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38 / GHIRARDO

Manfredoafuri

a n d Archtecturalheory

DIANE Y. GHIRARDO

In the late 1960s, Italian architect and historian Manfredo Tafurisurveyed

the situation of architecture and architecturalpracticewith grim resignation.

Theconcluding paragraphsof Architectureand Utopia:De.ign and Capitalist

Development, xpress fairlywell the monumentaldespairwhich suffused this

and subsequenttexts byTafuri:

Modernarchitectureha. markedout its ownfate by making itself..the bearer

of ideals of rationalization ... it is useless to struggle for escape when com-

pletely enclosed and confinedwithout an exit... No "salvation"LAany longer

to befound within it: neitherwandering restlesAly n labyrinthA f images so

multivalenttheyend inmutenesa,norenclosed in thestubbornsilence ofgeom-

etry content with its own perfection .. it iLuselesA to proposepurelyarchitec-

tural alternatives.'

ForTafuri,architecture since the Enlightenmenthad become the instru-

ment parexcellence of capitalist development,with the utopias proposed by

its greatest avant-gardesnothing but vehicles of worlddomination and admin-

istration in the hands of rampant capitalist expansion. But in his dip into

the history of Western Europeanarchitecture,Tafuriconveniently failed to

mention that architecturehad also been an instrument of feudal exploitation,

domination, and administration; an instrument of post-medieval colonial

expansion, exploitation, domination, and administration;an instrument of

colonization,exploitation,domination,and administration forImperialRome;

and so on. Architecture's nstrumental use by regimes of power s hardlynew.

What Tafuriaverred,however, s that in the contemporaryworld,this instru-

mentalization had become inescapable, presumablybecause of the totalizing

reachof the processesof capitalist rationalization. Buried n this formulation





logical criticism has been completed,there remains the problemof deciding

what instruments of knowledgemight be immediatelyuseful to the political

struggle. It is preciselyhere that my discoursemust end,but certainlynot by

choice."6 hepolitical foundationsof his position are clearenough in the early

1970s from the litany of examplesdrawn fromthe architecturalcanon which

he lined upin Architectureand Utopia.Tafuridescribed architects in each suc-

cessive phase as launching utopian projectswhichthen, one by one,revealed

their inevitable imbrication in the system of capitalist rationalization. At

several points in Architectureand Utopia,Tafurispecifically remarked that

the challengefacingarchitecturewas tobring ogether capitalist development

and the reorganizationand consolidation of the workingclass.7Thirty years

later,the referencesto the proletariatand the workingclass havea quaintair

aboutthem,the musty smell of somethinglong storedin adusty attic,but had

anyonepaidattention to the

political chargeand the stance of the

historian,uponwhichTafuri'swritingswerepredicated,wemighthavebeen sparedalot

of the nonsense that has passed fortheoryin the subsequentthreedecades.

What is remarkableis that the architecturaltheory machine in the

United States ecstatically embracedTafuri'sdespair,deploying t as a trigger

for a new architecture,while ignoring the political dimension fundamental

to his critique.Referencesto the social or political in most pronouncements

remained little more than piously uncontroversialgenuflections with about

as much basis in actual social or political conditions - much less actions

- as the decenteredsubjects featured during the 198os and 199os. How did

this happen?Misreadings of Tafuri,and the cues for a new attitude toward

architectureerroneouslydeduced rom his critique, spanthe 1970Sand198os

and irradiatedwriters in many publications; in this essay, I refer only to a

few of the most prominent, so-calledtheoretical texts written during three

decadesof iterations.

At the outset, it is worthnoting that Tafuri nsisted both on the separa-

tion ofhistory/theoryandpractice,and on the necessity for the critic to estab-

lish a distance fromthe objectof his inquiry.The single architecturalobject

was never the subjectof the historian orcritic's analysis. Infact,the examples

wereinterchangeable,becausethe task wasto understand he broader ntellec-

tual and social environment nto whichbuildings fit. Hedismissed the theory

andhistoryproducedby architectsas interested andinstrumental;architects

should stick to practice,he believed,andhistorians/critics to criticalhistory.8

Strikingas it did at the veryheart of most architecturalwriting in the United

States, this fundamental aspect of Tafuri's hought was simply ignored by

architects whofanciedthemselves critics,historians, ortheorists.The journal OppoAitions,which first published Tafuri'sessays in this

