Deconstructivism is a movement of
postmodern architecture which appeared in the 1980s. It gives the impression of the fragmentation of the constructed building, commonly characterised by an absence of obvious harmony, continuity, or symmetry. Its name is a portmanteau of
Constructivism
Constructivism may refer to:
Art and architecture
* Constructivism (art), an early 20th-century artistic movement that extols art as a practice for social purposes
* Constructivist architecture, an architectural movement in Russia in the 1920s a ...
and "
Deconstruction", a form of
semiotic analysis developed by the French philosopher
Jacques Derrida. Architects whose work is often described as deconstructivist (though in many cases the architects themselves reject the label) include
Zaha Hadid
Dame Zaha Mohammad Hadid ( ar, زها حديد ''Zahā Ḥadīd''; 31 October 1950 – 31 March 2016) was an Iraqi-British architect, artist and designer, recognised as a major figure in architecture of the late 20th and early 21st centu ...
,
Peter Eisenman,
Frank Gehry,
Rem Koolhaas,
Daniel Libeskind,
Bernard Tschumi
Bernard Tschumi (born 25 January 1944 in Lausanne, Switzerland) is an architect, writer, and educator, commonly associated with deconstructivism. Son of the well-known Swiss architect Jean Tschumi and a French mother, Tschumi is a dual French- ...
, and
Coop Himmelb(l)au
Coop Himmelb(l)au (A pun meaning ''Coop Sky Building'' and ''Coop Sky Blue'') is an architecture, urban planning, design, and art firm founded by Wolf D. Prix, Helmut Swiczinsky, and Michael Holzer in Vienna, Austria in 1968.
History
Coop Him ...
.
The term does not inherently refer to the style's ''deconstructed'' visuals as the English adjective suggests, but instead derives from the movement's foundations in contrast to the Russian Constructivist movement during the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
that "broke the rules" of classical architecture through the French language.
Besides fragmentation, deconstructivism often manipulates the structure's surface skin and deploys non-
rectilinear shapes which appear to distort and dislocate
established elements of architecture. The finished visual appearance is characterized by unpredictability and controlled chaos.
History, context and influences
Deconstructivism came to public notice with the 1982
Parc de la Villette
The Parc de la Villette is the third-largest park in Paris, in area, located at the northeastern edge of the city in the 19th arrondissement. The park houses one of the largest concentrations of cultural venues in Paris, including the Cité de ...
architectural design competition
An architectural design competition is a type of design competition in which an organization that intends on constructing a new building invites architects to submit design proposals. The winning design is usually chosen by an independent panel ...
, in particular the entry from
Jacques Derrida and
Peter Eisenman and the winning entry by
Bernard Tschumi
Bernard Tschumi (born 25 January 1944 in Lausanne, Switzerland) is an architect, writer, and educator, commonly associated with deconstructivism. Son of the well-known Swiss architect Jean Tschumi and a French mother, Tschumi is a dual French- ...
, as well as the
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
’s 1988 ''Deconstructivist Architecture'' exhibition in New York, organized by
Philip Johnson
Philip Cortelyou Johnson (July 8, 1906 – January 25, 2005) was an American architect best known for his works of modern and postmodern architecture. Among his best-known designs are his modernist Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut; the po ...
and
Mark Wigley
Mark Antony Wigley (born 1956) is a New Zealand-born architect and author based in the United States. From 2004 to 2014, he was the Dean of Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.
Career
Wigley receive ...
. Tschumi stated that calling the work of these architects a "movement" or a new "style" was out of context and showed a lack of understanding of their ideas, and believed that Deconstructivism was simply a move against the practice of
PoMo
The Pomo are an Indigenous people of California. Historical Pomo territory in Northern California was large, bordered by the Pacific Coast to the west, extending inland to Clear Lake, and mainly between Cleone and Duncans Point. One small ...
, which he said involved "making Doric temple forms out of plywood".
Other influential exhibitions include the 1989 opening of the
Wexner Center for the Arts
The Wexner Center for the Arts is the Ohio State University's "multidisciplinary, international laboratory for the exploration and advancement of contemporary art". The Wexner Center opened in November 1989, named in honor of the father of Limite ...
in
Columbus
Columbus is a Latinized version of the Italian surname "''Colombo''". It most commonly refers to:
* Christopher Columbus (1451-1506), the Italian explorer
* Columbus, Ohio, capital of the U.S. state of Ohio
Columbus may also refer to:
Places ...
, designed by Peter Eisenman. The New York exhibition has featured works by
Frank Gehry,
Daniel Libeskind,
Rem Koolhaas,
Peter Eisenman,
Zaha Hadid
Dame Zaha Mohammad Hadid ( ar, زها حديد ''Zahā Ḥadīd''; 31 October 1950 – 31 March 2016) was an Iraqi-British architect, artist and designer, recognised as a major figure in architecture of the late 20th and early 21st centu ...
,
Coop Himmelb(l)au
Coop Himmelb(l)au (A pun meaning ''Coop Sky Building'' and ''Coop Sky Blue'') is an architecture, urban planning, design, and art firm founded by Wolf D. Prix, Helmut Swiczinsky, and Michael Holzer in Vienna, Austria in 1968.
