View No. 49 (2013): For an Architect’s Training

Editors: Ana Tostões, Ivan Blasi
Guest editors: Gonçalo Canto Moniz
Keywords: Modern Movement, Modern architecture, Architectural education, Education of modern architecture.

The variety of discussions on architects’ mission, on architectural discipline and the recall on some key figures explain the argument of this Journal entitled For an Architect’s Training. The title quotes Walter Gropius’ “Blueprint for an architect’s training” spread through the French magazine L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui in February 1950 (number 28), dedicated to “Walter Gropius, the spread of an idea” and realized by Paul Rudolph under the direction of Gropius himself who developed his ideas on design education between art and technique, creation, research and applied science.

Published: 2013-11-01

Editorial

  • The variety of discussions on architects’ mission, on architectural discipline and the recall on some key figures explain the argument of this Journal entitled For an Architect’s Training. The title quotes Walter Gropius’ “Blueprint for an architect’s training” spread through the French magazine L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui in February 1950 (number 28), dedicated to “Walter Gropius, the spread of an idea” and realized by Paul Rudolph under the direction of Gropius himself who developed his ideas on design education between art and technique, creation, research and applied science.

Essays

  • In 1937, Walter Gropius wrote “Training the Architect” for his presentation as Chairman of the Department of Architecture of Harvard University. It reinvented his experience in the Bauhaus, between 1919 and 1928, and became the pedagogical program for the new Modern paradigm of an architectural education. At that moment, the Beaux–Arts system was being revaluated and the American schools of architecture intended to approach the university through a scientific and technological curriculum.

  • docomomo is the answer - what is the question?

  • he phenomenon of the Russian Avant–garde architecture formed under the influence of the Moscow Higher School of Architecture and Art is today widely known by the name of VKHUTEMAS. This school is mentioned in the context of professional activity of the artists and architects who also worked in other institutes, but who had creative links. In the limelight is Nikolai Ladovsky, creator of the introductory course on architectural composition, lecturing along with many authoritative Moscow utilitarian architects, such as Alexander Kuznetsov, Vesnin brothers and others.

  • 8 September 1943: The day the Italian army surrendered to the Allies is a - perhaps the most - decisive milestone in Ernesto N. Rogers’ life. From that transformative moment on, the young Italian architect built an extensive, in–depth international dialogue that led him to be recognized as a master in other, even quite distant, cultural contexts. It was in this concurrence of public and private life, which was practically a coincidence for him, that the career he had established as a partner in the BBPR and as a leading figure in the second generation of Italian rationalists would open...

  • Ludwig Hilberseimer’s role at defining trends in architectural education in the United States is a relevant one, and deserves special attention due to its rigorous method. This article aims to cast light at his teaching experience at IIT, where he promoted an integration of urban theory and political ideals. Understood as an act of cultural colonization, architectural education appears as a powerful tool to reshape the territory in the United States and the world, as part of an ongoing process of Modern postwar globalization.

  • The 60s were inaugurated with the Olympic Games, presenting the world with a new image of Rome: a city that was more modern, more efficient and definitively freed of the fascist period. The decade appeared (and not only in the Italian capital city) as a time of great political and cultural turmoil – and it was precisely the Faculty of Architecture in Rome that set one of the main stages for this struggle. The student movement began a process of profound questioning and transformation of the educational system.

  • The objective of this article is to present the scene which gave rise to the consolidation of the teaching of Architecture and Urbanism in Brazil in accordance with the precepts of Modern Architecture. Between 1930 and 1970 professional training and practice were intimately related to Brazilian political, social and economic contexts. This fact has led to the structuring of this article into three periods. In the first (1930-1945) the debates concerning the strengthening of the profession that took place. In the second (1945-1960) the courses disassociated themselves from the teaching of...

  • The term “Porto School” designates an identity that relates the pedagogy of a teaching institution with the ideas and the architectural practice of its professors and/or former students, resulting of the transmission (and update) of a way of thinking connected to a way of doing: a concern with social responsibility (perceived through the notions of collaboration and relationship with the context), a timeless concept of modernity, an intentional appropriation and miscegenation of models (in a process that we can call critical eclecticism), the belief that architecture should be considered...

  • Paul Philippe Cret was one of Penn’s greatest teachers and one of the city’s greatest architects. Louis I. Kahn, the University’s most well–known teacher, was one of Cret’s students. Holmes Perkins, educated at Harvard under Walter Gropius, reshaped the School and changed its orientation. The key task of the three architects was to articulate a new understanding of what is specific to the discipline, recreating its professional and intellectual center and orientation. This would not require the replacement or elimination of what had been developed in the preceding years; instead the task...

  • This paper reports firstly on the interrelated roles of architectural practice, education and research and focuses on the unique contribution of the Cambridge School in this area. The following section presents the drawbacks derived from a research assessment exercise where architecture was no longer considered an academic subject to be developed in a research intensive university and, finally, concludes that architecture in Cambridge succeeded in spite of its problems, not in the absence of them, which suggests strongly that other European architectural schools can learn from it.

Documentation Issues

  • The restoration of the Central City Alvar Aalto Library in Vyborg is completed and was officially inaugurated on 23rd November 2013. The restoration has been a long process which started in 1991. The work was carried out as a Russian–Finnish joint cross–border project within the context of two different socio–cultural societies, customs difficulties, economic fluctuations and currency rates, which could change the situation overnight. The project has been a learning process for all who have participated during the past years.

  • Universidades laborales, or workers’ universities, were set up throughout Spain during the years of the dictatorship, and were aimed at professionally training the working classes. Their charitable–educational nature was established by law in 1955, although several date back to before that official date. The Universidad Laboral de Gijón (1946-1957) was the first to be built, as reflected in the traditional and academic architecture of Luis Moya. Fernando Moreno Barberá, one of the most important architects involved, was the author of four centres: those of Las Palmas, 1970-73, Toledo,...

  • The term “Modern industrial heritage” is usually associated, in the Romanian context, directly with the 1920s-30s built legacy. This period is in fact commonly perceived as representative of the Romanian Modern Movement, in synchrony with the western Avant-garde. However, industrial traces even with modern influences were left on the national territory mostly by the 1945-89 Communist “forced industrialization.” The manifestation of the Communist industrial architecture was analyzed through the case study of Hunedoara Steelworks. It was also possible to investigate its destiny in the...

  • Even though Turkish Modernization in the 20th century was explained as a political revolution, it dealt much more with the transformation of space and social identity. As a result, the Turkish State built several industrial sites in Anatolian cities to strengthen their urban and social development.

Interviews

  • Herman Hertzberger is one of the main actors of the debate that relates Architecture with Education. He is not only the architect of many school buildings, but he is also the author of the book Space and Learning where he reflects about education and more specifically about how architecture contributes to the education issue and vice–versa.

News

  • An exhibition about the works of Japanese Modern architect, Junzo Sakakura, entitled “Une architecture pour l’ homme Junzo Sakakura in Architectural Documents”, took place from 27 November 2013 to 23 February 2014. The exhibi- tion was organized by the National Archives of Modern Architecture, Agency for Cultural Affairs which was established in May 2012 for the first time in Japan. This exhibition could promote to rethink MoMA Kamakura as facing on dangerous situations to inherit as cultural heritage of Mod- ern Movement in Japan.