country and which led the chargeto adoptbits of his theories selectively,is

as good a starting point as any,because it is the fountainhead of multiple

misrepresentationsof Tafuri's hought.As has been the case with his pursuit

of numerous other theorists, Peter Eisenman's fascination with Tafuri was

entirelyself-interested.Eisenmanhas alwayssought "critics"whowould cele-

brate his ownwork andreinforce his ownideas aboutarchitecture.Amazingly,

Eisenman continued to pursue Tafuri ong after his death. In an articlepub-

lished in 2oo0, Eisenmantwisted Tafuri'sarguments,about the autonomyof

history and criticism frompractice,to favor a view of architecture as autono-

mous from everythingelse.9Despite Eisenman's assiduous efforts to entice

him into his phalanx of theorists, Tafuriwas one of the few who consistently

resisted - a fact reflected n his abruptand total break fromEisenmanin 1980.

Nonetheless,OppositionspublishedTafuri's ssays, the work of his colleagues

and students, and Eisenman's Institute for Architectureand Urban Studies

(IAUS) invitedTafuri's olleaguesto visit the Instituteatvariouspoints.'0Tafuri

himself onlyvisited the United States three or four times duringthe 1970S.

In 1974, Tafuripresented a lecture at Princeton University, ater pub-

lished as "L'Architecture ans le Boudoir:The language of criticism and the

criticism of language," n Oppositionl 3.11He outlined the objectives of the

article on the first page, a passage systematicallymisunderstood as a mani-

festo forarchitectsdisenchanted with commodification o retreatto aneutral,

autonomous realm fordesign.Hewrote:

Today,hewho iAwilling to makearchitectureApeakisforcedtorelyon materi-

ala emptyof any and allmeaning:he i forcedto reduce todegreezero all archi-

tectonic ideology,all dreamrof social function and utopian reAidues. n hiA

handa,theelementaof themodernarchitectural raditioncomeAsuddenlyo be

reduced oenigmaticfragments,to mute ignals ofa languagewhose code has

been lost ... [The]puriAmof architectArom the latefifties] iAthat ofAomeone

driven to a deAperate ction that cannot bejuAtifiedexcept rom within itself.

ThewordAof theirvocabulary ... lie perilously on that sloping plane which

separateathe worldof reality rom themagiccircleof language... [Wiewish to

confrontthe languageof criticiam.'2

Inthis essay,andmost of the subsequentones,Tafuri's oncernwas the

role of criticism regardingfourattitudes that he identified in contemporary

architecture:

i. one in whichlanguagewas seen as apurely

technicalneutrality

2. architectureas amanifestation of the dissolution

of language

3. architectureunderstoodas criticism andirony,as well

as aposition which deniedarchitectoniccommunication

in favorof "information"

4. an architecturewhich attemptedto redistributethe

capitalist division of labor.

Withinthe first three categories,Tafuri ncludeddesigns by JamesStir-

ling, AldoRossi, Vittorio De Feo,the NewYorkFive,andVenturiand Rauch,

all of which he believedsuccumbedto one or anotherbrand of emptyformal-

ism. In the fourth,he included the work of RaymondUnwin,ClarenceStein,

CharlesHarrisWhitaker,HenryWright,Fritz Schumacher,Ernst May,andHannesMeyer.'3BycomparisonwithLeCorbusier,LudwigMies van derRohe,

and WalterGropius,none of the latter groupranked in the pantheon of the

greatmodernmovementarchitects. Notsurprisingly,commentatorsonTafuri

then and aterconveniently gnoredthe onlygroupwhoseworkhe advancedas

offeringan importantcontribution to architecturalpractice,although hardly

ablueprintforaction.