History
Coop Him ...
, and
Bernard Tschumi
Bernard Tschumi (born 25 January 1944 in Lausanne, Switzerland) is an architect, writer, and educator, commonly associated with deconstructivism. Son of the well-known Swiss architect Jean Tschumi and a French mother, Tschumi is a dual French- ...
. Since their exhibitions, some architects associated with Deconstructivism have distanced themselves from it; nonetheless, the term has stuck and has come to embrace a general trend within
Contemporary architecture
Contemporary architecture is the architecture of the 21st century. No single style is dominant. Contemporary architects work in several different styles, from postmodernism, high-tech architecture and new interpretations of traditional architec ...
.
Modernism and postmodernism
![Seattle Central Library, Seattle, Washington - 20060418](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Seattle_Central_Library%2C_Seattle%2C_Washington_-_20060418.jpg)
The term ''Deconstructivism'' in contemporary architecture is opposed to the ordered rationality of
Modernism
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
and
Postmodernism. Though postmodernist and nascent deconstructivist architects both published in the journal ''
Oppositions
''Oppositions'' was an architectural journal produced by the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies from 1973 to 1984. Many of its articles contributed to advancing architectural theory and many of its contributors became distinguished practi ...
'' (published between 1973 and 1984), that journal's contents mark a decisive break between the two movements. Deconstructivism took a confrontational stance to
architectural history
The history of architecture traces the changes in architecture through various traditions, regions, overarching stylistic trends, and dates. The beginnings of all these traditions is thought to be humans satisfying the very basic need of shelt ...
, wanting to "disassemble" architecture. While postmodernism returned to embrace the historical references that modernism had shunned, possibly ironically, deconstructivism rejected the postmodern acceptance of such references, as well as the idea of ornament as an after-thought or decoration.
In addition to ''Oppositions'', a defining text for both deconstructivism and postmodernism was
Robert Venturi
Robert Charles Venturi Jr. (June 25, 1925 – September 18, 2018) was an American architect, founding principal of the firm Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates, and one of the major architectural figures of the twentieth century.
Together with h ...
's ''Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture'' (1966). It argues against the purity, clarity and simplicity of modernism. With its publication,
functionalism and
rationalism
In philosophy, rationalism is the epistemological view that "regards reason as the chief source and test of knowledge" or "any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification".Lacey, A.R. (1996), ''A Dictionary of Philosophy ...
, the two main branches of modernism, were overturned as paradigms. The reading of the postmodernist Venturi was that ornament and historical allusion added a richness to architecture that modernism had foregone. Some Postmodern architects endeavored to reapply ornament even to economical and minimal buildings, described by Venturi as "the decorated shed." Rationalism of design was dismissed but the functionalism of the building was still somewhat intact. This is close to the thesis of Venturi's next major work, that
signs and ornament can be applied to a pragmatic architecture, and instill the philosophic complexities of
semiology
Semiotics (also called semiotic studies) is the systematic study of sign processes (semiosis) and meaning making. Semiosis is any activity, conduct, or process that involves signs, where a sign is defined as anything that communicates something, ...
.
The deconstructivist reading of ''Complexity and Contradiction'' is quite different. The basic building was the subject of problematics and intricacies in deconstructivism, with no detachment for ornament. Rather than separating ornament and function, like postmodernists such as Venturi, the functional aspects of buildings were called into question. Geometry was to deconstructivists what ornament was to postmodernists, the subject of complication, and this complication of geometry was in turn, applied to the functional, structural, and spatial aspects of deconstructivist buildings. One example of deconstructivist complexity is
Frank Gehry's
Vitra Design Museum
The Vitra Design Museum is a privately owned museum for design in Weil am Rhein, Germany.
Former Vitra CEO, and son of Vitra founders Willi and Erika Fehlbaum, Rolf Fehlbaum founded the museum in 1989 as an independent private foundation. The ...
in Weil-am-Rhein, which takes the typical unadorned white cube of modernist
art galleries
An art gallery is a room or a building in which visual art is displayed. In Western cultures from the mid-15th century, a gallery was any long, narrow covered passage along a wall, first used in the sense of a place for art in the 1590s. The lon ...
and deconstructs it, using geometries reminiscent of cubism and abstract expressionism. This subverts the functional aspects of modernist simplicity while taking modernism, particularly the international style, of which its white stucco skin is reminiscent, as a starting point. Another example of the deconstructivist reading of ''Complexity and Contradiction'' is
Peter Eisenman's
Wexner Center for the Arts
The Wexner Center for the Arts is the Ohio State University's "multidisciplinary, international laboratory for the exploration and advancement of contemporary art". The Wexner Center opened in November 1989, named in honor of the father of Limite ...
