Modern Architectural Theory: A Historical Survey, 1673-1968 by Harry Francis Mallgrave Review by: John V.

MacIuika Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 65, No. 3 (Sep., 2006), pp. 455-457 Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the Society of Architectural Historians Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25068310 . Accessed: 16/11/2011 08:35
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explored.

These

inadequacies

may

have

been due to the fact that the chronology of the club occupied somuch of the book.
Aside from issues of content, this

est sense," defining his topic "simply as the history of architectural ideas, literary
or otherwise" rate the main (xv). lines Setting of modern out to "nar architec

that German

theorists

occupy

special

place in this book. German

have interested Mallgrave

architects
a

throughout

huge
author's to the

publication?designed
son, John standard Hasbrouck?is one would

by
not

the
up

tural thought" inEurope and theUnited

States from the late seventeenth century

lifetime of careful scholarship dedicated in large part to pathbreaking Central

European figures?among them such

expect.

to the late 1960s, Mallgrave's

achieve original, assembling important prominence provocative an immense architectural

book will
an for of and

Although the placement of footnotes to the side of the body of text they accom
pany lengthy can be useful, notes here there are not enough to warrant appear the format. on the page discon scanned pat

less for advancing than thesis amount material

giants asGottfried Semper, Otto Wagner, and Johann Joachim Winckelmann. Also adding fuel to A History ofArchitectural
Theory expert Center are the author's as editor two of decades the Getty invalu series. for for The earlier recov of service for Arts

Occasionally,

the notes

to the reference. Most subsequent are the numerous poorly certing illustrations tern on some throughout: is so strong

summarizing it in a highly readable, crit ical, and at times compelling fashion.

Not since Hanno-Walter Kruft's

and Humanities'

able Texts current books ering history Mallgrave,

and Documents is a capstone responsible strands of

work and

the moir? that

the under

lying image is scarcely discernable. With six hundred illustrations, it would have been helpful to have them indexed.
In pendium architectural interest sum, of this book is a great on com raw material Chicago's whose the era

Architectural sweeping volume^ History of has an architectural Theory (Munich, 1985) historian wresded with the presentation of such a large body of theory. Focusing on
the last few centuries, Mallgrave avoids the

essays

numerous and

architectural for

theory?especially, from nineteenth-century

Germany?and
an ern enlarged, architecture. Thus, prises some

embedding them within

history of mod

problems inherent in Kruft's decision to reach all the way back to Vitruvius, and
produces sion ried, a richer, more nuanced in Kruft's survey. discus often hur then was possible

evolutionary

Scholars history. on the focuses city during

the German of the

material most

com care

strongest,

under scrutiny will find it an invaluable

resource. STEVEN New M. BEDFORD Connecticut

one-dimensional

fully argued material

Mallgrave stresses, such twentieth-century

in the book. As
classic works of as

seeming modesty of the goals Mallgrave outlines in his preface belies

the immense erudition and presentation

The

historiography

Hartford,

Note 1.H. Allen Brooks, The Prairie School: Frank Lloyd Wright and His Midwest Contemporaries (Toronto, 1972), 39-40.

that follows. The author kicks off his enterprise in the year 1673, when Claude
Perrault, the French physician and trans

Nikolaus Pevsner's Pioneers of the Modern Movement (London, 1936) long obscured
the importance theory for of in German work nineteenth-century the laying ground develop

lator of Vitruvius
French, famous century adherence sided quarrel with to

from Latin
the liberate from "moderns" seventeenth strict,

into
in a

twentieth-century

ments.

Like

much

of
work Anyone will

his

earlier
to

thinking to the

slavish classical

scholarship, serve as a corrective. the chapters enriched debate the role on

the present

ismeant

"ancient"

Germany architectural

perusing come away theory and

Theory

andModernity

precedent. Mallgrave calls a halt to his historical journey around the year 1968.
The architectural thought of the turbulent

about

in German-speaking that German to major theory

Harry Francis Mallgrave Modern Architectural Theory: A Historical Survey, 1673-1968