What didhe find appealingaboutthese architects?Inthe surveyof twen-

tieth centuryarchitecture,ModernArchitecture,irstpublished n 1976,Tafuri

spelledout the ways in whichUnwin,Whitaker,Schumacher,May,andMeyer

offeredalternatives to sterile exercises on language.14n the FrankfurtSied-

lungen planned by May, or example,Tafuriheld the signal featureto be the

political decision to reject the speculative building practices characteristic



Peter Eisenman, House IV,1971.

both of Haussman's ransformationof Paris and the segregated cities of the

United States in favorof low-costhousing situatedconvenientlynear the work-

place but integrated with nature.'5Perhaps most important, these and the

otherprojectsTafuriadvanced,healed,he claimed,the breachbetween avant-

garde aspirations for a new world and the "realisticpossibilities of a demo-

cratic administration."6Tafuriconsidereddrawbacks o workby these archi-

tects, such as those of Unwin at Letchworth,but he insisted that whatever

its limitations, Unwin's scheme providedlow density, high-qualityarchitec-ture integratedinto the naturalsetting.'7 What madeprojectssuch as Hamp-

stead GardenSuburbpraiseworthywas the architects'struggle to accomplish

realprojectsforthe middle and workingclasses ratherthan high-end,elitist

designs for the wealthy, empty formalgames, or aimless dreams of a better

world n somevague future to be accomplishedwithout effort, conflict, orfail-

ures along the way.At Frankfurt, or example,the Siedlungen expressed the

housing policies of social democratic trade unions, even though ultimately

theywere "neutralizedbythe autonomousdevelopmentof finance andmonop-

oly capital."' The lesson to be learned was not the impossibility of doing

anything,Tafuriargued,but ratherthat reformsneeded to be extended with a

coherentpolitical strategyto the entire complexof institutions, and not only

those involvingarchitectureandbuilding.Putanotherway,eventhough archi-

tecture became instrumental to latecapitalism,this need not be its onlyresult,

nor did this mean that the architect shouldretreat into contemplative games.

Tafurirepeatedthis point numerous times. In a 1976 interviewby Fran-

coise Very,Tafurispoke of "architecturewithout a capital A"as the most

interesting because it does not wallow in its crises and problems; nstead of

talking, it acts.9 Acting, or movement,Tafuri nsisted, mattered more than

results,and the movement hat "tends owardsomething"constitutes the "rec-

titude of all political activity."2It is thereforepuzzling that an astute criticsuch as MichaelHayscould describe Tafuri'sposition as expressingthe "inef-

fectuality of any resistance [to modernism]."2Even worse, FredricJameson

excoriated Tafuri orhis pessimism and for setting up a scandalouspolitical

impasse in his work.22

Given he choice betweena responsibleif not always entirelysuccessful

architecturalpracticeandthe heady avant-gardegames of the New YorkFive

and their progeny,between an architecturewhich Tafuridescribed as explod-

ing outtowardsrealityand an architectureof language games, it is not hard o

figureout which has appealedmore to theorists anddesigners since the 1970s.

Nevermind that Tafuriupbraidedadherentsof the latterapproach or follow-

ing "falsepaths laid out by the enemythat lead into the desert."23t is much

easier to play games with cardboard, itanium, or computergraphicsthan it



42 / GHIRARDO

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Daniel Libeskind, TimeSections, 1979.



MINING AUTONOMY / 43

is to strugglewith nearlyintractableproblemsof affordablehousing orurban

sprawl,energy crises, or any one of a series of majorproblemswhich we con-

fronttoday n the built environment.Thosegamesare also less likelyto offend

the varied interests which comprisethe purveyorsof consumerism,commer-

cialization, and capitalist rationalization(whoalso end up patronizing archi-

tects in one wayoranother)than might more directconfrontations.24

When Peter Eisenman announced the arrival of Post-Functionalism n

1976,he wrote of an architectural form different from what he referred o as

form as a relic of old,humanist theory,a new form which exists in an atempo-

ral, decompositionalmode, as something simplified from some pre-existent

set of non-specific spatial entities. Here, orm s understood as a series of frag-

ments - signs withoutmeaning.2?

