béton brut: andré bloc and the architecture-sculpture debate
promotor: Prof. dr. ir.-arch. Dirk De Meyer Faculteit Ingenieurswetenschappen en Architectuur Vakgroep Architectuur en Stedenbouw co-promotor: Prof. dr. Steven Jacobs Faculteit Letteren en Wijsbegeerte Vakgroep Kunst-, Muziek- en Theaterwetenschappen Decaan: Prof. dr. Marc Boone Rector: Prof. dr. ir. Rik Van de Walle 1
8
contents
béton brut: andré bloc and the architecture-sculpture debate acknowledgements introduction
4 10
part i bloc, synthesis of the arts, brutalism and concrete chapter one andré bloc and the architecture–sculpture debate chapter two the term brutalism and the material concrete in sculpture and architecture
part ii artworks and ‘espaces sculptés’ (sculptured space)
chapter three picasso’s encounter with concrete: carl nesjar and betograve chapter four concrete sculptures along the road and the international sculpture symposium
Photo section Espaces Sculptés
32 102
142 174 242
part iii buildings and ‘espaces architecturés’ (architectural space) chapter five the sculptural house Chapter six living in a béton brut sculpture chapter seven a sculptural environment for art
Photo section Espaces Architecturés conclusion: concrete synthesis appendix 1: data visualization appendix 2: repertory appendix 3: biography andré bloc illustration credits bibliography summary-samenvatting
262 288 332 374 396 410 420 440 444 462 483 9
Decorative panel executed by Carl Nesjar and designed by Odd Tandberg, office block in Oslo ca. 1958. Published in John- Eastwick Field and John Stillman, “Out of the Form,” The Architectural Review 125, no. 749 (June 1959): 386.
10
introduction
In particular, we distinguish the plasticity of reinforced concrete, and especially the massive sculptures for which eminent artists have, with happiness, abandoned natural stone.1 – Bernard Zehrfuss and Pierre Faucheux
This research endeavor began with an investigation into reinforced concrete architecture of the 1960s. Specifically, I was asking: why were these structures so sculptural? This curiosity directed me to further questions, such as: what is the relationship between sculpture and architecture in each particular artist or architect’s practice? How was this discussion conducted at that time? These questions led me to the influential, but little-known artist, architect, engineer, and journal editor André Bloc (1896–1966) and the magazines that he founded: L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui (Architecture of Today, 1930–present), Art d’Aujourd’hui (Art of Today, 1949–54), and Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture (Today: Art and Architecture, 1955–67). Bloc and his magazines were catalysts in an architecture-sculpture debate, a conversation based on an idea of a synthesis of the arts and that was largely forgotten. Likely in order to be able to reach such a synthesis, both sculptors and architects turned to concrete. Bloc proved to be the central figure of an international network of architects, artists, critics and theorists who played a role in that debate. This network included leading 1 Au passage nous distinguons la plastique du béton armé, et là particulièrement les sculptures dans la masse pour lesquelles d’éminents artistes ont, avec bonheur, abandonné la pierre naturelle. Bernard Zehrfuss and Pierre Faucheux, “L’Exposition: cent ans de béton armé,” L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, no. 27 (December 1949): VIII. Translated by the author.