. The Wexner Center takes the archetypal form of the
castle, which it then imbues with complexity in a series of cuts and fragmentations. A three-dimensional grid runs somewhat arbitrarily through the building. The grid, as a reference to modernism, of which it is an accoutrement, collides with the medieval antiquity of a castle. Some of the grid's columns intentionally don't reach the ground, hovering over stairways creating a sense of neurotic unease and contradicting the structural purpose of the
column. The Wexner Center deconstructs the archetype of the castle and renders its spaces and structure with conflict and difference.
Deconstructivist philosophy
Some Deconstructivist architects were influenced by the French philosopher
Jacques Derrida. Eisenman was a friend of Derrida, but even so his approach to architectural design was developed long before he became a Deconstructivist. For him Deconstructivism should be considered an extension of his interest in radical formalism. Some practitioners of deconstructivism were also influenced by the formal experimentation and geometric imbalances of Russian
constructivism
Constructivism may refer to:
Art and architecture
* Constructivism (art), an early 20th-century artistic movement that extols art as a practice for social purposes
* Constructivist architecture, an architectural movement in Russia in the 1920s a ...
. There are additional references in deconstructivism to 20th-century movements: the
modernism
Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...
/
postmodernism interplay,
expressionism,
cubism,
minimalism and
contemporary art
Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic co ...
. Deconstructivism attempts to move away from the supposedly constricting 'rules' of modernism such as "
form follows function
Form follows function is a principle of design associated with late 19th and early 20th century architecture and industrial design in general, which states that the shape of a building or object should primarily relate to its intended function ...
," "
purity of form," and "
truth to materials
Truth to materials is a tenet of modern architecture (as opposed to postmodern architecture), which holds that any material should be used where it is most appropriate and its nature should not be hidden. Concrete, therefore, should not be painted ...
."
![ImperialWarMuseumNorth01](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/ImperialWarMuseumNorth01.jpg)
The main channel from deconstructivist philosophy to
architectural theory was through the philosopher
Jacques Derrida's influence with
Peter Eisenman. Eisenman drew some philosophical bases from the literary movement
Deconstruction, and collaborated directly with Derrida on projects including an entry for the
Parc de la Villette
The Parc de la Villette is the third-largest park in Paris, in area, located at the northeastern edge of the city in the 19th arrondissement. The park houses one of the largest concentrations of cultural venues in Paris, including the Cité de ...
competition, documented in ''Chora l Works''. Both Derrida and Eisenman, as well as
Daniel Libeskind were concerned with the "
metaphysics of presence," and this is the main subject of deconstructivist philosophy in architecture theory. The presupposition is that architecture is a language capable of communicating meaning and of receiving treatments by methods of linguistic philosophy.
The dialectic of presence and absence, or solid and void occurs in much of Eisenman's projects, both built and unbuilt. Both Derrida and Eisenman believe that the locus, or place of presence, is architecture, and the same dialectic of presence and absence is found in construction and deconstructivism.
According to Derrida, readings of texts are best carried out when working with classical narrative structures. Any architectural deconstructivism requires the existence of a particular archetypal ''con''struction, a strongly-established conventional expectation to play flexibly against. The design of
Frank Gehry’s own
Santa Monica
Santa Monica (; Spanish: ''Santa Mónica'') is a city in Los Angeles County, situated along Santa Monica Bay on California's South Coast. Santa Monica's 2020 U.S. Census population was 93,076. Santa Monica is a popular resort town, owing to i ...
residence, (from 1978), has been cited as a prototypical deconstructivist building. His starting point was a prototypical suburban house embodied with a typical set of intended social meanings. Gehry altered its massing, spatial envelopes, planes and other expectations in a playful subversion, an act of "de"construction"
In addition to Derrida's concepts of the metaphysics of presence and deconstructivism, his notions of trace and erasure, embodied in his philosophy of writing and arche-writing found their way into deconstructivist
memorials. Daniel Libeskind envisioned many of his early projects as a form of writing or discourse on writing and often works with a form of
concrete poetry
Concrete poetry is an arrangement of linguistic elements in which the typographical effect is more important in conveying meaning than verbal significance. It is sometimes referred to as visual poetry, a term that has now developed a distinct me ...
. He made architectural sculptures out of books and often coated the models in texts, openly making his architecture refer to writing. The notions of trace and erasure were taken up by Libeskind in essays and in his project for the
Jewish Museum Berlin
The Jewish Museum Berlin (''Jüdisches Museum Berlin'') was opened in 2001 and is the largest Jewish museum in Europe. On of floor space, the museum presents the history of Jews in Germany from the Middle Ages to the present day, with new focuses ...
. The museum is conceived as a trace of the erasure of the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
, intended to make its subject legible and poignant. Memorials such as
Maya Lin
Maya Ying Lin (born October 5, 1959) is an American designer and sculptor. In 1981, while an undergraduate at Yale University, she achieved national recognition when she won a national design competition for the planned Vietnam Veterans Memoria ...
's
Vietnam Veterans Memorial
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a U.S. national memorial in Washington, D.C., honoring service members of the U.S. armed forces who served in the Vietnam War. The site is dominated by two black granite walls engraved with the names of those ...
and Peter Eisenman's
Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe (german: Denkmal für die ermordeten Juden Europas), also known as the Holocaust Memorial (German: ''Holocaust-Mahnmal''), is a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, designed by arc ...
are also said to reflect themes of trace and erasure.