Together, hese two formal "tendencies... constitute the essence of this

new,modern dialectic. Theybegin to define the inherent nature of the object

in and of itself and its capacityto be represented."26his position has affini-

ties with Tafuri'sobservations about the "fragmentationof the order of dis-

course," he "silence ofform,""empty igns."27 ven at the time, Tafurispecifi-

callyreferred o Eisenman'sdesigns as emblematic of atendencyto "repossess

... the uniquecharacterof the object by removing t from ts economic and func-

tional contexts... placing it in parentheseswith the flux of objects generated

bythe production system."28n1976,Tafuridescribed he "exasperated ormal-

ism" of Eisenman as producing"sadistic"spaces precisely because "onlyby

rulingout all reasons and demandshaving nothing directly o do with architec-

ture can Eisenman keep his architecturallanguage intact."29 isenman later

echoed Tafuri'swriting when he proposedan architecture for the late twenti-

eth century"asanindependentdiscourse,free of external values - classical or

anyother;that is, the intersection of the meaning-free,the arbitrary,and the

timeless in the artificial,"an architecturewhichconsisted onlyof self-referen-

tial language.3 This echo was just that - a displacedand disembodiedversion

of Tafuri'sposition.

Although t would be convenient to arguethat figures such as Eisenman

andlaterLibeskind ullybelieved that the act ofbuildingwas so compromised

that autonomy was the only defensible position, and that the only way of

advancing a critical position was to stand aloof from the world of practice,

it just wasn't so. Eisenman's indifference to political, economic, and func-

tional considerations is legendaryand longstanding, and expresses nothing

more than an unwillingness to be troubledby such nasty inconveniences. The

remainingmembers of the NewYorkFive did not adoptsuch drastically polem-

ical positions as Eisenman did, and cheerfully built for any multinational

which issued invitations. Thelitany

of clients for whom theapostles

of auton-

omy later built (or wanted to build) alone ought to put to rest any notion

that autonomous architecturerepresentedanything other than a convenient

publicrelations device at a time when clients werescarce,such as duringthe

late1970s. Evenso,Tafuriwas initially more tolerantof the retreat into purity

and empty formalism, for he discerned it to be, at least in some cases, an

expressionof anguish in the face of the totalizing powerof capitalism.31 ut it

did not take long forthis tolerance to evaporatewith regardto Eisenmanand

the so-called Americanavant-garde, nding up only a fewyearslater in an atti-

tude of wryamusement.32Althoughhe penned critiquesof purismand of post-

modernism,Tafurialso reminded his readers that the struggle overpostmod-

ernism was but "awar of words in confrontation with other words,a struggle





MINING AUTONOMY / 45

Aldo Rossi, ArchiftetturaAssassinata, 1974.

alist and deconstructivist architectural theorists aimed to banish. That they

did so by proposingtheir own dogmas of indeterminacy,decenteredness,and

the fetish of discourse is an embarrassmentno one was eager to admit. One

of the thrills of readingthe writings of postmodernist(orpoststructuralist,or

deconstructivist)architectural heorists is the blithe indifference with which

they treat such logical inconsistencies, as we shall see: tb~&,eeplayo signi-

.. havte o-rs t'hie fl oang

heinowerf abelesnot merelyllowinghe irreducibleultiplicims:

The "Tower of Babel" doeA not merely figure the irreducible multiplicity of

tongues; it exhibitS an incompletion, the impouibility of finishing, of totaliz-

ing, of saturating, of completing something on the order of edification, archi-

tectural conrtruction, system and architectonics.38

Followingup on this, in 1988, MarkWigley rejectedthe notion of "ground-

as-support" nd followedDerrida'snotion that the structure(of architecture)

stands not on the groundbut on an abyss:

Deconstruction leads to a complete rethinking of the supplemental relation-

ship organized by the architectural motif of ground/structure/ornament... The

edifice is erectedby concealing the abyAson which it,stands. Thisrepression

produces the appearance of solid ground.39

Andlater,in speaking of ornament as a "violationof structure,"and architec-

ture as the possibility of building,Wigleycelebrated he indeterminacywhich

deconstruction madepossible in architecture:

Such a gesture does not constitute a method, a critique,an analysis, or a

source of legitimization. It is not atrategic. It has no prescribed aim. Which ib

not to say that it is aimles. It moves very precisely, but not to some end. It is

not a project.40

Or,as JeffreyKipnis put it, deconstructionofferedwhat he called "motifs" or

architecturaldesign:

Do notdestroy;maintain,renew,and reinscribe.Do battle with thevery meaning

ofarchitecturalmeaningwithoutproposinga new order .. [to]destabilizemean-

ing.Todestabilizemeaningdoes notimplyprogressionowardanynew andstable

end,and thus can neithermean to endmeaningnor tochangemeaning.4"