11
architects such as Le Corbusier, Marcel Breuer, and Pier Luigi Nervi, as well as prominent artists (e.g., Pablo Picasso, Félix del Marle, and Nicolas Schöffer), and theoreticians and writers (e.g., Siegfried Giedion, Léon Degand, Pierre Guégen, and Rogier Bordier). This dissertation focuses on the works and publications of these leading artists and architects of what can be considered the long 1960s, that is, the period from the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s. These works are situated between the high-modernist experiments in the exchange between art and architecture (i.e., De Stijl, Constructivism, Bauhaus, etc.) and the postmodern “plurality” of the so-called “expanding field” that followed the conceptual and minimalist art of the 1960s and 1970s. By analyzing characteristics such as scale, shape, mass, proportion, technological principles, texture, and materials, my broader research agenda is to trace the ways in which architecture appears within this category of sculptural works. The aim of this research is to consider the exchange between architecture and sculpture, and the development of an interface or meeting ground where formal, technical, and aesthetic principles were adopted and translated by two disciplines that nevertheless remain distinct and autonomous. This dissertation also provides a reading of the public discussions about this synthesis in the period’s magazines and conferences. Architectural historian Frédéric Migayrou, who referred to the magazines of André Bloc as medium for experimentation across the arts as an “architecture-sculpture movement,” was the first to note this debate. 2 Drawing on Migayrou’s analysis, I discuss the influence of André Bloc and the specific importance his works and initiatives played on an international level. André Bloc served as a pivotal figure in a vast and international network of artists and architects through the magazines he founded, and in which he widely promoted a synthesis of the arts, standing for an integration of architecture, painting, and sculpture in public space as well as the mutual conflation between architecture and sculpture through the use of concrete. In addition, he was a founding member of the movement called Groupe Espace (1951–1963), which advocated similar ideas by promoting the synthesis of the arts as a “social service” through exhibitions, public
2 The term architecture-sculpture movement was first coined by Frédéric Migayrou and referred to in the magazines of André Bloc that were a medium for experimentation across the arts. This movement was mentioned in the catalogue for the French pavilion of VI Mostra International d’Architecture de Venice, 15 September–16 November, 1996. I like to use this as an umbrella term, however I describe it more as a debate than a movement, especially with regard to the various figures discussed throughout the dissertation. Frédéric Migayrou, Bloc: Le Monolithe Fracturé: VIe Mostra Internationale d’Architecture de Venise (Paris: L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui: AFAA, 1996). 12
demonstrations, events, and urban planning projects. Bloc wrote in 1964 on the sculptural quality of reinforced concrete in architecture: “The character of such works involves exceptional qualities of plasticity very close to those employed by contemporary sculpture.”3 In that same year, Bloc created his first sculptures habitacles, sculptures resembling housing structures. These sculptures were derived from his earlier works. As early as 1949, Bloc made his first monumental sculpture, Signal, at the Place d’Iéna in Paris for the centennial of the invention of reinforced concrete. This work established his reputation as a pioneer in experimenting with concrete in monumental and architecturally scaled sculpture. Bloc evolved from producing architecture, paintings, mural arts, semi-abstract objects, architectural models, and sculptures for public space to his later sculptures habitacles, which brought architecture and sculpture closer together. In his early architectural works, such as his own house in Meudon (1953), Bloc attempted to bring painting, sculpture, and architecture together, thus laying the groundwork for what he would call “synthesis.” His later works engaged with the sculptural form, which he achieved in his intended synthesis. He experimented with the concept of synthesis in his magazines as well as in his own architectural and artistic oeuvre. The objective of this dissertation is to unearth the significance of this movement and its little-acknowledged figures such as Bloc and his role in the initiation of brut aesthetics in post-war art. In doing so, this project deals with works by several collectives—including Groupe Espace and the International Sculpture Symposia—and individual artists such as Joop Beljon, Jacques Moeschal, Mathias Goeritz, and Pierre Szekely, among others, all of whom were part of an international network with Bloc in its center. The timeline in appendix 1 maps this network, showing the artists and architects that were most featured in the magazine alongside André Bloc. In the lead, followed by Claude Parent, Mathias Goeritz, and Oscar Niemeyer, were André Bloc and Le Corbusier. In the repertory appendix we see that institutions such as the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Museum of Modern Art in Rio De Janeiro, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York Art, and the Architecture School at Yale University were the most covered. 3 Bloc particularly refers to the architecture of Paul Rudolph and Louis Kahn here. “Le caractère de telles oeuvres suppose des qualités d’invention plastique exceptionnelles très proches de celles qui animent la sculpture contemporaine.” André Bloc, De La Sculpture à l’architecture (Boulogne, Seine: Editions Aujourd’hui, 1964): 10.
