Constellations: HAA 2400 Special Topics Modern - Architecture by the Book: The Production and Use of Texts, 18th-20th c.
In the wake of the Scientific Revolution, the central tenets of classical aesthetics that underpinned Western architectural theory since antiquity--assumptions about universality and beauty--dissolved in the face of empirical science and cultural relativism. Having always been a hybrid type, architectural writing fragmented into a plethora of divergent approaches, borrowing from any number of scientific disciplines and literary genres, including fiction, autobiography, history, travel writing, linguistic theory, and archaeology. Architectural writing became a forum for new speculative and utopian discourses that responded to social and political change, and was transformed by the emergence of critics, new publics (including children) and institutional frameworks such as academies, technical schools and professional organizations. Architectural writing in the early modern period is a mirror for the processes of modernization and industrialization, reflecting contemporary historical and scientific enquiries as well as economic and nationalist ideologies. This seminar course will be built around the exceptionally rich architectural holdings of the Bernd Collection at the Carnegie Library and the rare book collections at the Hillman and Frick libraries. The objective of this course is to examine individual texts and groups of texts that can be considered as forming distinct discourses within 18th- and 19th-century architectural thought, and to place these texts within the cultural, institutional, and intellectual milieu in which they were produced. Issues such as genre, format, the relationship of texts and images, printing techniques, the publishing industry, patronage networks and collecting will also be considered as part of a comprehensive analysis of architectural writing in the early modern period. Prerequisite(s): A good reading knowledge of French will be an asset.