Many of the deconstruction texts of the late i98os and early199os were

enshrined in tomes on architecturaltheory.Abandonedby practitioners like

Libeskindand Eisenman once they startedto obtaincommissions,andbythe-

orists because it soon becamethoroughlyunfashionable,deconstruction and

the texts that celebrated t still gatherdust. After all,none of these theorists

- globe-trottingtravelersall - wants to travel with a decenteredsubject who

is a pilot and for whom reality is only a discourse and a crash nothing but

an arrayof free-floating signifiers. Did manyof the architecturaltheorists

fully graspthe dimensions of the poststructuralistanddeconstructivisttheo-

ries they wholeheartedlyembraced?BernardTschumiunwittinglyrevealed a

certain haziness about some fundamentals of deconstruction in 1988, when

somebody evidently forgot to tell him that in the deconstructivist era, sys-

tems were out:"disjunctionbecomes a systematicandtheoretical tool for the

makingof architecture."42

Despite the embrace of the end of the classical, the end of mean-

ing, the end of history, the dissolution of representation,and so forth, the

ig8os-era theorists resorted to didactic pronouncementsas rigid andtotaliz-

ing as the meta-narrativeshatthey supposedlywerebesieging, andtheyoften

trumped he adversarywhen it cameto grandiosityof scope. Onegood exam-pleof this - what wemightcall an "a-formalormalism"- is that of Daniel Libe-

skind, from his suite of drawings,ChamberWorks:

Architecture s neither onthe in,sidenor theoutside.It is not a givennor a phy?s-

icalfact. It has no History and it does notfollow Fate. Whatemergesin dif-

ferentiatedexperiencea Architectureas an index of therelationshipbetween

what was and what will be.Architectureas non-existent reality is a Aymbol

which in the process of consrciousness leaves a trail of hieroglyphAn space

and time that touchequivalentdepths of Unoriginality.43

Whatdynamicstriggeredthree decades of theoretical delirium n whichpoeti-

cizing reflectionpassed fortheory,and whatdoes it all have todo with Tafuri?

Certainlywith the economicexpansionof the i98os notions that buildingwas

impossibleand that the only optionwas politicalaction becameprogressively

less attractive to architects,especially academicones, who eventuallyfound

commissions in the economic climate of the g99os.But it was also preciselythis group hat hankered or intellectual fortification,so abracingdose of suit-

ablyenigmatic European heory was just the ticket. Theproblemwas, which

one?Addressingthis query set the stage for the spectacle of thirty years of

trying on and discarding borrowed heories with the rapidityof a commodi-

fied consumerat an outlet sale. Much of Tafuri'sbodyof theory ended up in

thepile of discardedgarments, especiallywhen he called forarchitecture o be

politicallyengaged.Whatremained were Tafuri'sreferences to "nosalvation

possible,"an architecture "emptyof any and all meaning,"and the claim

that Tafuri had sounded the death of architecture - but these hung on as

handy excuses for engaging only in work on the language of architecture,

empty formalism. An otherwise assured historian, JoanOckman stumbled

over Tafuri'sviews on architecturallaborby reading him through the rosy

spectacles of Eisenman.44Refractedthrough Eisenman'sdistorted lens, in



Ockman'saccount, Tafuri ends by preferringthe purism of the New York

Fiveto engaged work. Yetas early as 1976, Tafuri dismissed architecture as

miserable when it preenswithmaximumpomp;he professedmuch more inter-

est in architecturewith a small "a," nd as examples offered the cooperative

building programsof communist-governed taliancities whichgatheredwork-

ers together with builders but harbored no illusions about "resolving" he

housing problem.45Her description of Tafuri'sview of "historyas tragedy"

is worth counteringwith Massimo Cacciari'sobservation in his eulogy that

Tafuritaught the most difficult lesson: the art of disenchantment together

with hope and faith.4

Tafuriwas not outlining an agenda for a new architecturalproduction

disengaged frompolitical reality.On the contrary, t was to the critic andthe

historian that he addressedhis remarksas an approach o the criticism and

history of architecture.Of the work of the NewYorkFive,for example,Tafuritellingly commented:"In he face of such products,the task of criticismis to

begin from withinthe workonlyto escape from it as soon as possible so as not

to be caught in the vicious circle of a languagethat speaks onlyof itself."

