THE AUTONOMY PROJECT - tafuri. because architecture is critically impotent in the face of advanced capitalism, tafuri ultimately wants to affirm history’s autonomy and

THE CRISIS OF MODERNISM:THE AUTONOMY PROJECT

THE DAY MODERNISM DIED: MARCH 16TH, 1972 @ 3:00PM

AN OBSESSION WITH FORM AND LANGUAGE...

AN OBSESSION WITH FORM AND LANGUAGE...OR SOCIO-PSYCHO DESIRE?

AUTONOMY:

AUTONOMY:

+ THE STATE OF EXISTING OR ACTING SEPARATELY FROM OTHERS

+ THE POWER OR RIGHT OF A COUNTRY, GROUP, ETC., TO GOVERN ITSELF

K. MICHAEL HAYS

One should not ask whether architecture is autonomous, or whether it can willfully be made so, but rather how it can be that the question arises in the rst place, what kind of situation allows for architecture to worry about itself to this degree.

1966

VS

U.S EUROPEROBERT VENTURICAPITALISM

CONTINGENT IMAGESYMBOLISMPOP ART

LONDON/CAMBRIDGEPHILADELPHIAYALE/PENNPRAGMATICINCLUSIVE

NEO-REALISM

ALDO ROSSISOCIALISMIDEAL TYPEESSENCE

CONCEPTUAL ARTMILAN/VENICENEW YORK CITY

COLUMBIA/PRINCETONCRITICALEXCLUSIVE

NEO-RATIONALISM

VS

ROBERT VENTURI

I like complexity and contradiction in architecture - not the incoherence or arbitrariness of incompetent architecture and not the precious intricacies of picturesqueness. I speak of a wider and solider matter: a kind of complexity and contradiction based on the need to consider the richness of experience within the limitations of the medium.

ROBERT VENTURI

I like complexity and contradiction in architecture - not the incoherence or arbitrariness of incompetent architecture and not the precious intricacies of picturesqueness. I speak of a wider and solider matter: a kind of complexity and contradiction based on the need to consider the richness of experience within the limitations of the medium.

I am not intimidated by the puritanical, moral language of modern architecture. I like forms that are impure rather than pure, compromising rather than clean, distorted rather than straightforward, ambiguous rather than articulated, allusive rather than simple, perverse rather than impersonal, accommodating rather than excluding.

ROBERT VENTURI

I like complexity and contradiction in architecture - not the incoherence or arbitrariness of incompetent architecture and not the precious intricacies of picturesqueness. I speak of a wider and solider matter: a kind of complexity and contradiction based on the need to consider the richness of experience within the limitations of the medium.

I am not intimidated by the puritanical, moral language of modern architecture. I like forms that are impure rather than pure, compromising rather than clean, distorted rather than straightforward, ambiguous rather than articulated, allusive rather than simple, perverse rather than impersonal, accommodating rather than excluding.

I prefer both-and to either-or, black and white, and sometimes gray, to black or white.

ROBERT VENTURI

I like complexity and contradiction in architecture - not the incoherence or arbitrariness of incompetent architecture and not the precious intricacies of picturesqueness. I speak of a wider and solider matter: a kind of complexity and contradiction based on the need to consider the richness of experience within the limitations of the medium.

I am not intimidated by the puritanical, moral language of modern architecture. I like forms that are impure rather than pure, compromising rather than clean, distorted rather than straightforward, ambiguous rather than articulated, allusive rather than simple, perverse rather than impersonal, accommodating rather than excluding.

I prefer both-and to either-or, black and white, and sometimes gray, to black or white.

A valid architecture evokes many levels of meaning; its space and its elements become readable and workable in several ways at once.

LESS IS A BORE

ROBERT VENTURI

Mies makes wonderful buildings only because he ignores many aspects of a building. If he solved more problems, his buildings would be far less potent.

