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Phases of Post Modern Architecture— Deconstructivism- Part I
IIT Roorkee July 2018
Overview
This video introduces Deconstructivism as a post-modern architectural movement that emerged in the 1980s. It contrasts Deconstructivism with earlier modernist and post-modern styles, highlighting its rejection of ordered rationality, minimalist forms, and clear structural expression. The movement draws inspiration from conceptual art movements like Constructivism and Cubism, emphasizing fragmentation, visual complexity, and a deliberate sense of incompleteness and structural ambiguity. The video explores key characteristics such as angular lines, avoidance of 90-degree angles, and ornamentation derived from geometric complexity rather than historical styles or new technology.
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Chapters
- Deconstructivism is a late post-modern architectural movement that emerged around the 1980s.
- It represents a departure from the ordered rationality and minimalist aesthetics of high modernism.
- Unlike earlier post-modern styles like historicism (which referenced history) or high-tech (which showcased technology), Deconstructivism focuses on fragmentation and complexity.
- The movement's conceptual roots can be traced to modernist art movements like Constructivism and Cubism.
Understanding Deconstructivism's place within post-modernism helps contextualize its radical departure from previous architectural norms and its unique approach to form and structure.
- Modernism emphasized order, simplicity, and 'less is more,' often with clear structural expression.
- Deconstructivism embraces complexity, contradiction, and 'more is more,' intentionally obscuring structural logic.
- While modernist structures like Eero Saarinen's airports showed how loads flowed, Deconstructivist facades hide the actual construction process.
- Deconstructivist lines are often angular and possess 'more inertia' compared to the rectilinear, low-inertia lines of modernism, frequently avoiding 90-degree angles.
This comparison clarifies Deconstructivism's core principles by contrasting them with the familiar ideals of modernism and the visible structural honesty of earlier architectural styles.
The contrast between Eero Saarinen's airport structures, where construction techniques are visible, and Deconstructivist buildings where the facade conceals the internal structural logic.
- In Deconstructivism, ornamentation arises from the complexity of geometry and a deliberate sense of structural or visual imbalance.
- This contrasts with historicism's use of historical motifs or high-tech's focus on new technology as ornamentation.
- The aesthetic prioritizes dynamic forms created by angular lines and varied directions, moving away from minimalist purity.
- Deconstructivism can be seen as a form of 'post-modern cubism' due to its fragmentation of forms.
Understanding how Deconstructivism generates its aesthetic through geometric complexity and imbalance is key to appreciating its departure from traditional notions of beauty and order.
The use of acute and obtuse angles, and lines flowing in different directions, creating a visually dynamic and intentionally imbalanced composition.
- Deconstructivism draws conceptual inspiration from early 20th-century art movements like Russian Constructivism and Cubism.
- Constructivism, though largely conceptual in architecture during its time (1920s), explored dynamic, tilted structures and machine aesthetics.
- Cubism, particularly in paintings by Picasso and Braque, fragmented objects into multiple viewpoints and dimensions, including time.
- These art movements influenced Deconstructivism's use of broken forms, multiple perspectives, and a sense of temporal dimension.
Recognizing the influence of Constructivism and Cubism reveals the intellectual and artistic lineage of Deconstructivism, explaining its fragmented and multi-layered approach to design.
Picasso's paintings, which depict multiple views of a subject simultaneously, influencing the fragmented and multi-perspectival nature of Deconstructivist architecture.
- The Waxner Center for the Arts by Peter Eisenman exemplifies Deconstructivism's questioning of established forms.
- It features elements like a 'cut' bastion, symbolizing a questioning of inherent structural strength and completeness.
- The interior uses elements resembling scaffolding or incomplete structures, serving as both aesthetic features and wayfinding devices.
- Pseudo-columns that hang or don't transfer load, and misaligned grids, intentionally disrupt expectations and create visual tension.
Analyzing specific projects like the Waxner Center provides concrete examples of how Deconstructivist principles are translated into built form, challenging viewers' perceptions of structure and completeness.
The 'cut' bastion at the corner of the Waxner Center, which visually breaks a traditionally robust element, questioning its inherent strength and completeness.
- The Aronoff Center features tilted floor plates and a facade that visually suggests instability, playing with perceptions of structural integrity.
- Its design incorporates cubist principles by breaking the facade into overlapping rectangles and cubes.
- Bernard Tschumi's Parc de la Villette utilizes fragmented forms, hanging elements, and deliberate visual connections that are not structurally sound, creating complex compositions.
- These examples highlight the Deconstructivist tendency to present a facade that intentionally misrepresents or obscures the actual structural reality.
These additional case studies reinforce the core tenets of Deconstructivism by showcasing how architects manipulate form, perception, and structural expression to create dynamic and thought-provoking spaces.
The Aronoff Center's exterior appearance of tilted floor plates, which contrasts with the actual, walkable horizontal floors inside, demonstrating a deliberate visual deception.
Key takeaways
- Deconstructivism challenges the modernist ideal of clarity and order by embracing complexity, fragmentation, and contradiction.
- The movement's aesthetic is derived from geometric complexity and intentional structural ambiguity, rather than historical references or technological display.
- Deconstructivist architecture often deliberately obscures its structural logic, presenting a facade that may not reflect the internal construction.
- Inspiration from art movements like Constructivism and Cubism is evident in Deconstructivism's fragmented forms and multi-perspectival approach.
- Key visual characteristics include angular lines, avoidance of right angles, and a sense of incompleteness or visual imbalance.
- Deconstructivism questions viewers' preconceived notions about structure, stability, and architectural form.
- The ornamentation in Deconstructivism is the complexity of its geometry and the dynamic tension it creates.
Key terms
DeconstructivismPost-modern architectureModernismHistoricismHigh-tech architectureConstructivismCubismInertia (in lines)Geometric complexityStructural imbalance
Test your understanding
- How does Deconstructivism's approach to structural expression differ from that of modernism?
- What are the primary sources of ornamentation in Deconstructivist architecture?
- In what ways did the art movements of Constructivism and Cubism influence Deconstructivist architecture?
- What does the video mean when it describes Deconstructivist lines as having 'more inertia'?
- How do architects like Peter Eisenman use specific design elements to question viewers' assumptions about structure and form?