The task of the critic and that of the historian are different ones:

Thus we abandon the objectitself and move into the ysAtemwhich, in itself,

gives meaning.And criticism therebyexplicitly moves its inquest from aspe-

cific taAk to the structure that conditions the total meaning of the object...

Theroleof criticismia theviolation of the object n queAtion.47

But if architecturedemandsengagementwith political, social, andeconomic

systems and institutions, criticism requiresdistance, Tafuriinsisted, some-

thing in short supply today.The closeness of theorists and architects who

mutually celebrate one another, cite one another, invite one another to con-

ferences, write books and publish articles about one another,and hire one

another, is almost incestuous, and certainly leaves no space for debate, let

alone the distance that Tafurideemed essential for the practiceof bothhistory

and of criticism. Indeed, n 1986, Tafuriarguedthat thereis no criticism,only

history,a historynot of objects,but of men,in which the challengeis to under-

stand how a workof architecture fits into its own time. The historian examin-

ing currentwork,he held,must create an artificial distance.48nstead,what we

havetodayin architectural heoryis a morerobustly-structuredersionof the

verysystemTafurichallenged,a systemthat gives meaningto and fetishisizes

architecturalobjects,and which endows its practitionerswith the status and

rewards ypicalof a well-oiledcomponentof capitalist rationality.Inshort,we

have a system of theory productionand architecturalproductionbytheorist/

practitioners that is complicit with the commodificationof capitalist hege-

monyTafuriexplicitlycriticized- and against which most of these theorists

and practitionershave repeatedlyrailed.Althoughpresentedas autonomous,

independentof politics and economics, this work was directlyinstrumental,

and that was the problem: he denial of instrumentalitybyveiling the work as

autonomousas muchasthe fact of instrumentality.That s, to assertthat archi-

tecture is autonomousand thereforenot instrumental to politicalends covers

the fact that architecture s deeplyimbricated n politics, and that is just as

much aproblemas specificcases of instrumenality.As Tafuriastutelyobserved

in 1980, these experimentsin private anguages reveal aboveall the desireto

remainon the stage ever moregrotesquelymimingin aneffort to entertain."49

MarkWigleyobserved hatdespitethe powerandsignificanceofTafuri's

bombshells on history, theory and practice,there has been little sustained

dialogue generatedby his work. In the United States, his views were subdi-

vided"into ittle tasteless pieces forconsumptionby theAngloSaxons. Little

has been added to his master'svoice beyond a series of useful footnotes."50

Instead,Wigleyclaims that Tafuri's mpactregisters elsewhere: "... research

not directly nfluencedbyTafuriand which makesonlyoccasionalreferences o

his writingmightactuallybe the mostdisruptiveegacyof his work."51

Eventhough Tafuricalled for a separationof history and criticism from

practice, Wigley claims that "new forms of research"have one foot on each

side of the gap, "testing ts limits without eversimplybridging t, scrutinizing

its contours closely - "52 WhatWigleycalls a "non-prescriptiveArchitectural

Theory"challenges "the discourse" n new ways. "Tafuri,"e says, "won'tgo

away.His threatlives on in writingthat he wouldno doubt have hated."Wigley

is probablycorrect on that count,but not for the reasons he imagines.Tafuriwould have loathed the slick repetition of the celebratory exts, the absence

of rigorous scholarship, andthe construction of a theory-criticismestablish-

ment;he would have dismissed most of it as empty language games on a par

with much of architecturalpractice.

Havingreplacedanolderregime, his systemoftheory/practicetself now

needs to bedismantled,or, o reframean observation romModernArchitecture,

whatpossibilitiesareopento adisciplinesuch as architecture hatis asyetinca-

pableof posingto itself theproblemof its ownplace n thepoliticalarena?53



NOTES

1 ManfredoTafuri,Architecture and Utopia. Design and Capital- 15 Ibid.,p.181.

ist Development (Cambridge MA: MITPress 1976,translation 16 Ibid

of Progetto e Utopia (Bari: Laterza, 1973),p.181.17 Ibid., p.38.