ROBERT VENTURI

Mies makes wonderful buildings only because he ignores many aspects of a building. If he solved more problems, his buildings would be far less potent.

e doctrine less is more bemoans complexity and justies exclusion for expressive purposes....he [the architect] can exclude important problems only at the risk of separating his architecture from the experience of life and the needs of society.

DYNAMISM OF A CYCLIST 1913

ROBERT VENTURI

Mies makes wonderful buildings only because he ignores many aspects of a building. If he solved more problems, his buildings would be far less potent.

e doctrine less is more bemoans complexity and justies exclusion for expressive purposes....he [the architect] can exclude important problems only at the risk of separating his architecture from the experience of life and the needs of society.

Blatant simplication means bland architecture.

COMPLEXITY AND CONTRADICTION CRITIQUES MODERNISMS FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION.

COMPLEXITY AND CONTRADICTION CRITIQUES MODERNISMS FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION.

COMPLEXITY AND CONTRADICTION CRITIQUES MODERNISMSOBSESSION WITH FLOWING SPACE.

COMPLEXITY AND CONTRADICTION CRITIQUES MODERNISMS FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION.

COMPLEXITY AND CONTRADICTION CRITIQUES MODERNISMSOBSESSION WITH FLOWING SPACE.

COMPLEXITY AND CONTRADICTION ARTICULATES DIFFERENCEAND SEPARATION (BETWEEN INSIDE AND OUTSIDE) ON THE FACADE.

RATHER THAN PROJECT ITS SOCIAL, MORAL, AND POLITICAL PROGRAMS OUTWARD, SUCH AN ARCHITECTURE ABSORBS AND SUBSUMES SOCIO-CULTURAL DIFFERENCE INTO ITS DISCIPLINARY CODES (HISTORY) AND MODES OF OPERATION ONLY TO PROJECT IT BACK SYMBOLICALLY AS IMAGE.

ALDO ROSSI

SEEKS THE FIXED LAWS OF A TIMELESS TYPOLOGY (PARTICULARLY WITHIN THE EUROPEAN CITY).

ALDO ROSSI

SEEKS THE FIXED LAWS OF A TIMELESS TYPOLOGY (PARTICULARLY WITHIN THE EUROPEAN CITY).

DEFINES THE (EUROPEAN) CITY BY ITS ARCHITECTONIC ELEMENTS OR CULTURAL PHYSIOGNOMY.

ALDO ROSSI

SEEKS THE FIXED LAWS OF A TIMELESS TYPOLOGY (PARTICULARLY WITHIN THE EUROPEAN CITY).

DEFINES THE (EUROPEAN) CITY BY ITS ARCHITECTONIC ELEMENTS OR CULTURAL PHYSIOGNOMY.

CRITICAL TERMS THAT ENDOW THE CITY WITH ITS COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS INCLUDE:ARTIFACTS, PERMANENCES, MONUMENTS, MEMORY,AND LOCUS.

ALDO ROSSI

SEEKS THE FIXED LAWS OF A TIMELESS TYPOLOGY (PARTICULARLY WITHIN THE EUROPEAN CITY).

DEFINES THE (EUROPEAN) CITY BY ITS ARCHITECTONIC ELEMENTS OR CULTURAL PHYSIOGNOMY.

CRITICAL TERMS THAT ENDOW THE CITY WITH ITS COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS INCLUDE:ARTIFACTS, PERMANENCES, MONUMENTS, MEMORY,AND LOCUS.

ARGUES THAT ARCHITECTURAL TYPOLOGIES RESIST THE NAIVE FUNCTIONALISM OF MODERNISM AND HENCE ITS TENDENCY TOREDUCE ARCHITECTURE TO PROGRAM ANDCIRCULATION IN ITS QUEST FOR COMMER-CIALIZATION AND PROFIT.

ALDO ROSSI

SEEKS THE FIXED LAWS OF A TIMELESS TYPOLOGY (PARTICULARLY WITHIN THE EUROPEAN CITY).