Constructivism and Russian Futurism
Another major current in deconstructivist architecture takes inspiration from the
Constructivist and
Russian Futurist
Russian Futurism is the broad term for a movement of Russian poets and artists who adopted the principles of Filippo Marinetti's " Manifesto of Futurism," which espoused the rejection of the past, and a celebration of speed, machinery, violenc ...
movements of the early twentieth century, both in their graphics and in their visionary architecture, little of which was actually constructed.
Artists
Naum Gabo
Naum Gabo, born Naum Neemia Pevsner (23 August 1977) (Hebrew: נחום נחמיה פבזנר), was an influential sculptor, theorist, and key figure in Russia's post-Revolution avant-garde and the subsequent development of twentieth-century scul ...
,
El Lissitzky
Lazar Markovich Lissitzky (russian: link=no, Ла́зарь Ма́ркович Лиси́цкий, ; – 30 December 1941), better known as El Lissitzky (russian: link=no, Эль Лиси́цкий; yi, על ליסיצקי), was a Russian artist ...
,
Kazimir Malevich, and
Alexander Rodchenko
Aleksander Mikhailovich Rodchenko (russian: link=no, Алекса́ндр Миха́йлович Ро́дченко; – 3 December 1956) was a Russian and Soviet artist, sculptor, photographer, and graphic designer. He was one of the founders ...
, have influenced the graphic sense of geometric forms of deconstructivist architects such as
Zaha Hadid
Dame Zaha Mohammad Hadid ( ar, زها حديد ''Zahā Ḥadīd''; 31 October 1950 – 31 March 2016) was an Iraqi-British architect, artist and designer, recognised as a major figure in architecture of the late 20th and early 21st centu ...
and
Coop Himmelb(l)au
Coop Himmelb(l)au (A pun meaning ''Coop Sky Building'' and ''Coop Sky Blue'') is an architecture, urban planning, design, and art firm founded by Wolf D. Prix, Helmut Swiczinsky, and Michael Holzer in Vienna, Austria in 1968.
History
Coop Him ...
. Both Deconstructivism and Constructivism have been concerned with the tectonics of making an abstract assemblage. Both were concerned with the radical simplicity of geometric forms as the primary artistic content, expressed in graphics, sculpture and architecture. The Constructivist tendency toward
purism
Purism, referring to the arts, was a movement that took place between 1918 and 1925 that influenced French painting and architecture. Purism was led by Amédée Ozenfant and Charles Edouard Jeanneret (Le Corbusier). Ozenfant and Le Corbusier f ...
, though, is absent in Deconstructivism: form is often deformed when construction is deconstructed. Also lessened or absent is the advocacy of
socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
and
collectivist causes.
The primary graphic motifs of constructivism were the rectangular bar and the triangular wedge, others were the more basic geometries of the square and the circle. In his series ''Prouns'', El Lizzitzky assembled collections of geometries at various angles floating free in space. They evoke basic structural units such as bars of steel or sawn lumber loosely attached, piled, or scattered. They were also often
drafted and share aspects with
technical drawing
Technical drawing, drafting or drawing, is the act and discipline of composing drawings that visually communicate how something functions or is constructed.
Technical drawing is essential for communicating ideas in industry and engineering ...
and
engineering drawing. Similar in composition is the deconstructivist series ''Micromegas'' by Daniel Libeskind.
Contemporary art
Two strains of modern art,
minimalism and
cubism, have had an influence on deconstructivism.
Analytical cubism
Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassemble ...
had a sure effect on deconstructivism, as forms and content are dissected and viewed from different perspectives simultaneously. A synchronicity of disjoined space is evident in many of the works of
Frank Gehry and
Bernard Tschumi
Bernard Tschumi (born 25 January 1944 in Lausanne, Switzerland) is an architect, writer, and educator, commonly associated with deconstructivism. Son of the well-known Swiss architect Jean Tschumi and a French mother, Tschumi is a dual French- ...
.
Synthetic cubism, with its application of
found object art, is not as great an influence on deconstructivism as
Analytical cubism
Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassemble ...
, but is still found in the earlier and more vernacular works of Frank Gehry. Deconstructivism also shares with minimalism a disconnection from cultural references.
With its tendency toward deformation and dislocation, there is also an aspect of
expressionism and
expressionist architecture
Expressionist architecture was an architectural movement in Europe during the first decades of the 20th century in parallel with the expressionist visual and performing arts that especially developed and dominated in Germany. Brick Expressionis ...
associated with deconstructivism. At times deconstructivism mirrors varieties of expressionism,
neo-expressionism
Neo-expressionism is a style of late modernist or early-postmodern painting and sculpture that emerged in the late 1970s. Neo-expressionists were sometimes called ''Transavantgarde'', '' Junge Wilde'' or ''Neue Wilden'' ('The new wild ones'; 'Ne ...