13
Through a study of Bloc’s involvement in the debates on the interactions between sculpture and architecture, this dissertation has broader implications for the understanding of the differences between the disciplines of sculpture and architecture, and how they are imagined and constructed. By focusing on attempts to synthesize these fields, this dissertation illuminates not only the diverging disciplinary features of sculpture and architecture, but also the ways in which concrete allowed for the cross-fertilization of these disciplines. I demonstrate how fundamental the use of concrete was to the development of a new architecturalsculptural form, and how their interdisciplinary and socially-focused practices constitute an overlooked part of the history of post-war art. These practices were transmitted through the magazines of André Bloc and the International Sculpture Symposia from Europe (with high activity in France and Italy), through the U. S. and eventually also into South America, India, and Japan, as the table in appendix 1, which shows the geographic representation of projects on architecture-sculpture featured in the magazines, demonstrates.
Roots The debate on the synthesis reached its apex between 1947 and 1957, and was primarily based on Sigfried Giedion’s theory on monumentality and new monumentality. To a large extent, Bloc brought Giedion’s theories into practice. Starting from a theory that called for collaboration between artists and architects, Giedion’s concepts evolved and became the impetus to integrate art into society, both from an educational and aesthetic perspective. It became a synthesis focused on the integration of art into architecture and the creation of an architecture that was sculptural. Bloc’s magazines, and Bloc himself, distributed these ideas and brought them into practice. Through the magazines, different viewpoints—varying from those that brought all arts together into one new monumental form to those who advocated the idea that one of the disciplines played a dominant role, or to those who stated that architecture and sculpture were on an equal basis— were distributed. The differing opinions published in these magazine were proposed by different writers, most importantly by Bloc himself and by Léon Degand, Pierre Guégen, and Rogier Bordier. As the tables in appendix 1 show, these are the writers that wrote most frequently on the relationships between art and architecture. The initial basis of this concept of the synthesis of the arts, applied through André Bloc’s networks, was formed already in 1933, at the fourth Congrès 14
Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne (CIAM) in Athens, where Fernand Léger gave a speech entitled “The Wall—The Painter—The Architect,” presenting the notion of a synthesis in relation to the ways in which architects and painters could think collaboratively about the wall. This idea laid the groundwork for a practice-oriented synthesis and the work of Bloc. A method of working first described by Sigfried Giedion, Fernand Léger, and José Luis Sert in their 1943 key text, “Nine Points on Monumentality.”4 It declared an ambition for an expressive and symbolic role for the built environment in a modern society. It required close collaborations among planners, architects, painters, and sculptors. In 1944 Giedion further elaborated on this idea in his essay, “The Need for a New Monumentality.” In this text, Giedion made a call for bringing art into public space and being made accessible to all. 5 Later in 1958 he would associate this “New Monumentality” with the sculpture of Pablo Picasso, Antoine Pevsner, Naum Gabo.6 The discussion of the synthesis of the arts was elaborated further at CIAM 6 in Bridgwater, United Kingdom, in 1947. Giedion took the lead in CIAM on the discussion about the synthesis of the arts of architecture, sculpture, and painting.7 Then, Bloc picked up the discussion of the synthesis of the arts expressed at CIAM, bringing it to a much wider audience through his magazines, particularly in Art d’Aujourd’hui. In addition, these ideas were further promoted through the influential publication Art in European Architecture—Synthèses des Arts (1956) by architect and critic Paul Damaz.8 The book provided a broad survey of post-war collaborations between architects, painters, and sculptors, pointing to the fact that architects and artists had always been interested in the relationship between art and architecture. The synthesis in the 1950s differed from that of the interwar period because of its practice-oriented synthesis, with a social role that aimed to make public space visually appealing through the inclusion of painting or sculpture, thus enticing immediate contact with society at large. Art d’Aujourd’hui considered
