
nature by the action of the human mind upon them and the organization of physical effort in
constructing buildings.

4. Beauty – aspiration towards God expressed in ornamentation drawn from nature, his creation

5. Life – buildings should be made by human hands, so that the joy of masons and stone carvers is
associated with the expressive freedom given them

6. Memory – buildings should respect the culture from which they have developed

7. Obedience – no originality for its own sake, but conforming to the finest among existing English
values, in particular expressed through the "English Early Decorated" Gothic as the safest choice of
style.
Writing within the essentially British tradition
of the associational values that inform aesthetic
appreciation, Ruskin argued from a moral
stance with polemic tone, that the technical
innovations of architecture since the
Renaissance and particularly the Industrial
Revolution, had subsumed its spiritual content
and sapped its vitality. He also argued that no
new style was needed to redress this problem,
as the appropriate styles were already known
to man. The 'truest' architecture was therefore,
the older Gothic of medieval cathedrals and
Venice. The essay sketched out the principles
which Ruskin later expounded upon in the
three-volume The Stones of Venice published
between 1851 and 1853. Practically, he
suggested an 'honest' architecture with no
veneers, finishes; hidden support nor machined
mouldings and that beauty must be derived
from nature and crafted by man.
He had an abiding confidence in the natural, untutored instinct for rightness and beauty in the
average person: "all men have sense of what is right in this matter, if they would only use and apply
this sense; every man knows where and how beauty gives him pleasure, if he would only ask for it
when he does so, and not allow it to be forced upon him when he does not want it." There is an
easily perceived contrast here with the thread of modernism that holds that people must be taught to
appreciate good design. Another contrast with modernism is in the aesthetic of functionality:
Ruskin saw no beauty in well-designed tools: beauty is out of place where there is not serene
leisure, or "if you thrust it into the places of toil. Put it in the drawing-room, not into the workshop;
put it on domestic furniture, not upon tools of handicraft." It will be sensed, even in so brief a
quotation, that for Ruskin, Beauty was not an inherent characteristic but a thing that could be
applied to an object or withheld from it.
GIOTTO’S TOWER
• Ragged against modern age, against factory systems,
against iron. (the most fruitful source of corruption)

• Praised ancient buildings erected by crastmen.

• He suggested honest architecture, no veneers, finishes,


hidden support system, nor marchine mouldings. He
believed that beauty must be derived from nature and
crafted by men.

• Good buildings lead to good society and vice versa.

• Decoration distinguished architecture from mere


construction.

• Favoured large surfaces with as much colour as


possible. Favoured alternating bands of stone and brick
which could stress on horizontal layering of masonry –
represent strata of earth from which all materials come
from.

• Permanent or constructional polychromy

• Architecture should be picturesque and vivid


QUATREMÈRE DE QUINCY
B I OG R A P H Y

•Born Antoine Chrysostôme Quatremèrede Quincy on October


28, 1755 in Paris, France
•His cloth merchant family was of a Parisian bourgeois
•Attended College Louis-le-Grande to study law and later
learned sculpture at G. Courstou’satlier.
•1776 traveled to Italy, visiting Naples with Jacques Louis
David (painter) and Antonio Canova(sculptor)
•1785 he won a prize for Mèmoiresurl’architectureègyptienne,
an essay on Egyptian architecture, which initiated his career as
a scholar.
•1787 received commission for the
Dictionnaired’architecturefrom C.J. Panckoucke, editor of the
EncyclopèdieMèthodique. First volume published in 1807.
•Received no professional training in architecture.
•From 1816 –1839 he served as permanent secretary to the
Académiedes Beaux-Arts and sought to control all official
building.
•As secretary, was also responsible for selecting students and
awarding the Prix de Rome.
•Very much the fervent neo-classicist, wanted to preserve the
antiquity.
T R E AT I S E vs D I C T I O N A R Y

•Quatremère did not write a formal treatise; instead, he was commissioned to write the first formal
dictionary of architecture.

•What does writing a dictionary accomplish?


1.A need for clarification and careful distinctions between meanings of words that had overtime,
accumulated multiple ambiguous meanings and connotations.

•In hopes of “satisfying all classes of readers by embracing the universality of knowledge comprised
by subject.”

2.For the first time, instead of writing for a patron or institutional privilege, Quatremère writes for the
public.

3.In an age of expanding readership and scholarly academic professionalism, the dictionary was
easily produced and equally a readily consumed object.
I D E A O F I M I TAT I O N

•Quatremère believed that architecture was imitative of nature in two ways:

1.In the details of nature –like the certain characteristics of an individual 2.In nature
as a collective whole –like referring to a specific species

•In regards to Laugier’s hut:

•Architecture has no direct model in nature that can be concretely considered an


origin.

•The hut is merely the beginning, not an origin because a certain distance had to be
travelled in architectural theory to arrive at it.

•Influence should be seen, not in a material sense, but in a metaphorical one

•Nature offers three kinds of materials:


1.Earth –when made into bricks, ranks among stone.
2.Stone –projections and cornices received their form from imitating wood
3.Wood –offers a vast array of analogies, inductions and free assimilations
O R I G I N S O F AR C H I T E C T U R E

• Believed the beginning of laws, principles, theory, and practice of architecture went back to the
Greeks. (typical for a neo-classicist)

• Architecture imitates types or models presented by nature to art.

• Also theorized that Laugier’shut was not the beginning of architecture, but merely one of three
original architectural types:
1.Hut

• Post and lintel construction

• Transposed into stone and became a model for Greek architecture

2.Cave

• Heavy dark interiors marked religious architecture of the Egyptians

3.Tent

• Light and mobile structure shows traces in wooden structures of the Chinese.