, and
abstract expressionism as well. The angular forms of the Ufa Cinema Center by Coop Himmelb(l)au recall the abstract geometries of the numbered paintings of
Franz Kline
Franz Kline (May 23, 1910 – May 13, 1962) was an American painter. He is associated with the Abstract Expressionist movement of the 1940s and 1950s. Kline, along with other action painters like Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Robert Mot ...
, in their unadorned masses. The UFA Cinema Center also would make a likely setting for the angular figures depicted in urban German street scenes by
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (6 May 1880 – 15 June 1938) was a German expressionist painter and printmaker and one of the founders of the artists group Die Brücke or "The Bridge", a key group leading to the foundation of Expressionism in 20th-century ...
. The work of
Wassily Kandinsky
Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky (; rus, Василий Васильевич Кандинский, Vasiliy Vasilyevich Kandinskiy, vɐˈsʲilʲɪj vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ kɐnʲˈdʲinskʲɪj; – 13 December 1944) was a Russian painter a ...
also bears similarities to deconstructivist architecture. His movement into abstract expressionism and away from figurative work, is in the same spirit as the deconstructivist rejection of ornament for geometries.
Several artists in the 1980s and 1990s contributed work that influenced or took part in deconstructivism.
Maya Lin
Maya Ying Lin (born October 5, 1959) is an American designer and sculptor. In 1981, while an undergraduate at Yale University, she achieved national recognition when she won a national design competition for the planned Vietnam Veterans Memoria ...
and
Rachel Whiteread
Dame Rachel Whiteread (born 20 April 1963) is an English artist who primarily produces sculptures, which typically take the form of casts. She was the first woman to win the annual Turner Prize in 1993.
Whiteread was one of the Young British Ar ...
are two examples. Lin's 1982 project for the
Vietnam Veterans Memorial
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a U.S. national memorial in Washington, D.C., honoring service members of the U.S. armed forces who served in the Vietnam War. The site is dominated by two black granite walls engraved with the names of those ...
, with its granite slabs severing the ground plane, is one. Its shard-like form and reduction of content to a minimalist text influenced deconstructivism, with its sense of fragmentation and emphasis on reading the monument. Lin also contributed work for Eisenman's Wexner Center. Rachel Whiteread's cast architectural spaces are another instance where
contemporary art
Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic co ...
is confluent with architecture. ''Ghost'' (1990), an entire living space cast in plaster, solidifying the void, alludes to Derrida's notion of architectural presence.
Gordon Matta-Clark
Gordon Matta-Clark (born Gordon Roberto Matta-Echaurren; June 22, 1943 – August 27, 1978) was an American artist best known for site-specific artworks he made in the 1970s. He was also a pioneer in the field of socially engaged food art.
...
's ''Building cuts'' were deconstructed sections of buildings exhibited in art galleries.
1988 MoMA exhibition
Mark Wigley
Mark Antony Wigley (born 1956) is a New Zealand-born architect and author based in the United States. From 2004 to 2014, he was the Dean of Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.
Career
Wigley receive ...
and
Philip Johnson
Philip Cortelyou Johnson (July 8, 1906 – January 25, 2005) was an American architect best known for his works of modern and postmodern architecture. Among his best-known designs are his modernist Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut; the po ...
curated the 1988
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
exhibition ''Deconstructivist architecture'', which crystallized the movement, and brought fame and notoriety to its key practitioners. The architects presented at the exhibition were
Peter Eisenman,
Frank Gehry,
Zaha Hadid
Dame Zaha Mohammad Hadid ( ar, زها حديد ''Zahā Ḥadīd''; 31 October 1950 – 31 March 2016) was an Iraqi-British architect, artist and designer, recognised as a major figure in architecture of the late 20th and early 21st centu ...
,
Coop Himmelblau
Coop Himmelb(l)au (A pun meaning ''Coop Sky Building'' and ''Coop Sky Blue'') is an architecture, urban planning, design, and art firm founded by Wolf D. Prix, Helmut Swiczinsky, and Michael Holzer in Vienna, Austria in 1968.
History
Coop Him ...
,
Rem Koolhaas,
Daniel Libeskind, and
Bernard Tschumi
Bernard Tschumi (born 25 January 1944 in Lausanne, Switzerland) is an architect, writer, and educator, commonly associated with deconstructivism. Son of the well-known Swiss architect Jean Tschumi and a French mother, Tschumi is a dual French- ...
. Mark Wigley wrote the accompanying essay and tried to show a common thread among the various architects whose work was usually more noted for their differences.
Computer-aided design
Computer-aided design is now an essential tool in most aspects of contemporary architecture, but the particular nature of deconstructivism makes the use of computers especially pertinent. Three-dimensional modelling and animation (virtual and physical) assists in the conception of very complicated spaces, while the ability to link computer models to manufacturing jigs (CAM -
Computer-aided manufacturing
Computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) also known as computer-aided modeling or computer-aided machining is the use of software to control machine tools in the manufacturing of work pieces. This is not the only definition for CAM, but it is the most ...
