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CODE 108348
ACADEMIC YEAR 2024/2025
CREDITS
SCIENTIFIC DISCIPLINARY SECTOR ICAR/18
LANGUAGE Italian
TEACHING LOCATION
  • LA SPEZIA
SEMESTER 2° Semester
TEACHING MATERIALS AULAWEB

AIMS AND CONTENT

LEARNING OUTCOMES

The course aims at providing students the basic knowledge of the architecture of 20th and 21st century architecture. Learning how to read and interpret the history of modern and contemporary architecture will implement the critical conscience and ethical responsibility of future designers.

AIMS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES

The main expected learning outcomes are:

- the knowledge of the main architects and movements in the history of architecture from the last decades of the nineteenth century to today.

- The ability to correctly identify and place some aspects of architectural production (buildings, projects, texts) in time and space, using an adequate vocabulary

- The knowledge of the basic tools of historical analysis in architecture and the understanding of the main cultural, social, economic and urban transformations in the 20th and 21st century.

TEACHING METHODS

Lectures (in person and online).

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

The course traces the history of modern and contemporary architecture, from the end of the nineteenth century to the present day, with particular attention to the intersections between architecture, technique, art, politics and society. The lessons will have the Western world as their main geographical focus, but insights into other global contexts will also be provided.

 

Syllabus:

1. Art Nouveau: Belgium, France and Catalan Modernism

2. Art Nouveau: Glasgow School, Vienna Secession, Adolf Loos and Liberty

3. Across the Ocean: Chicago Skyscrapers and Frank Lloyd Wright

4. Steel and Concrete: Pioneers and Visionaries

5. The Architecture of Factories

6. German Expressionism, De Stijl and Dutch Modernism

7. German Modernism and Bauhaus

8. Le Corbusier (1923-45)

9. Mies van der Rohe in Germany

10. Russian Constructivism

11. Modernism in the U.S.

12. Another Modernism: Alvar Aalto

13. Modern Classicism: Italy (Rationalism and the Architecture of the Regime)

14. Le Corbusier (1945-65)

15. Modernism in Latin America, Mies Van der Rohe, Frank Lloyd Wright and Eero Saarinen after the Second World War

16. "The Italian Retreat from Modern Architecture": Italian Architecture after WW2

17. Mass housing, Brutalism and Structuralism

18. Louis Kahn: Monumentality, Form and Tradition

19. Italian Architects: Carlo Scarpa, Franco Albini and Pier Luigi Nervi

20. The Trend and the Post-Modern

21. Radical and High-Tech Architecture

22. Deconstructivism, OMA and Zaha Hadid

23. Some Remarks on Contemporary Architecture

RECOMMENDED READING/BIBLIOGRAPHY

William J. R. Curtis, L’architettura moderna del Novecento, Milano 1999 / William J.R. Curtis, L'architettura moderna dal 1900, London 2006.
Kenneth Frampton, Storia dell’architettura moderna, Bologna 2008.
Elena Dellapiana, Guido Montanari, Una storia dell'architettura contemporanea, Novara 2021.
Colin Davies, A New History of Modern Architecture, London 2017.
Josep Maria Montaner, Dopo il movimento moderno, Roma 2008.

Further reading on specific topics will be provided at the end of each lesson.

TEACHERS AND EXAM BOARD

LESSONS

LESSONS START

February 21th, 2024

Class schedule

The timetable for this course is available here: Portale EasyAcademy

EXAMS

EXAM DESCRIPTION

The final exam consists of an oral test on the topics covered in class.

Students will have the opportunity to take an mid-term written test.