4 José Lluis Sert, Sigfried Giedion, and Fernand Leger, “Nine Points on Monumentality” (1943), in Architecture You and Me, by Sigfried Giedion, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1958): 49. 5 Sigfried Giedion, “The Need for a New Monumentality” (1944), in Architecture You and Me, by Sigfried Giedion, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1958): 25–39. 6 Sigfried Giedion, Architecture You and Me, 24 7 This can also be concluded through the readings of the Documents of CIAM 6 and CIAM 7, in which Giedion pushed the conversations toward aesthetics, collaborations, and the arts in general. Ciam 7: Bergamo 1949: Documents (Nendeln: Kraus Reprint, 1979); and CIAM 6: Documents. International Congresses for Modern Architecture (Bridgwater, 1947). 8 Paul Damaz, Art in European Architecture—Synthèses des Arts (New York: Reinhold Publishing Corporation, 1956), 69. 15
synthesis to be a meeting of the disciplines rather than a blending of the disciplines into one new form. Bloc articulated and propagated this idea of collaboration among different professions, but this viewpoint can also be found among a wide range of artists based in various regions—such as with Mathias Goeritz in Mexico and Germany, with Tony Smith in the United States, and with Joop Beljon in the Netherlands—each beginning to work with sculpture on an architectural scale. Bloc’s magazines, and Giedion’s later writings further circulated these ideas, which evolved over time so that the idea of a synthesis of the arts shifted towards the concepts of sculptural architecture and architectural sculpture. For example, in Giedion’s subchapter, “The Present State of Architecture,” added to his new 1962 introduction of his seminal book Space, Time and Architecture, he discussed and contextualized the new sculptural tendencies of architecture. Giedion asked himself: “Architecture is approaching sculpture and sculpture approaches architecture. What do these symptoms mean?”9 He thereby divided sculptural architecture into two phases: one earlier phase in which painting was the point of departure—exemplified by De Stijl artists such as Theo van Doesburg, Cornelis van Eesteren, Gerrit Rietveld, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe—and a second phase with sculpture and Le Corbusier as reference points.10 This dissertation precisely investigates this later phase in depth. This later phase contains architectural sculpture and sculptural architecture, and developed from the synthesis of the arts and the new monumentality. This is clearly substantiated by the number of known texts on architecture sculpture and sculptural architecture (see appendix 1). In the graphic tables we see that the number of articles being published peaked between 1950 and 1966. After 1966, articles featuring architectural sculpture, sculptural architecture, and synthesis of the arts decline. Within this study architectural sculpture includes the architecturallyscaled sculptures, sculptural environments, sculptural art integrations in architecture, art in public spaces, and concrete sculptures. Architectural sculpture is understood as a volume that deals with spatiality and, in some cases, proportion; it is an expansion of the domain of sculpture into the world of architecture and public space. This expansion may be achieved either by increasing the scale of a sculpture to architectural scale or by using materials that refer to the built environment (e.g., concrete or brick). The large-scale and
9 Sigfried Giedion, Space, Time and Architecture: The Growth of a New Tradition. 4th ed. (1941, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1962), xxxviii. 10 Giedion, xlv. 16
constructional complexity of these sculptures required architectural as well as engineering skills. Bloc’s magazines, accordingly, used various terminologies to refer to this category, including sculpture et architecture (sculpture and architecture), recherche d’expression architecturales (research into architectural expression), architectures de sculpteurs (architectures of sculptors), sculpture monumentale (monumental sculpture), or espaces sculptés (sculpted spaces). Sculptural architecture, on the other hand, refers to spatiality that deals with volumes in such a way that the construction comes to possess a sculptural shape or sculpted form. Additionally, this sort of architecture has a texture and material tactility at play that links it to the act of sculpting through the borrowing of techniques from sculpture. In Bloc’s magazines, the following terms are used to refer to this type of architecture: architecture sculpture (sculptural architecture), la plastique architectural (architectural sculpture), architectures fantastiques (fantastical architecture), sculptures habitacles (habitacle sculptures), espaces architecturés (architectural space), and forme sculptée (sculpted form). The crossover between sculpture and architecture was not only noticed by Bloc and Giedion; it was also discussed by other theorists such as Theodor Adorno, who—in his 1966 essay on the blurring of art disciplines, “Die Kunst und die Künste”—noted that the boundaries between sculpture and architecture were being erased. Adorno mentioned, for instance, how sculptor Fritz Wotruba referred to architect Hans Scharoun as a source of inspiration.11 Importantly, this blurring of boundaries must be understood in relation to sculptural influences on architecture but also with regard to the influence of architecture on sculptural forms. This is, for example, the case for sculpture that is made out of béton brut (raw concrete). These works therefore have specific architectural characteristics that are stylistically reminiscent of the language of brutalism, as seen, for example, in the work of Jacques Moeschal, Joop Beljon, and Mathias Goeritz.12 The