) allows the mass production of subtly different modular elements to be achieved at affordable costs. Also, Gehry is noted for producing many physical models as well as computer models as part of his design process. Though the computer has made the designing of complex shapes much easier, not everything that looks odd is "deconstructivist."
Gallery
File:JewishMuseumBerlin.jpg, Jewish Museum, Berlin
The Jewish Museum Berlin (''Jüdisches Museum Berlin'') was opened in 2001 and is the largest Jewish museum in Europe. On of floor space, the museum presents the history of Jews in Germany from the Middle Ages to the present day, with new focuses ...
, Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
File:Bodenlos.jpg, Alpine Deconstructivism in Kitzbühel, Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
, by Christine
Christine may refer to:
People
* Christine (name), a female given name
Film
* ''Christine'' (1958 film), based on Schnitzler's play ''Liebelei''
* ''Christine'' (1983 film), based on King's novel of the same name
* ''Christine'' (1987 fil ...
& Horst Lechner
File:Steinhaus Steindorf.jpg, Günter Domenig' s "Steinhaus" at Lake Ossiach
Lake Ossiach (german: Ossiacher See, sl, Osojsko jezero) is a lake in the Austrian state of Carinthia. It is the state's third largest lake, superseded only by Wörthersee, Lake Wörth and Millstätter See, Lake Millstatt.
Geography
It is situ ...
, Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
File:Vitra002a.jpg, Vitra Design Museum
The Vitra Design Museum is a privately owned museum for design in Weil am Rhein, Germany.
Former Vitra CEO, and son of Vitra founders Willi and Erika Fehlbaum, Rolf Fehlbaum founded the museum in 1989 as an independent private foundation. The ...
by Frank Gehry, Weil am Rhein
Weil am Rhein (High Alemannic: ''Wiil am Rhii'') is a German town and commune. It is on the east bank of the River Rhine, and extends to the point at which the Swiss, French and German borders meet. It is the most southwesterly town in Germany an ...
, Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
File:Prag ginger u fred gehry.jpg, Dancing House
The Dancing House ( cs, Tančící dům), or Fred and Ginger, is the nickname given to the Nationale-Nederlanden building on the Rašínovo nábřeží ( Rašín Embankment) in Prague, Czech Republic. It was designed by the Croatian-Czech archit ...
by Vlado Milunić
Vladimir Milunić (3 March 1941 – 17 September 2022) was a Czech architect. He was noted for designing the " Dancing House" in Prague with Frank Gehry. He also taught at the Czech Technical University in Prague.
Early life
Milunić was b ...
and Frank Gehry, Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and List of cities in the Czech Republic, largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 milli ...
, Czech Republic
The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...
File:Capital-city-towers-moscow-indexxrus.JPG, City of Capitals
The City of Capitals ( rus, Город Столиц, r=Gorod Stolits) is a mixed-use complex composed of two skyscrapers and an office building located on plot 9 in the Moscow International Business Center in Moscow, Russia with a total area of ...
in Moscow IBC, Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...
File:Dresden-Kristallpalast-nigh.jpg, UFA-Palast in Dresden
Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label= Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth ...
, Dresden
Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label= Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth ...
, Germany, by Coop Himmelb(l)au
Coop Himmelb(l)au (A pun meaning ''Coop Sky Building'' and ''Coop Sky Blue'') is an architecture, urban planning, design, and art firm founded by Wolf D. Prix, Helmut Swiczinsky, and Michael Holzer in Vienna, Austria in 1968.
History
Coop Him ...
File:Image-Disney Concert Hall by Carol Highsmith edit-2.jpg, Walt Disney Concert Hall by Frank Gehry, Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
, California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
File:Guggenheim Bilbao may-2006.jpg, The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao
The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is a museum of modern and contemporary art designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry, and located in Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain. The museum was inaugurated on 18 October 1997 by King Juan Carlos I of Sp ...
by Frank Gehry, in Bilbao
)
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, Spain
, image_flag = Bandera de España.svg
, image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg
, national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond")
, national_anthem = (English: "Royal March")
, i ...
File:Estación Paseo de Gracia (1991-2014) Daniel Navas, Neus Solé. Arquitectos -3.jpg, Paseo de Gracia Station, Barcelona
Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...
(1991) by Daniel Navas, Neus Solé. Arch.
File:Gymnázium v Orlové.jpg, The Gymnasium by Josef Kiszka and Barbara Potysz, in Orlová, Czech Republic
The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...
File:Barcelona 2010 August 005 Hotel.JPG, Hotel Porta Fira
Hotel Porta Fira (also Torres de Toyo Ito with Torre Realia BCN) is a 28-storey, skyscraper hotel designed by Toyo Ito on the Plaza de Europa in the district of Granvia l'Hospitalet in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat, a suburb of Barcelona, Cataloni ...
(left) in Barcelona
Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...
, Spain, by Toyo Ito
is a Japanese architect known for creating conceptual architecture, in which he seeks to simultaneously express the physical and virtual worlds. He is a leading exponent of architecture that addresses the contemporary notion of a "simulated" ...