Cambridge, Press, $110, 2005, England: Cambridge University illus. xvii + 503 pp., 109 b/w

and Europe had in con after

decade of the '60s is typical for the way in which it "challenged the relevancy of the
current body of architectural injected politics, a measure theory of and, intellec into the in the process, tual fatigue,

tributing

developments

the 1890s. In this effort, Mallgrave

such architectural in historians recuperating as far more reinvented Instead, Schwarzer teenth in which styles century the than a

joins
nine setting

as Mitchell

ISBN 0-521-79306-8

and cynicism

Historical are perforce

surveys

of architectural and in his

theory five

discourse" (xvi). In the four hundred pages bridging his start and end dates,Mallgrave
delivers fourteen chapters and a short epi

architects to exhaustion.

historicist Mallgrave

selective,

brings to life the modernity

tication revealing innovations. of the age's glimmers For architectural

and sophis
debates,

hundred-page,

double-columned

Modern

logue around a central

"Excursus Foundations German author most to on a Few of of

section titled
the Conceptual

Architectural Theory: A Historical Survey, 1613-1968, Harry Francis Mallgrave has clearly had to do a lot of selection. A
well-respected editor, announces tackle and early architectural architect, on his historian, Mallgrave intention "in its broad

of twentieth-century example, quo lengthy nature of

Modernism." reveals detailed his

Twentieth-Century It is here that agenda while making

the his

tations

reveal

the

advanced

scholarly no It is perhaps

arguments. surprise works that will read find

Karl Friedrich Schinkel's architectural thinking in the mid-1830s. At the time,

Schinkel falling mused "into the about error his of experience pure of radical

architectural

theory

ers of Mallgrave's

earlier

books

455

abstraction ['die Fehler der rein radical Abstraction'], by which I conceived a specific architectural work entirely from
utilitarian purpose and construction."

From Claude

Jacques-Fran?ois Perrault, from

Blondel Marc-Antoine

to

raphy with prominent

treatments themes,

of

leading

figures, institu

and emerging

Laugier to Carlo Lodoli and John Soane,

Mallgrave of personality context-dependent tural taste convictions. defines the strives to convey as the nature "The rules," both the role as well conditional, of rules wrote architec are the taste; archi

tions. Global developments are limited to

the legacy of the International Congr?s Style mod ernism, Internationaux

Presciently
and rigid"

seeking to avoid such "dry

architectural creations,

d'Architecture Moderne
Corbusier Japan, trast, in such and Mexico. is Mallgrave's Far

(CIAM), and Le
as Brazil, by con

Schinkel admonished himself to remain mindful of "two essential elements: the historic and the poetic" (98). Given Mallgrave's depth
acknowledged mastery of German

locations stronger, account of

tect Jacques-Germain and

archi (16); Mallgrave uses

Soufflot
such quotations

in 1744
ele

regional

architectural developments
States. accounts Christopher Occasionally of figures his as Peter

in theUnited
penetrating diverse Eisenman, as

gantly to remind us of the frequency with

which conventions can shade into

tectural scholarship, one might logically askwhether his book is unfairly weighted
toward not the Teutonic. detailed architects The reader on need such and fear. While German sections

dogma, only to be hardened further by institutional politics and control "by an exceedingly small circle of people whose
authority by has been as established by as much circumstance accomplishment"

Alexander,

Louis Kahn, Colin Rowe, and Eero Saarinen are interrupted by individual
paragraphs listing an architect's major

leading

as David

Friedrich Schinkel,

Gilly, and Semper

Leo

von

Klenze, benefit from

his present figure counterparts to

buildings without making

nection be understood to any particular as part of

explicit con
This can Mallgrave's

earlier studies, Mallgrave's connects work each German English, French, and Italian

(322). At the same time, it is easy to appreciate Mallgrave's skillful summary

of the reception of Laugier's Essay on

theory.

