Lecture 2 ARCH 219

1 – burke = inquiry into the nature of beauty, how do you describe beauty, why people think the Parthenon is the most beautiful perfect building-sublime – also an aesthetic experience that has nothing to do with proportions (how we think of beauty) this is another form of aesthetic experience-painters starting painting landscape-going against the notion that human cities were good and moral and Christian and that the nature was of the devil and had witches and goblins etc. flipping this around

Burke’s distinction between sublime and beautiful =

2. staurt and revett drew ancient buildings -maybe if we start in ancienct Greece we can reach full beauty-perfect greek arch- greek revivalists

3. altes museum schinkel-early 19th century-rival that of d’Medici-greek arch is the perfect form, let’s do that-many people think it’s the best building ever designed-perfect rectilinear proportions-new building type-what is the perfect tapering of the columns?-everything is the right shape and size compared to everything else

4. british museum, Robert smirke-greek revival-ionic columns (taller and slenderer)-great library at the center of the museum (can only read them in the library)

5. stourheadPicturesqueUntil this point the perfect garden was the franco-italian garden (tuileries) conquering nature, straight lines, orderly-new kind of garden about arousal and feelings-these gardens are not “beautiful”, they are sublime-irregularRight doesn’t look like leftMovmentGarden keeps changingDifferent types of architecture that remind you of different times/ages/styles

6. great pagoda, William chambers

7. royal pavilion, john nash-“oriental” architecture as picturesque

-onion domes-building made for having fun-using foreign “strange” architecture style-palm tree columns in the kitchen because it’s hot and humid nash you’re disgusting-russian + oriental + middle eastern

8. Medical college of Virginia-egyptian revival-prisons called “the tombs”

What was the Picturesque and orientalism, and how did they affect landscape and architectural design?Picturesque – all about feelings, new gardens that were looser, sublimeOrientalism – reappropriating architectural style of a foreign place to create feelings, sublime, stand for things

9. strawberry hill, Horace Walpole-started with classical country house and turned it into a medieval castle-gothic revival-took off columns, attached buttresses, -created gothic horror story-fireplace looks like the fron of a church-triple arch-english didn’t like how French designed the end of a church-long hall

10. a.w.n. pugin, contrasts-classical architecture is immoral and wrong! WTF-you ought to design gothic buildings because gothic is morally and theologically correct what the fuck it’s a building-lots of people went to prison in England-more than 200 offenses for which you received the death penalty-most people went to prison cuz they owed money-gothic architecture is morally superior-pugin looked at the churches of sir john soande and thought they were disgusting-introduction of the idea that architectural style can moral or immoral

11. st giles a.w.n. – pugin-pugins church, created from the best parts of the medieval churches of England-trying to do gothic revival (high point of Christianity)

12. houses of parliament, Charles barry and pugin-cultural argument-represents england’s past-stands for the country-Stands for Englishness-pugin designed the interior-pugin got angry because barry wasn’t being “true” to gothic architecture-parliament is actually attached to an old medieval hall

-Barry is basically designing a classical building, highly regular-church spire on great rotunda in the center is irregular-pugin was upset that barry was using classical design as decoration-rich in decoration, lot’s of window area-building is stone attached to cast iron steel frame, allowing more windows

13. reform club, barry-for pugin there is only one correct style

14. john ruskin, the seven lamps of architecture-one of the first art critics in England-becomes famous speaker-loved venetian gothic-loved the way light played on the sides of buildings-delicacy in venetian gothic, richness of texture

15. all saints Margaret street, butterfield-gothic revival as functional-design medieval building in a rectangular building block with buildings attached to it on either side-right next to multistory apartments-gothic architecture is irregular! Because buildings were modified so they would be useful-they respond to the use and the site, making them irregular-conscious rejection of classical buildings, which were symmetrical and proportional-gothic arch = functional-can open up the building to big stained glass windows without worrying about the building falling down

Describe the various ideas associated with the gothic revival -moral vs immoral-functionality -richness of texture-jesus-iron steel frame allowing windows

The architect’s dream = LOVE