11 Adorno writes: “Moreover, sculptors have ceased to respect the boundaries between sculpture and architecture that had seemed self-evident, since they were based on the distinction between functional and nonfunctional art. Fritz Wotruba recently drew my attention to the fact that many of his own sculptures start off with the rudiments of the human figure and then develop in a process of increasing dematerialization into quasiarchitectonic forms—he referred specifically to Scharoun.” Theodor Adorno, “Art and the Arts” in Can One Live after Auschwitz: A Philosophical Reader, trans. Rodney Livingstone (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003), 368–69. 12 Béton brut is a type of raw, architectural concrete, in which the wooden imprints are revealed from its in-situ casting and unfinished form. Brutalism—the idiom which in great part derives from the béton brut (raw concrete) work by Le Corbusier—has come to be associated with a number of definitions and loaded with a plethora of diverse connotations when applied to architecture. The difficulty in setting out a coherent narrative for the movement and its development is twofold. First, the meaning of brutalism has come to be somewhat taken for 17
highlight of béton brut is an emphasis on leaving the formwork rough, or laissé brut de décoffrage.13 Béton brut gave an architectural layer to sculpture for example in the way it required architectural skills, whereas in architecture it created a sculptural character. These surface textures have a distinct tactile sense, a characteristic that is often identified with modernist sculpture. Bloc’s magazines highlighted these features, both in their textual contributions and in their illustrations. Today this period is linked to brutalism, although it is seen as a far more formal counterpart to British brutalism. As will be discussed in chapter two, British brutalism is associated with the architects Alison and Peter Smithson and architect and historian Reyner Banham, and characterized by “under-design,” which was first and foremost an ethical basis the movement. In French circles on the other hand, architects and writers were talking more about béton brut. In Bloc’s magazine, the term brutalism was mostly used when referring to external critics . For example, Arthur Drexler, then curator of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), was quoted in an article on Le Corbusier’s 1963 exhibition. The MoMA show focused on Le Corbusier’s post-war works, which were heavier and more sculptural. Drexler referred to these works as containing “a certain brutalism.” 14 Associating brutalism with béton brut, Drexler’s text makes clear that this term was used more thoughtfully then than it is today; in that time, it was not applied to all structures made in béton brut. Today, brutalist has become a generic term for all concrete structures for which the concrete formwork has been left unfinished. In his 1966 edition of Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture—a special issue that was called “Espaces Sculptés—Espaces Architecturés,” translated as “Sculptured Space—Architectural Space”—Bloc maintained a clear-cut distinction between architectural sculpture, and sculptural architecture. The introduction of this issue stated that “a few sculptors proposed collaborating directly in designing living architecture. Some architects
granted as a formal style in the architecture of post-war institutional buildings. At the same time, the words ‘brutalism’ and ‘brutalist’ have been used for a diverse range of architectural styles, each underpinned by different approaches to both form and ethics, and with a different geographical mapping. Second, most theoretical work on brutalism stems from the seminal work of Reyner Banham, who offered the first and impressively comprehensive—although also geographically and historically limited—appraisal of brutalism in the context of his discussion of the ‘New Brutalism’ movement, and whose critical analysis continues to be an important frame of reference for any work on brutalism today. R. Banham, The New Brutalism: Ethic or Aesthetic?, London, Architectural Press, 1966. 13 These examples are not referred to as brutalism in the pages of Bloc’s magazines, the most common term in reference to these houses was béton brut. Cent Maisons d’Aujourd’hui, L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, no. 103 (1962). 14 Arthur Drexler, “Exposition Le Corbusier,” Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, no. 41 (May 1963): 60–61. 18