Architecture (Paris, 1753) in prerevolu

tionary France, along with reactions to

discussed
These

in detail earlier in the book.

account greatly of architectural and enhance the

effort to give due diligence to the breadth of architectural production afterWorld War II, but it does not always advance his
account of theory.

interconnections

Mallgrave's ory in Europe the ments cultural

as a whole, for place

strengthen

the book among particular individuals in England (Soane andGeorge Dance, who liked it), Germany (JohannWolfgang
von Goethe, who was less enthusiastic),

Mallgrave
recounts American

capably and informatively

post-World battles of not War over II taste,

numerous institutional waxing

appreciation taking

parallel develop across and political Along vast the way, collection here though and not the of can it is as a

and Italy (Piranesi, who appreciated

but went It is tain amid ical, a his own way). harder the pace subject of to main matter understandably focus on

it,

and tural

the

and waning Yet he does

architec see mas

boundaries. of the

influence.

importance source material scarcely rendered be

sive qualitative shifts in the development

of architectural to the r?gime circles tury. To arise theory academic from and the ancien professional cen appear to for X

assembled

tight

overestimated, as footnotes

the accelerating social, and

only

political

change

technolog in the

of the midan extent, course

to late these of his

twentieth shifts

bibliography, no doubt due to limitations

on during centuries and length. the recurring and nineteenth eighteenth over relative include arguments proportion; versus Roman the merits models; of the Additional themes

twentieth wars, political stripes new social

century. activism,

world Cataclysmic mass markets and and radicalism of all

in the

discussion, of Team

movements, add new

dimensions

to architec

example and Aldo influenced architects

in his van

consideration

absolute

tural theory and infuse itwith significant

implications. for mass shortages, From forced idleness

Eyck's humanism take

anthropologically that called cues

for from

Hellenism role and pitting

to

increasing

of architecture agent of progress;

as a bearer the

of culture debates and over mirror

following military defeat to the pressing

need war housing Mallgrave theory expanded Accounting as Oswald to address post out, points to respond for influ

the

developing
of Peter

world.
and Alison

The
too,

"rough
like

style

poetry" brutalist Manfredo Venturi's ernism sure on

Smithson's

Gothicists in which theory

against

classicists;

constructions, Tafuri's "gentle" later the that of that on, put Marxism objections

the ways architectural

disagreements occasionally

architectural to new ences

or Robert to mod pres in his body centuries, stable con in or

conflicts in the broader political and cul

tural rations American of Western emphasizes contingent landscape. Highly contextual British, create Italian, a explo and of French, developments architectural the multivocal, nature

challenges. as diverse

Spengler's

considerable initial claim

tapestry that and

of the West (Vienna, 1918) to Frederick Taylor's Principles of Scientific (New York, 1911), to say Management Decline
nothing of the communist revolution,

author's he sees formed

preface, culture ideas the texts"

a "closed over

ideas remain of

theory

remarkably changing

regional, of architectural think

the Great Depression, World War

the emergence task theory. Mallgrave's combine solution is to continue of the cold history war, midable tural for any

II, or

face

constantly

is a for

(xvi). yet, Mallgrave's as the is that point events of the

West. ing in the The opening discussions of France and Britain in the seventeenth and eigh
teenth centuries typify this approach. 2006

of architec

And inasmuch to

discussions

according

to geog

1960s?and the "American Civil War of 1968," as he calls it?destabilized archi

456

JSAH

/ 65:3,

SEPTEMBER

tectural

culture,

they produced

responses

cation" was
University terned Journal. after the

put

together
students

by Yale
and pat Yale Law observed,

book, has played an important role in

"the current revival of Classicism to which, own practice and it Traditional might be architecture," added, Stern's

less shocking than reminiscent of earlier centuries' efforts. back on the "Looking in the 1968," he observes year epilogue, was one "if there idea that bound

architecture

student-edited the writer

Perspecta,

together the Institute for Architecture andUrban Studies, the work of theNew York Five, the populism of Venturi and
Moore, and Italian rationalism, it was the idea of revival or revisitation: the revival

from topics ranging "Michelangelo to Frank Lloyd Wright and from the new Lever Building to designs for a portable dwelling in the addressed
event ety?later ism?was of atomic This vari bombings." as hailed Perspecta's plural at least in part a response to

owes a debt of gratitude (2). Such claims

of by discovery the are undermined, of Stern's however, better including prevalence architectural

known

heroes,

Philip Johnson, Louis Kahn,

Rudolph, lenging whom modern he appreciates architecture

and Paul
for "chal from

of the now iconic forms of the 1920s, of

baroque naculars, mannerisms of an idealized, and popular even Laugier ver

the frustration Yale students felt toward

the ential ment example, egocentric modern posturing architects. of some influ com for rather

within" (158).
Plattus introduces the second ten

inspired neoclassicism"
is quick to point out

(414).Mallgrave
that such a pro

"I am not Moses, tended to

Wright's I am God," down

volumes
Plattus considerably was

of Perspecta (1967-83),
less a student at stake than many when

with
Stern.