2 See, for example, the introductions toTafuri's essays pub-

lished in Oppositions 3 (May 1974);Oppositions 5 (Summer 18 Ibid. p.183.

1976), Oppositions 11 (Winter 1977), Oppositions 17(Summer 19 FrancoiseV(

1979); Peter Eisenman, "TheWicked Critic,"ANY 25-26, (2000), tecture, Moo

66-70, and indeed, many of the articles in that publication. 20 Ibid t20 Ibid., p.67,tr

3 In this essay Iuse the existing English translations of Tafuri's21 K.Michael

work because this is how most Americans were introduced

to it; Ionly offer my own translations where it is less signifi- 22 FredricJam

cant for the history of the misrepresentations. in J. Ockmar

4 Yve-Alain Bois, review of Theories and History of Architecture, eton: Prince

in Oppositions 11 (Winter 1977), p.118-123. Bois berated Politics of T

Tafuri for not having "paidmore attention to architectural Debate," Ne

form" (p.119)and for being "incap[able of] render[ing] 23 Ibid.,p.312.

account of a building,"a taskTafuri acquitted perfectly well 24 Forafuller

in a very different type of book, ModernArchitecture, but Architectunwhich was certainly not called for in Theories and Histories.

25 Peter Eisenr5 ManfredoTafuri, Teoriee storia dell' architettura (Bari: Lat- 1976), now i

erza, 1968), p.129-130.26 Ibid.,p.12.

6 Tafuri,Architecture and Utopia, p. x.27 Tafuri,"L'Ar

7 Ibid.,p.xi, 181,182.28 Ibid.,p.307.

8 Richard Ingersoll, interview with ManfredoTafuri, "There

is no criticism, only history," Design Book Review(Spring 29 Tafuriand D

1986), p.8-11. 30 Peter Eisenr

9 Peter Eisenman, "The Wicked Critic,"ANY25-26 (2000), p.70. the Beginnir

Eisenman projected his own need for surrogates ontoTafuri, p.154-172, n

holding that Piranesi became a surrogate forTafuri. Eisen- 1968(Cambr

man also wrote: "Thedissolution of form and the void of the cited is on p

signifiers become the negative in itself. The construction 31 Tafuri,Archi

of a utopia of dissolved form becomes the recuperation Jefferson," pof the negative. In Piranesi's 'discovery' ofTafuri, architec-

32 "Entretien,"ture is nothing more than a sign and an arbitraryconstruc-

tion."Inthis Eisenman completely ignoresTafuri's own ideas 33 Tafuri,"The

about his critical enterprise, including being an analyst of 34 bd., p.300

the events of history rather than a seeker of surrogates or

puppets into whose mouths words could be placed. 35 Tafuri and D

10 Among the colleagues invited to and published by the 36 Hal Foster,"

IAUS were GiorgioCiucci, Francesco Dal Co, Franco Rella, p.145-153; B

GeorgesTeyssot, and Massimo Cacciari. Studio Interr

ed. Architec11 ManfredoTafuri, "L'Architecturedans le Boudoir:The lan- of a labyrint

guage of criticism and the criticism of language," Opposi- "architecturetions 3 (May 1974), now in M. Hays, ed. Oppositions Reader

(NewYork:Princeton Architectural Press, 1998), p.291-316. 37 In histext "1

Although the number was dated 1974, Oppositions was 1979),Tafuri

famously one to two years behind the publication date. In Derrida,Jac

1987,Tafurimassively transformed this essay for publication to English rein an edited volume of his essays, TheSphere and the Laby- of the New

rinth: Avant-Gardes andArchitecture from Piranesi to the of Jefferson

1970s, trans. Pellegrino d'Acierno and Robert Connolly (Cam- e architettur,

bridge MA:MITPress, 1987), p. 267-290. Iquote from the text and translat

as it was when it influenced theorists during the 1970s and p.291-303.

most of the 1980s. 38 Jacques Der

12 Ibid.,p. 292. Graham,ed.

nell Univers13 Ibid.,p. 310.