File:McCormick Tribune 060304.jpg, The McCormick Tribune Campus Center
The McCormick Tribune Campus Center (MTCC) is a building on the main campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology, in the Bronzeville neighborhood on the south side of Chicago. The McCormick Tribune Campus Center opened September 30, 2003. A ...
at Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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's IIT Campus by Rem Koolhaas, completed 2003
File:Puente de la mujer, Buenos Aires (32008).jpg, Puente de la Mujer
The Puente de la Mujer (Spanish for "Woman's Bridge") is a rotating footbridge for Dock 3 of the Puerto Madero commercial district of Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is of the cantilever spar cable-stayed bridge type and is also a swing bridge, but som ...
, Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
by Santiago Calatrava
Santiago Calatrava Valls (born 28 July 1951) is a Spanish architect, structural engineer, sculptor and painter, particularly known for his bridges supported by single leaning pylons, and his railway stations, stadiums, and museums, whose sculp ...
File:Synagogue Mainz Exterior1.jpg, New synagogue in Mainz
Mainz () is the capital and largest city of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany.
Mainz is on the left bank of the Rhine, opposite to the place that the Main joins the Rhine. Downstream of the confluence, the Rhine flows to the north-west, with Ma ...
by Manuel Herz
Manuel Herz is an architect with his own practice in Basel, Switzerland and Cologne, Germany.
He was educated at the RWTH Aachen in Germany and at the Architectural Association in London. He has received numerous prizes and awards, published wid ...
Critical responses
Since the publication of
Kenneth Frampton
Kenneth Brian Frampton (born 20 November 1930) is a British architect, critic and historian. He is the Ware Professor of Architecture at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University, New York. He has b ...
's ''Modern Architecture: A Critical History'' (first edition 1980) there has been a keen consciousness of the role of criticism within architectural theory. Whilst referencing Derrida as a philosophical influence, deconstructivism can also be seen as having as much a basis in
critical theory as the other major offshoot of postmodernism,
critical regionalism
Critical regionalism is an approach to architecture that strives to counter the placelessness and lack of identity of the International Style, but also rejects the whimsical individualism and ornamentation of Postmodern architecture. The stylings ...
. The two aspects of critical theory, urgency and analysis, are found in deconstructivism. There is a tendency to re-examine and critique other works or precedents in deconstructivism, and also a tendency to set aesthetic issues in the foreground. An example of this is the
Wexner Center
The Wexner Center for the Arts is the Ohio State University's "multidisciplinary, international laboratory for the exploration and advancement of contemporary art". The Wexner Center opened in November 1989, named in honor of the father of Limite ...
.
Critical Theory, however, had at its core a critique of capitalism and its excess, and from that respect many of the works of the Deconstructivists would fail in that regard if only they are made for an elite and are, as objects, highly expensive, despite whatever critique they may claim to impart on the conventions of design.
The difference between criticality in deconstructivism and criticality in critical regionalism, is that critical regionalism ''reduces'' the overall level of complexity involved and maintains a clearer analysis while attempting to reconcile modernist architecture with local differences. In effect, this leads to a modernist "vernacular." Critical regionalism displays a lack of
self-criticism
Self-criticism involves how an individual evaluates oneself. Self-criticism in psychology is typically studied and discussed as a negative personality trait in which a person has a disrupted self-identity. The opposite of self-criticism would be ...
and a
utopia
A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book '' Utopia'', describing a fictional island societ ...
nism of place. Deconstructivism, meanwhile, maintains a level of self-criticism and a
dystopianism of place, as well as external criticism and tends towards maintaining a level of complexity. Some architects identified with the movement, notably
Frank Gehry, have actively rejected the classification of their work as deconstructivist.
Critics of deconstructivism see it as a purely formal exercise with little social significance.
Kenneth Frampton
Kenneth Brian Frampton (born 20 November 1930) is a British architect, critic and historian. He is the Ware Professor of Architecture at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University, New York. He has b ...
finds it "elitist and detached".
Nikos Salingaros
Nikos Angelos Salingaros ( el, Νίκος Άγγελος Σαλίγκαρος; born 1952) is a mathematician and polymath known for his work on urban theory, architectural theory, complexity theory, and design philosophy. He has been a close ...
calls deconstructivism a "viral expression" that invades design thinking in order to build destroyed forms; while curiously similar to both Derrida's and Philip Johnson's descriptions, this is meant as a harsh condemnation of the entire movement. Other criticisms are similar to those of deconstructivist philosophy—that since the act of deconstructivism is not an empirical process, it can result in whatever an architect wishes, and it thus suffers from a lack of consistency. Today there is a sense that the philosophical underpinnings of the beginning of the movement have been lost, and all that is left is the aesthetic of deconstructivism.
[Chakraborty, Judhajit; Deconstruction: From Philosophy to Design]. Arizona State University, retrieved June 2006. "Today, in the mid 90s the term 'deconstructivism' is used casually to label any work that favours complexity over simplicity and dramatises the formal possibilities of digital production."] Other criticisms reject the premise that architecture is a language capable of being the subject of linguistic philosophy, or, if it was a language in the past, critics claim it is no longer.