• Each of the three types originated as shelter for a kind of people in a particular place, all bound
by the laws of necessity, through use, climate,or country.
A R C H I T E C T U R E & LA N G U A G E

• TYPE –is an object with respect to which each artist can conceive works of art that
may have no resemblance to each other

• MODEL –is an object that should be repeated as is

• CHARACTER –implies something more expressive than type.

• Quatremère distinguishes three meanings of architectural character:


1.Essential Character –natural character, the purest simplest essence of something

2.Distinctive Character –refers to a building’s dominant quality

3.Relative Character –two parts


a)Ideal –art of architecture metaphysically considered
b)Imitative –allows for sensuous ideas through manipulation of forms
(Relative character is much like that of ideal beauty and imitative beauty)
PO E T I C O R D E R

•Quatremère’s last theory is a metaphysical one that distinguishes the source of rules, namely
principles.

•Principles are considered to be simple truths from which many lesser truths or rules are
derived.

•Quatremère’s four classes of rules (first two are based on nature and the second two are
based on conventions):
1. Reason or “the nature of things”
• The theory of art in architecture –imitation, invention, principles, rules

2. Constitution of the soul, mind, and senses


• Beauty in architecture –symmetry, eurhythmy, proportion, ordonnance

3. Authority of precedents
• Retrieval of traditional knowledge –antique, restoration, restitution

4. Even habit and prejudice


• Theoretical parameters influencing renewal within tradition in-dissociable couples
imitation and invention, conventions and genius
GOTTFRIED SEMPER
•Gottfried Semper (November 29, 1803 - May 15, 1879) Germany

•He was a German Architect, art critic, and professor of


architecture.

•Brilliant, influential writer about Architecture

•Pupil of Leo Von Klenze

•Neo-Cinquecento and Neo-Baroque works

•Return to first principles.


• Between 1830 and 1833, he travelled to Italy and Greece in order to study the architecture and
designs of antiquity.

• In 1832, he spent four months involved in archaeological research of the famous Acroppolis.

• During this period, he became very interested in the polychromy debate, which centred around the
question whether buildings in Ancient Greece and Rome had been colorfully painted or not.
The Four Elements of Architecture is a book by the German architect Gottfried Semper. Published in
1851, it is an attempt to explain the origins of architecture through the lens of anthropology. The book
divides architecture into four distinct elements: the hearth, the roof, the enclosure and the mound.
The origins of each element can be found in the traditional crafts of ancient "barbarians":
hearth – metallurgy, ceramics
roof – carpentry
enclosure – textile, weaving
mound – earthwork
Semper, stating that the hearth was the first element created: "The first sign of settlement and rest
after the hunt, the battle, and wandering in the desert is today, as when the first men lost paradise,
the setting up of the fireplace and the lighting of the reviving, warming, and food preparing flame.
Around the hearth the first groups formed: around the hearth the first groups assembled; around it
the first alliances formed; around it the first rude religious concepts were put into the customs of a
cult.“

"Throughout all phases of society the hearth formed that sacred focus around which it took order and
shape. It is the first and most important element of architecture.

Around it were grouped the other three elements: the roof, the enclosure, and the mound. The
protecting negations or defenders of the hearths flame against three hostile elements of nature."
Enclosures (walls) were said to have their origins in weaving. Just as fences and pens were woven
sticks, the most basic form of a spatial divider still seen in use in parts of the world today is the fabric
screen. Only when additional functional requirements are placed on the enclosure (such as structural
weight-bearing needs) does the materiality of the wall change to something beyond fabric.
The mat and its use in primitive huts interchangeably as floors, walls, and draped over frames was
considered by Gottfried Semper to be the origins of architecture.

“Sempers Four Elements of Architecture were an attempt at a universal theory of architecture. "The
Four Elements of Architecture was not the classification of a specific typology but rather was more
universal in its attempt to offer a more general theory of architecture.” Rather than describing one
building typology as being the beginning, he considers what assemblies and systems are universal in
all indigenous primitive structures.”

The Four Elements of Architecture as an archeologically driven theory stressed functionalism as a


prerequisite to intentionality.

Sempers primitive hut theory as put fourth by the Four Elements of Architecture is considered to be
significant in contemporary theory.
Works
• Dresden
• Hoftheater (destroyed by fire)
• Villa Rosa (destroyed in the Second world war)
• Semper Synagogue (destroyed on November 9, 1938 )
• Oppenheim-Palace
• Semper Gallery (Dresden Gemäldegalerie)
• Neues Hoftheater (Semperoper)

• Zürich
• City Hall (only concept for competition; not built)
• Polytechnic School, (ETH Zurich)
• Observatory

• Winterthur
• City Hall

• Vienna
• Municipal Theatre (Burgtheater)
• Museum of Art History (Kunsthistorisches Museum)
• Natural History Museum (Naturhistorisches Museum)
ETH ZURICH
• As the onset of the industrial revolution, the Swiss Federation planned to establish a polytechnic
school.

• As the judge for the competition Semper deemed the submitted entries unsatisfactory and,
ultimately, designed the building himself.

• Situated (where fortified walls once stood), visible from all sides on a terrace overlooking the core
of Zurich.
Neues Hoftheater (Semperoper)

Hoftheater
Semper Gallery (Dresden
Gemäldegalerie)

City Hall
Polytechnic School,
(ETH Zurich)

Observatory

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