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 | | Space, Time and Architecture: The Growth of a New Tradition, Fifth Revised and Enlarged Edition (Charles Eliot Norton Lectures) by Siegfried Giedion ISBN-10: 9780674830400 ISBN-10: 0-674-83040-7 ISBN-13: 9780674830400 ISBN-13: 978-0-674-83040-0 Hardcover 1967-01-01 Harvard University Press Find Lowest Price |
Editorials | ||
Product Description A milestone in modern thought, Space, Time and Architecture has been reissued many times since its first publication in 1941 and translated into half a dozen languages. In this revised edition of Mr. Giedion's classic work, major sections have been added and there are 81 new illustrations. The chapters on leading contemporary architects have been greatly expanded. There is new material on the later development of Frank Lloyd Wright and the more recent buildings of Walter Gropius, particularly his American Embassy in Athens. In his discussion of Le Corbusier, Mr. Giedion provides detailed analyses of the Carpenter Center at Harvard University, Le Corbusier's only building in the United States, and his Priory of La Tourette near Lyons. There is a section on his relations with his clients and an assessment of his influence on contemporary architecture, including a description of the Le Corbusier Center in Zurich (designed just before his death], which houses his works of art. The chapters on Mies van der Rohe and Alvar Aalto have been brought up to date with examples of their buildings in the sixties. There is an entirely new chapter on the Danish architect Jorn Utzon, whose work, as exemplified in his design for the Sydney Opera House, Mr. Giedion considers representative of post-World War II architectural concepts. A new essay, "Changing Notions of the City," traces the evolution of the structure of the city throughout history and examines current attempts to deal with urban growth, as shown in the work of such architects as José Luis Sert, Kenzo Tange, and Fumihiko Maki. Mr. Sert's Peabody Terrace is discussed as an example of the interlocking of the collective and individual spheres. Finally, the conclusion has been enlarged to include a survey of the limits of the organic in architecture. | ||
Reviews | ||
A dated manifesto whose time has passed This book is vast in its ambitions, uneven in its analysis, and badly dated in its defense of modern architecture. Giedion's basic premise is that the Industrial Revolution caused a separation to occur between thinking and feeling, this separation was exemplified by what he considers derivative architecture during the 19th century, and that it is up to the modern movement to reunite these two spheres by combining emotions with a scientific approach to architecture, and by adding the dimension of time to its three dimensional depiction of space. His historical analysis is quite erudite, but his treatment of the major architects who founded the modern movement, particularly Gropius and Le Corbusier, verges on hagiography. For instance he considers Gropius' PanAm building in New York, and Le Corbusier's Carpenter Center at Harvard to be great works of architecture, when contemporary critics view these as among their worst. The only American architect given comparable attention is Frank Lloyd Wright. The book flounders at the end in its speculation about the future, praising Le Corbusier's advocacy of separating people from cars by building elevated highways, and housing people in slablike high rise towers. Considering that Pruitt-Igoe was already, at the time of his final revision to his book, failing in St. Louis as an approach to house poor families (it was later blown to smithereens as a total disaster), this advocacy of housing people in high rises rings hollow indeed. He also advocates separating functions in a city, at a time again during his final revision, when Jane Jacobs "Death and Life of Great American Cities" was revolutionizing city planning by advocating just the opposite. It is worth reading because it makes you think, but it is badly dated. | ||
I like this book alot This book tells the story of important buildings built since a long time ago, even bridges! Lots of nice pictures and drawings, especially of the real important artsy buildings built after WWII. You can learn alot about the history of world culture and architecture just by looking at the pictures! All my friends saw "Wow" when I show them this book! Wow!! | ||
brief and to the point 90 per cent of books in a typical bookstore are not worth the paper they are written on. This is NOT one of those books. The concepts presented in this book are profound. It is the best book I own. | ||
The seminal work on Modern Architecture One cannot even presume to understand modern architecture until one has read Giedion's classic work. This book did more to shape the view of modern architecture than did any other book. Giedion provides an impressive survey of architecture down through the ages, illustrating those aspects which had an influence on modern architecture. One of his more illucidating chapters is "The Demand for Morality in Architecture," which underscores the content of this work. The heart of the book is his chapter on "Space-Time in Art, Architecture, adn Construction," in which he examines the leading figures and movements in modern architecture, with the spotlight on Walter Gropius, Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe and Alvar Aalto. These were the founding fathers. He examines the roots of their ideas as well as the influence they had in shaping the modern movement. This later edition also includes a chapter on "Jorn Utzon and the Third Generation," which Giedion felt had successfully carried the principles of modern architecture into contemporary society. Giedion also explores the shifts in attitude toward city planning in the late 19th century and early 20th century, reviewing such seminal figures as Ebenezer Howard, Patrick Geddes, Arturo Soria y Mata, and Tony Garnier, which ultimately lead to the creation of C.I.A.M, the International Congress of Modern Architecture. Giedion is unabashed in his support of modern architecture, which has made this book the favorite whipping post of post-modern critics. But, few have explored the subject as deeply as has Giedion. Don't rely on other interpretations of Giedion. Read "Space, Time and Architecture" before drawing any conclusions. | ||
Excellent history I enjoyed this book for the author's insights into how 20th century architecture, starting from certain antecedents in the 19th century, such as the early iron-reinforced concrete structures of William LeBaron Jenny, progressed through Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright, the Bauhaus school, and so on, up to the style which he calls "the hanging curtain of glass." Giedion shows how this spectacular 20th-century building originated around the turn of the last century and how it's modern variations represent a triumpth of this type of design. The basic principle, as exemplified early on in the Carson, Pirie, Scott, and Co. building in Chicago, is that as stuctural members receeded from the outlying masonry walls into the interior skeleton of the building, this allows the architect to open up the facade with windows, skylights, and other penetrating elements in order to let the maximum amount of air and light into the building. Eventually no real supporting structural members need reside on the outside of the building, and the aesthetic result is the "hanging curtain of glass" effect... Whatever one thinks of this type of building, it has become a major landmark of 20th-century architectural design in cities all over the world. Giedion's treatment of Robert Maillart's graceful, parabolic spanning bridge designs in the Swiss Alps and some other places, such as the Tavanasa Bridge in the U.S., which he specifically discusses as one of Maillart's most important achievements, is also very interesting. Overall, Giedion's book is a fine treatment of an important and difficult period in the history of architecture, and is one of the most important books on architecture to be written in recent decades. | ||