96405 - History of Architecture (1)

Academic Year 2022/2023

  • Teaching Mode: Traditional lectures
  • Campus: Bologna
  • Corso: First cycle degree programme (L) in Drama, Art and Music Studies (cod. 5821)

    Also valid for First cycle degree programme (L) in Drama, Art and Music Studies (cod. 0956)

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course the student: knows the general outline of the history of architecture; recognizes, historically contextualizes and critically evaluates the major architectures of the contemporary age; knows the major formal and constructive aspects of the works considered; knows how to connect architecture with other art disciplines.

Course contents

The course is divided into two parts:

part 1

The course intends to introduce students to the knowledge of contemporary architecture by analyzing significant works, personalities and issues. The study of the works focuses on the analysis of some topics such as pattern the configuration of space, the role and forms of structure, the questions of truth and nature of materials, the pattern a the ornament, the polychrome and the coating. This course also deals with works by artists whose creative process has contributed to focus on concepts often decisive for architecture.

By the end of the course, students are able to evaluate architectures considering the connection between idea, conception, form and materials, and to understand the cultural, technical and artistic issues related to their realization. Studying the various architectural experiences allows students to deal with some issues that may suggest their initiating personal research.

Course contents

  • Polychromic architecture systems: from Quatremère de Quincy to Jakob Ignaz Hittorff
  • From the principle of polychrome to the coating principle: Gottfried Semper
  • Construction and structure systems: Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc
  • Chicago School Architecture: from the frame to the curtain wall
  • Frank Lloyd Wright: the enclosure of the space
  • Otto Wagner, Joseph Maria Olbrich, Josef Hoffmann, Josef Plečnik: order and truth of the coating
  • Adolf Loos, from the law of coating to Raumplan
  • Auguste Perret, order and truth of the structure
  • Mies van der Rohe: search for absolute structure
  • Le Corbusier, from the ornamental composition to the "espace indicible"

part 2

The seminars focus on the book: Sigfried Giedion, Spazio tempo ed architettura. Lo sviluppo di una nuova tradizione, Milano, Hoepli, 1984. Starting from the study and understanding of the text, students must develop research and reflections that are discussed during the seminars. They are asked to develop considerations that take into account what is presented during the lessons and to find the iconographic material necessary to comment on the work.

The student must:

  • Know the author of the essay
  • Know the content of the essay
  • Know the context in which the essay was written
  • Develop reflections on the contents of the essay
  • Collect the iconographic material necessary to comment on your reflections
  • Participate actively during the seminar lessons

By the end of the course, each student will discuss their research in a collective meeting.

The evaluation of the research will be part of the final examination.

Readings/Bibliography

Attending Students

Bibliography

Cometa Michele, L’architettura italiana tra policromia e storicismo, in Id., Il Romanzo dell’Architettura. La Sicilia e il Grand Tour nell’etàdi Goethe, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1999, pp. 299-325 (Virtuale)

Fanelli Giovanni, Gargiani Roberto, Il principio del rivestimento. Prolegomena a una storia dell'architettura contemporanea, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1994

Giedion Sigfried, Spazio tempo ed architettura. Lo sviluppo di una nuova tradizione, Milano, Hoepli, 1984

Rosellini Anna, La Ville Contemporaine di Le Corbusier e Pierre Jeanneret, o del paesaggio svizzero sublimato in metropoli, in La Città Nuova. Oltre Sant’Elia. Cento anni di visioni urbane, Milano, Silvana Editoriale, 2013, pp. 67-79 (Virtuale)

Rosellini Anna, Unité d’Habitation in Marseille - Experimental Artistic Device, in Ruth Baumeister, What Moves Us? Le Corbusier and Asger Jorn in Art and Architecture, Zürich, Scheidegger & Spiess, 2015, pp. 38-45 (Virtuale)

Non-attending Students

Bibliography

Cometa Michele, L’architettura italiana tra policromia e storicismo, in Id., Il Romanzo dell’Architettura. La Sicilia e il Grand Tournell’etàdi Goethe, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1999, pp. 299-325 (Virtuale)

Fanelli Giovanni, Gargiani Roberto, Il principio del rivestimento. Prolegomena a una storia dell'architettura contemporanea, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1994

Giedion Sigfried, Spazio tempo ed architettura. Lo sviluppo di una nuova tradizione, Milano, Hoepli, 1984

Rosellini Anna, La Ville Contemporaine di Le Corbusier e Pierre Jeanneret, o del paesaggio svizzero sublimato in metropoli, in La Città Nuova. Oltre Sant’Elia. Cento anni di visioni urbane, Milano, Silvana Editoriale, 2013, pp. 67-79 (Virtuale)

Rosellini Anna, Unité d’Habitation in Marseille - Experimental Artistic Device, in Ruth Baumeister, What Moves Us? Le Corbusier and Asger Jorn in Art and Architecture, Zürich, Scheidegger & Spiess, 2015, pp. 38-45 (Virtuale)

Teaching methods

Lectures and seminars

Assessment methods

Attending students

Collective discussion of research topics

The class participation is also evaluated.

Oral examination on course content and bibliography

Non-attending students

Oral examination of the topics discussed in the bibliography

During the oral exam, students must demonstrate to have acquired a critical understanding of the topics discussed in the bibliography.

Attending and non-attending students

1. It will be assessed as excellent the performance of those students achieving an organic vision of the course contents, the use of a proper specific language, the originality of the reflection as well as the familiarity with the tools for analyzing the architecture works.

2. It will be assessed as average the performance of those students showing mostly mechanical or mnemonic knowledge of the subject, not articulated synthesis and analysis capabilities, a correct but not always appropriate language, as well as a scholastic study of the history of architecture.

3. It will be assessed as barely sufficient the performance of those students showing learning gaps, inappropriate language, lack of knowledge of the history of architecture.

4. It will be assessed as insufficient the performance of those students showing learning gaps, inappropriate language, no orientation within the recommended bibliography and inability to analyse the architecture.

Teaching tools

Students will be provided with the images projected in lesson and part of the bibliography.

Office hours

See the website of Anna Rosellini

SDGs

Quality education Gender equality Sustainable cities

This teaching activity contributes to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN 2030 Agenda.