Read the text (PDF attached) and then write a1-2 pagesummary of the central ideas.
- How does the author define their ideas about the purposes of buildings or their architectural mission?
- What is their unique perspective on architecture? Do they propose a direction for the future of architectural design or practice?
- In your discussion, you must providetwo quotations from the textwith the page number citation in parentheses.
- Finally, connect your discussion of this textto one building by the architectthat is included in the textbook or LM 10 on Blackboard. Identify the building (name, date, location) and explain clearly the ways in which you see the written ideas of the architect visually expressed in that architectural example.
Le Corbusier, page from Vers une architecture (Toward an Architecture), 1923 Charles-Edouard Jeanneret, later known as Le Corbusier, was born on October 6, 1887, in La Chaux-de-Fonds, in the French-speaking part of Switzerland. He became one of the most important Modernist architects of the 20th century. Due to the dominance of the Beaux-Arts system, the innovations in design that were taking place in other parts of Europe and in the United States had only minimal resonance in France. For modernism to develop it needed someone who could break its cultural isolation and provide a suitable alternative. That person was Charles Édouard Jeanneret-Gris, who later changed his name to Le Corbusier (1887–1965). A Swiss-born architect who worked briefly in the offices of Auguste Perret and Peter Behrens, Le Corbusier moved permanently to Paris in1916, at the age of twenty-nine. Le Corbusier’s articles in the magazine, L’Esprit nouveau, as well as his epochal 1923 book Vers une architecture (Towards a New Architecture), became the most significant summary statements of the ideals of the modernist movement to appear since World War I. Still Life, by Le Corbusier, 1920 Jeanneret began his career designing houses in the Art and Crafts style in his native city of La Chaux-de-Fonds in Switzerland. But once in Paris, and after a travel tour to Turkey, Greece, Italy, and other parts of Europe and the Mediterranean in 1911, he allowed his unique style to develop rapidly. He was strongly influenced by the modern painters (and dabbled in painting in what he called a "Purist" style akin to Cubism), particularly the Cubists. In 1920, he took on the name Le Corbusier. Vers une architecture outlined Five Points toward a New Architecture: the pilotis (stilts) that support the building, the free plan with the only structural support coming in the form of columns, the free facade, the strip window, and the roof terrace. These features,he argued, were based on structural properties of reinforced concrete as well as the increasing availability of mass-produced architectural elements. They also allowed the architect to work with pragmatic forms. The idea of the pilotis was to remain with Le Corbusier throughout his career. Inspired by Rousseauesque thinking that invested undisturbed nature with an ideal of plenitude, Le Corbusier’s pilotis were meant to liberate the land from the oppression of a building that interrupted its flow and rhythm. The Five Points of Architecture In response to his aspirations and admiration of mechanized design, Le Corbusier established “The Five Points” of architecture, which is simply a list of prescribed elements to be incorporated in design. The Five Points of architecture can be thought of as Le Corbusier’s modern interpretation of Vitruvius’ Ten Books on Architecture, not literally in the sense of an instructional manual for architects, but rather a checklist of necessary components of design. So much so that Villa Savoye is thoroughly tailored to Corbusier’s Five Points. · Pilotis · Flat Roof Terrace · Open Plan · Ribbon Windows · Free Façade In 1927, he built two houses for the exhibition at Weissenhof, Stuttgart - Germany. This was a showcase for architects from the Modern movement. The next year, he was a founding member of the International Congress of Modern Architecture in Switzerland. Le Corbusier built several houses during the next few years. One of his most famous houses was the Villa Savoye in Poissy, France, completed in 1931. Here he applied the five points of architecture. He continued to build houses, but published his book Architecture of the Machine Age in 1936. The Villa Savoye Le Corbusier, Villa Savoye, Poissy, France, 1929 Watch this video illustrating the Five Points of Architecture using the Villa Savoye: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1womjgDI_I&t=1s Then watch this short documentary about the villa: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfDJAXuXpd0