This book focuses on the first edition of Kenneth Frampton's Modern Architecture: A Critical History, published in 1980. It searches for clues and positions that will provide the reader with an unprecedented insight into the significance of Frampton's historiography of modern architecture. It explores selected themes in line with Frampton's many-faceted contribution, certain aspects of which can be noted between the lines of his ongoing criticism of the present-day architecture, which inevitably lead us to a critical understanding of the past, the modernity of architecture's contemporaneity. The compiled chapters attempt to open a window onto the constellation of themes that allowed Frampton to hold on to his anteroom view of history even amidst the flow of time and flood of temporalities spanning 1980-2020. The book elucidates how Frampton's critical presentation of the history of modern movement architecture and the book's classificatory mode (periodization?) contribute to our understanding of the contemporaneity of architecture today.
This acclaimed survey of modern architecture and its origins has become a classic since it first appeared in 1980. For this fourth edition Kenneth Frampton has added a major new chapter that explores the effects of globalization on architecture in recent years, the rise annd rise of the celebrity architect, and the way in which practices worldwide have addressed such issues as sustainability and habitat. The bibliography has also been updated and expanded, making this volume more complete and indispensable than ever.
Composed of ten essays and an epilogue that trace the history of contemporary form as an evolving poetic of structure and construction, the book's analytical framework rests on Frampton's close readings of key French and German, and English sources from the eighteenth century to the present. Kenneth Frampton's long-awaited follow-up to his classic A Critical History of Modern Architecture is certain to influence any future debate on the evolution of modern architecture. Studies in Tectonic Culture is nothing less than a rethinking of the entire modern architectural tradition. The notion of tectonics as employed by Frampton—the focus on architecture as a constructional craft—constitutes a direct challenge to current mainstream thinking on the artistic limits of postmodernism, and suggests a convincing alternative. Indeed, Frampton argues, modern architecture is invariably as much about structure and construction as it is about space and abstract form. Composed of ten essays and an epilogue that trace the history of contemporary form as an evolving poetic of structure and construction, the book's analytical framework rests on Frampton's close readings of key French and German, and English sources from the eighteenth century to the present. He clarifies the various turns that structural engineering and tectonic imagination have taken in the work of such architects as Perret, Wright, Kahn, Scarpa, and Mies, and shows how both constructional form and material character were integral to an evolving architectural expression of their work. Frampton also demonstrates that the way in which these elements are articulated from one work to the next provides a basis upon which to evaluate the works as a whole. This is especially evident in his consideration of the work of Perret, Mies, and Kahn and the continuities in their thought and attitudes that linked them to the past. Frampton considers the conscious cultivation of the tectonic tradition in architecture as an essential element in the future development of architectural form, casting a critical new light on the entire issue of modernity and on the place of much work that has passed as "avant-garde." A copublication of the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies and The MIT Press.
"A Genealogy of Modern Architecture" is a reference work on modern architecture by Kenneth Frampton, one of today's leading architectural theorists. Conceived as a genealogy of twentieth century architecture from 1924 to 2000, it compiles some sixteen comparative analyses of canonical modern buildings ranging from exhibition pavilions and private houses to office buildings and various kinds of public institutions. The buildings are compared in terms of their hierarchical spatial order, circulation structure and referential details. The analyses are organized so as to show what is similar and different between two paired types, thus revealing how modern tradition has been diversely inflected. Richly illustrated, "A Genealogy of Modern Architecture" is a new standard work in architectural education.
We are dealing with architectural works in which the subtle charm of the forms and the close relationship with nature are combined with great architectural knowledge and perfect functionality.
This highly acclaimed survey of modern architecture and its origins has become a classic since it first appeared in 1980, and has helped to shape architectural practice and discourse worldwide. For this extensively revised and updated fifth edition, Kenneth Frampton has added a new section that explores in detail the modernist tradition in architecture across the globe in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. He examines the varied ways in which architects are not only responding to the geographical, climatic, material and cultural contexts of their buildings, but also pursuing distinct lines of approach that emphasize topography, morphology, sustainability, materiality habitat and civic form. It remains an essential book for all students of architecture and architectural history.
Bognar describes in detail the work of Kengo Kuma whose designs have been attracting growing international attention. Kuma's work is characterized by simplicity and sensitivity to ecological issues taking account of the site and the materials used.
An authoritative, visual exploration of the eminent twentieth-century architect's buildings features newly commissioned photography and includes coverage of such structures as the Chapel of Ronchamp and the Carpenter Arts Center.