Others question the wisdom and impact on future generations of an architecture that rejects the past and presents no clear values as replacements and which often pursues strategies that are intentionally aggressive to human senses.
See also
*
Constructivism (art)
Constructivism is an early twentieth-century art movement founded in 1915 by Vladimir Tatlin and Alexander Rodchenko. Abstract and austere, constructivist art aimed to reflect modern industrial society and urban space. The movement rejected deco ...
*
Structuralism (architecture)
Structuralism is a movement in architecture and urban planning that evolved around the middle of the 20th century. It was a reaction to Rationalism'sAldo van Eyck, "Statement Against Rationalism", written for CIAM VI in 1947. In: ''Aldo van ...
*
Futurism (art)
Futurism ( it, Futurismo, link=no) was an artistic and social movement that originated in Italy, and to a lesser extent in other countries, in the early 20th century. It emphasized dynamism, speed, technology, youth, violence, and objects such ...
*
Novelty architecture
Novelty architecture, also called programmatic architecture or mimetic architecture, is a type of architecture in which buildings and other structures are given unusual shapes for purposes such as advertising or to copy other famous buildings w ...
*
Khôra
''Khôra'' (also ''chora''; grc, χώρα) was the territory of the Ancient Greek ''polis'' outside the city proper. The term has been used in philosophy by Plato to designate a receptacle (as a "third kind" 'triton genos'' '' Timaeus'' 48e4), a ...
*
Vorticism
Vorticism was a London-based modernist art movement formed in 1914 by the writer and artist Wyndham Lewis. The movement was partially inspired by Cubism and was introduced to the public by means of the publication of the Vorticist manifesto in ...
*
Günter Behnisch
Günter Behnisch (12 June 1922 – 12 July 2010) was a German architect, born in Lockwitz, near Dresden. During the Second World War he became one of Germany's youngest submarine commanders. Subsequently, Behnisch became one of the most prominen ...
*
Thom Mayne
Thom Mayne (born January 19, 1944) is an American architect. He is based in Los Angeles. In 1972, Mayne helped found the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc), where he is a trustee and the coordinator of the Design of Cities po ...
*
Rooftop Remodeling Falkestrasse The rooftop remodeling Falkestrasse located in Vienna, Austria, is a Coop Himmelb(l)au architectural project. ''Architizer, About Coop Himmelblau'', March 2012
The remodelling is an edition to a pre-existing traditional Viennese building. The law fi ...
*
Reconstruction (architecture)
Reconstruction in architectural conservation is the returning of a place to a known earlier state by the introduction of new materials. It is related to the architectural concepts of restoration (repairing existing building fabric) and preservatio ...
References
Notes and citations
Bibliography and further reading
*
*
*
References
* Derrida, Jacques (1967). ''Of Grammatology'', (hardcover: , paperback: , corrected edition: ) trans.
Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Johns Hopkins University Press.
* Derrida, Jacques & Eisenman, Peter (1997). ''Chora l Works''. Monacelli Press. .
* Derrida, Jacques & Husserl, Edmund (1989). ''Edmund Husserl's Origin of Geometry: An Introduction''. University of Nebraska Press.
* Frampton, Kenneth (1992). ''Modern Architecture, a critical history''. Thames & Hudson- Third Edition.
* Johnson, Phillip & Wigley, Mark (1988). ''Deconstructivist Architecture: The Museum of Modern Art, New York''. Little Brown and Company.
* Hays, K.M. (edited) (1998). ''Oppositions Reader''. Princeton Architectural Press.
* Kandinsky, Wassily. ''Point and Line to Plane''. Dover Publications, New York.
* McLeod, Mary, "Architecture and Politics in the Reagan Era: From Postmodernism to Deconstructivism," "Assemblage," 8 (1989), pp. 23–59.
* Rickey, George (1995). ''Constructivism: Origins and Evolution''. George Braziller; Revised edition.
* Salingaros, Nikos (2008). "Anti-Architecture and Deconstruction", 3rd edition. Umbau-Verlag, Solingen, Germany.
* Tschumi, Bernard (1994). ''Architecture and Disjunction''. The MIT Press. Cambridge.
* Van der Straeten, Bart
''Image and Narrative – The Uncanny and the architecture of Deconstruction''Retrieved April, 2006.
* Venturi, Robert (1966). ''Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture'', The Museum of Modern Art Press, New York.
* Venturi, Robert (1977). ''Learning from Las Vegas'' (with D. Scott Brown and S. Izenour), Cambridge MA, 1972, revised 1977.
* Wigley, Mark (1995). ''The Architecture of Deconstruction: Derrida's Haunt''. The MIT Press. .
* Vicente Esteban Medina (2003
''Forma y composición en la Arquitectura deconstructivista'' © Tesis doctoral, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. Registro Propiedad Intellectual Madrid Nº 16/2005/3967. Link de descarga de tesis en pdf: http://oa.upm.es/481/
External links
*
* (Spanish) Vicente Esteban Medina (2003
''Forma y composición en la Arquitectura deconstructivista''
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Architectural styles
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Deconstructivist Architecture