nouncement
"for revivals part (414). resting

is not intended pejoratively,

have always theory a point, than been and and a an integral practice"

shut

of these

than expand debate (32). George Howe,

who became chair of Yale's architecture

issues of the journal were first published

and expresses well-known Focusing on a sense works the of surprise first articles that many there. appeared that have

of modern He has

on more

one, good four hundred pages

department

in

1950,

responded

by

of a discussion

that concludes with the assertion that 1968 could be interpreted either as the beginning of the end of
architectural of reconsideration the theory, or and simply retrench he con more On the read as a time

"to establish the argu Perspecta founding ments that revolve the axis of around contemporary turntable, as the architecture encompassing present and and to express on a broader as well to the

been deemed significant by the architec

tural establishment, Plattus notes that at

the past extendable the

modern

least half of the articles in Perspecta 12 (1969) have become "minor, and, in
some cases, major classics" (252). Those

future"

independent

ment. structs,

Within

framework identifies radical their breaks. own minds,

Mallgrave than up

critical voices of its student editors (4). Fifty years later, the efforts of gen
erations rewarded ing of Yale students reduced have been with?or to, depend hefty compi

reprinted here include Robert Venturi

and Denise Scott on Brown, the People "Mass Freeway, Communication

continuities way to making

or Piranesi
Frampton,

Is Too
"Maison

Easy"; Kenneth
de Verre"; and Alan

ers of this book will find that the journey

Mallgrave considered worth invites and us on informative, is not only well but one well

on one's

perspective?a

of essays titled Re-Reading Perspecta: The First Fifty Years of the Yale
Architectural Journal. Stern, Its faculty Alan Plattus, editors, and Robert A. M.

lation

Colquhoun, "Typology Method" (252).

Questions of Deamer's the third of context

and Design
form the core

taking. JOHN City University V. MACIUIKA of New Baruch York,

College

Peggy Deamer, have selected slightly less than one third of the original material and introduce each of the first thirty
issues of Perspecta. dean, presents on issues. of Stern, the school's volume from cur and the to the a fascinat years of the rent the entire articles introductions provide

to introductions insightful ten of Perspecta volumes

(1985-2000). Deamer discusses the ways

architectural debate was broadened

through the inauguration of Oppositions in

1973, the Harvard Architecture Review in

Robert A. M. Stern, Alan Plattus, and Peggy Deamer, editors Re-Reading Perspecta: The First Fifty Years of the Yale Architectural
Journal Cambridge, 827 Mass.: b/w MIT Press, illus. $75, 2004, xvii +

comments first ten

selected His

1980, and Assemblage in 1986. She com

ments shifts on the student editors' responses of decon to toward considerations

volumes ing

1952-65 of

journal,

retelling which

the early is particularly

struction, posed with

interesting

pp., 900+

ISBN 0-262

19506-2

in light of his youthful role as editor of Perspecta 9/10 (1965). Although Stern's
texts are a in his joy to read, he is overly aggres sive drive discussions For to confront modernism particu notes

a focus on and issues making, In comparison realm. by the digital the earlier there are fewer sections,

here that have been definitively marked as

"classics." issues This may be why portion example, some seem only of the in Dreamer's For under three of

On

19 August 1952, a brief article appeared at the bottom of the book review page of the New York Times
announcing that a "new magazine named

through larly

of history, example,

represented.

classicism.

he

that the famed American classicist Henry

Reed, Hope as a crank" Jr., who and whose was "once early dismissed from article

in twenty-six published 24 (1988) and Perspecta 25 (1989) Perspecta the articles

are reprinted in the current very context. volume, leav ing the reader with ing of the original little understand

Perspecta" had been published

first mented time that that day. the new The notice "slick-paper

for the
com publi

Perspecta 1 (1952)

is reprinted

in the

books

457