Postmodernisms in Architecture

Charles Jencks
The Language of Postmodern Architecture - Book that described the beginning of postmodern aesthetics, but did not address the whole of architectural styles including the persistence of modernism.

postmodernism was centered on the united states.

Three major postmodern buildings


 * AT&T Building, NY - Philip Johnson
 * Piazza d'Italia, New Orleans
 * Portland Building, Portland, Oregon

'''Bonaventura Hotel - John Portman - Los Angeles

Much discussed by cultural theorists Jean Baudrillard and Fredric Jameson

Postmodernism

Definitions supplied by


 * Jencks
 * Jameson
 * Juergen Habermas
 * Lyotard

Staatsgalerie
Stuttgart, Germany - 1977-83 - James Stirling'''

Criticized by contemporary German architects as fascists (because of the stone)

Representational and abstract, monumetal and intimate -> tries to reconcile opposed terms

building lacks a facade "leans back and fades away"

Incorporates a public pathway that flows through the facade/roof of the building

Joke: stones falling out of the front wall, challenge you to think it's broken, falling, not working

walkways that have vibrantly colored hand rails

"punk architecture" -> high tech meets neoclassicism

rotunda spac: seems to focus the viewer/walker towards the center of the rotunda, towards a focal point -> but there is nothing there, no focus (is postmodernism without a focus?) or does the absence of a focus challenge the individual to construct a meaning/focus.

classical, egyptian, victorian elements included in the rotunda.

Stirling alludes and is inspired by the Berlin

Altes Museum
1823-28 K.F. Schinkel
 * The Altes Museum was the first custom built museum in history
 * Rotunda space with greek sculpture -> tactic employed in Staatgalerie
 * Building lacks a facade "no fear of thresholds"

Rich set of references

Colin Amery (critic) dislikes the color -> believes that Stirling has bad color sense

Stirling defends it as reflecting purpose of the building as a place that would not be like a stone quarry but instead a living place to view contemporary art.

Ricardo Bofil
Very strong and powerful architecture

First big project: St. Quentin-en-Yvelines

Constructed cheaply, so not a pleasant building

Palace of Abraxas -> also designed for public housing

References to classical architectural elements -> constructed at grand scale in concrete.

Montpelier, France, Housing Development

Reference to the floorplan of St. Peter's.

high, extended cornices

Frankfurst, German Architecture Museum

Centered on a pure, clean idealization of the house

Contains the records of the postmodern architects: Venturi, Moore, Stirling,

Aldo Rossi
Denied being a postmodernist

Built what he continued to be "eternal forms"

Built a major cemetary ->

Aspired to timelessness

Built a floating theater for the Venice Biennale.

"Tried to make architecture in an honest way."