39 MarkWigley14 ManfredoTafuriand Francesco Dal Co, ModernArchitecture, tion of Babe

trans. Robert ErichWolf (New York:HarryN. Abrams, Inc., p.661-75; th

1979), originally published by Electa in Milan in 1976 under

the title Architettura Contemporanea. Because the authors 40 Ibid., .671.

singled out the chapters which each wrote independently, it 41 Jeffrey Kipnis possible to single outTafuri's views; here Irefer only to (April1991),

chapters Tafuri claimed as his own. p.710-742.

ery,"Entretienavec ManfredoTafuri,"AMC, Archi-

uvement Continuite 39 (June 1976), p.64-68.

ranslations mine.

lays, "Tafuri'sGhost,"ANY25-26 (2000), p. 38.

eson, "Architecture and the Critique of Ideology,"

n et al,, Architecture/Criticism/ldeology (Princ-

atonArchitectural Press, 1985); Jameson, "The

heory: Ideological Positions in the Post-modern

;wGerman Critique33 (Fall1984), p.53-65.

discussion of this point, see my article, "The

e of Deceit," Perspecta 21 (1984), p.110-115

nan, "Post-Functionalism," Oppositions 6 (Fall

nOppositions Reader, p.12.

chitecture dans le Boudoir,"p.296,299, 300.

al Co, ModernArchitecture, p.409.

nan, "TheEndof the Classical: The End of

ng,the End of the End,"Perspecta 21 (1984),

ow in M. Hays, ed. Architecture TheorySince

idge MA:MITPress, 1998), p.522-538;the text

. 530.

tecture and Utopia, p.ix;see also "TheAshes of

p.302.

).65.

Ashes of Jefferson," p.301.

al Co, ModernArchitecture, p.410.

'(Post)Modern Polemics," Perspecta 21 (1984),

ernard Tschumi, "The Architectural Paradox,"

national(September-October 1975), now in Hays,

ture TheorySince 1968,p.218-228.Tschumi writes

hfrom which it is impossible to escape, and of an

[that] can never be."

The Historical Project,"' Oppositions 17(Summer

had already introduced the theories of Jacques

:ques Lacan,Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari

eaders, and his critique of the language gamesYork ivewere articulated again in "The Ashes

," n Italian in Lasfera e il labirinto:Avanguardia

a da Piranesi agli anni '70(Turin:Einaudi1980)

ed into English in TheSphere and the Labyrinth,

rrida,"DesTours de Babel,"trans. Joseph F.

. J. Graham, Difference in Translation(Ithaca: Cor-

ity Press, 1985), p.165, cited byWigley, p.672.

y,"TheTranslation of Architecture, the Produc-

I," n Hays, Architecture Theorysince 1968,

hequote is from p.670.

is, "Twistingthe Separatrix," Assemblage 14

now in Hays, Architecture Theorysince 1968,

42 Bernard schumi,"NotesTowards Theory f Architectural

Disjunction,"Architecture and Urbanism 216 (September

1988),p.13-15,now nKateNesbitt, d. TheorizingNew

Agenda forArchitecture:An Anthology of ArchitecturalTheory

1965-1995NewYork: rincetonArchitectural ress,1996),

p.170-172.

43 Daniel Libeskind,Chamber Works:Architectural Meditations

on Themes from Heraclitus (London:Architectural Associa-

tion,1983).

44 JoanOckman, Venice ndNewYork,"asabella 19-620

(January-February995), .57-71.

45 "Entretien,".67.As evidence orTafuri'sreferenceor he

work f the NewYorkFive,Ockman ites Taf ri's omment

from Architecture and Utopia, an essay written before he

hadanycontactwithorknowledge bout hisgroup.

46 Ockman'somment s in"Venice nd NewYork,".64;Cac-

ciari's s from he eulogy"Quidum"deliverednVeniceon

25February994, xerpted nCasabella19-620,p.168.

47 Tafuri, L'Architectureans e Boudoir,".307.

48 Ingersoll, Theres nocriticism, nlyhistory," .8-11.

49 Tafuri, a ferae il labirintoTurin:Einaudi,980), 68-9,

translationmine.

50 MarkWigley, Post-Operativeistory," NY 5-16 2000),

p.47-53;he quotations fromp.53.

51 Ibid.

52 Ibid.

53 Tafuri and Dal Co, ModernArchitecture, p. 40.

Documents

GHIRARDO 2000-Tafuri Arch Theory US 1970-2000