DEFINES THE (EUROPEAN) CITY BY ITS ARCHITECTONIC ELEMENTS OR CULTURAL PHYSIOGNOMY.

CRITICAL TERMS THAT ENDOW THE CITY WITH ITS COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS INCLUDE:ARTIFACTS, PERMANENCES, MONUMENTS, MEMORY,AND LOCUS.

ARGUES THAT ARCHITECTURAL TYPOLOGIES RESIST THE NAIVE FUNCTIONALISM OF MODERNISM AND HENCE ITS TENDENCY TOREDUCE ARCHITECTURE TO PROGRAM ANDCIRCULATION IN ITS QUEST FOR COMMER-CIALIZATION AND PROFIT.

ARCHITECTURAL TYPOLOGIES ARE LATENTWITH (DISCIPLINARY) HISTORIES THAT ORIGINATE AND OPERATE OUTSIDE OF ANYPARTICULAR CIRCUMSTANCE.

MANFREDO TAFURI

MANFREDO TAFURI

DRAWS A PARALLEL BETWEEN THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN THE 1920S AND CONTEMPORARY THOUGHT.

MANFREDO TAFURI

CRITICIZES THE HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURAL CRITICISM ITSELF FOR BEING OPERATIVE.

MANFREDO TAFURI

OPERATIVE CRITICISM MISREADS THE PAST THROUGH THE IDEOLOGICAL BIASES OF THE PRESENT.

MANFREDO TAFURI

IDEOLOGY - IN MARXIST TERMS - SIGNIFIES THE FALSE CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE BOURGEOISIE THAT PREVENTS THE PROLETARIAT FROM ATTAINING A TRUE CONSCIOUSNESSOF HIS/HER REVOLUTIONARY POTENTIAL.

MANFREDO TAFURI

IDEOLOGY - IN MARXIST TERMS - SIGNIFIES THE FALSE CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE BOURGEOISIE THAT PREVENTS THE PROLETARIAT FROM ATTAINING A TRUE CONSCIOUSNESSOF HIS/HER REVOLUTIONARY POTENTIAL.

MANFREDO TAFURI

BECAUSE ARCHITECTURE IS CRITICALLY IMPOTENT IN THE FACE OF ADVANCED CAPITALISM, TAFURI ULTIMATELY WANTS TO AFFIRM HISTORYS AUTONOMY AND THEORETICAL SEPARATION FROM CON-TEMPORARY PRACTICE.

MANFREDO TAFURI

ALDO ROSSI MANFREDO TAFURI

+

AUTONOMOUS TYPETIMELESS PERMANENCES

AUTONOMOUS HISTORYIDEOLOGICAL CRITIQUE

=

ARCHITECTURE AS A THEORETICAL PROJECT; AS FORMALLY AND THEORETICALLY RESISTANCE TO CAPITALISM

AN OBSESSION WITH THE FAILURES OF MODERNISM

A NEW AVANT-GARDE THAT SHARED THE HISTORIC ONES FORMAL CHARACTERISTICS BUT NOT ITS POLITICAL AGENDAS

THE WHITES VS. THE GRAYS

PETER EISENMAN MICHAEL GRAVES

PETER EISENMAN MICHAEL GRAVES

FOUNDED THE CONFERENCE OF ARCHITECTS FOR THE STUDY OF THE ENVIRONMENT [CASE] IN 1964.

PETER EISENMAN

FOUNDED THE INSTITUTE OF ARCHITECTURE AND URBAN STUDIES [IAUS] IN 1967.

NEW YORK FIVE (THE WHITES)

1 2

53 4

1.PETER EISENMAN2.MICHAEL GRAVES3.CHARLES GWATHMEY4.JOHN HEDDIERICHARD MEIER

PETER EISENMAN

PETER EISENMAN

CASA DEL FACSIO, GUISEPPE TERRAGNI (1936)