even behave like real sculptors and their work includes original inspiration worthy of our epoch.” 15 This was reflected in the pages of architects who had used the sculptural approach to architecture, such as Frederick Kiesler, Walter Förderer, Hermann Finsterlin, Jacques Couëlle, and Constant Nieuwenhuys. The same applies to sculptors who used an architectural approach to sculpture such as Joop Beljon, Mathias Goeritz, Pierre Székely, and Bloc himself. A similar approach was used for the structure of this dissertation in the last two parts: one part focusing on Espaces Sculptés, and the other focusing on Espaces Architecturés.16 Moreover, the introduction to the 1966 issue calls for a synthesis that is not about addition, but instead about integration: “Le Corbusier and others often referred to the Synthesis of the Arts—up to now we had contented ourselves with intentions. Synthesis is not an addition. It is not sufficient to add a few paintings or statues to architecture to endow it with quality.”17 This number shows us a culmination of archi-sculpture projects seen in previous numbers. The images further direct the reader to look at examples from both perspectives—a sculptural approach and architectural approach—through the formal connections made between sculpture and architecture. Discussing espaces sculptés on the one hand and espaces architecturés on the other, I draw additionally on the division that critic Michel Ragon suggested in his 1963 book on domestic architecture: “l’architecture-sculpture” (sculptural architecture) versus “la sculpturearchitecture” (architectural sculpture).18 Explaining the differences between these two phenomena, he states: “Because it is necessary to differentiate between the architects who made art the way the sculptor would and the sculptors whose works are a priori free. [The sculptors] can create proposals submitted to the meditation of the architects and the engineers who will realize them afterwards or will adopt them according to the technical requirements, which artists do not have to ask themselves.”19 15 “Espaces Sculptés,” Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, no. 53 (May–June 1966), III. 16 Throughout the dissertation I refer to espaces sculptés as the works of art and espaces architecturés as the buildings. Although these terms could also be used in reverse, espaces sculptés could also be applied to architecture or espaces architecturés could be applied to sculpture. Bloc does not explicitly define these terms in one way or another. 17 “Espaces Sculptés,” III. 18 In Ragon’s book Ou vivrons-nous demain? (1963), published at the beginning of the peak of sculptural architecture, he dedicated a chapter to “la maison sculpture” (the sculptural house). Many of the figures cited in Ragon’s writings are present in Bloc’s magazines. Michel Ragon, Ou Vivrons-Nous Demain? (Paris: Robert Laffont, 1963). 19 “Parce qu’il y a lieu de différencier les architectes qui réalisent leur art à la manière d’un sculpteur et les sculpteurs dont les œuvres a priori gratuites peuvent constituer des propositions soumises à la méditation des architectes et des ingénieurs qui les réaliseront ensuite ou les modifieront suivant des exigences techniques que les plasticiens n’ont pas à se 19
Ragon emphasizes the fact that architects are confronted with restrictions associated with technical requirements, safety, and the needs of the client.20 Many of Ragon and Bloc’s examples of architecture, sculpture, and writing were engendered by the discussions about the synthesis of the arts that took place at the sixth CIAM conference. This discussion, together with Bloc’s unique editorial role in which he brought architecturesculpture hybrid work into the public eye, gave birth to the architecturesculpture debate, which is the main topic of this study.
Structure and Chapter Layout This dissertation comprises seven chapters divided into three parts. Part 1, “Bloc, Synthesis of the arts, Brutalism, and Concrete,” introduces the main terms and definitions that were used in the architecture-sculpture debate. It contains the two first introductory chapters that analyze André Bloc’s influential role, and unpacks the history and terminology of brutalism and the use of concrete. These two chapters provide a theoretical framework for the subsequent chapters that deal with individual works and specific practices that were, in one way or another, influenced by the theoretical debates discussed in the first chapters. Chapter 1, “The Architecture-Sculpture Debate and the Role of André Bloc through L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, Art d’Aujourd’hui, Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, and Groupe Espace,” explores the work of French architect, sculptor, and writer André Bloc and his influence on the merging of art and architecture through the magazines he founded and the art-architecture movement he was involved in. In his magazines, readers came into contact with hybrid intersections between art and architecture, architectural sculpture, sculptural architecture, and the social implications of art. This chapter focuses on the promotion and effects of the idea of the “synthesis of the arts,” as well as on the public projects completed by those involved in the movement. The magazines, as well as the Groupe Espace, demonstrate how the impetus to combine sculpture with architecture was paramount from the mid-1950s until its peak in the mid-1960s. This chapter reveals the importance of Bloc’s contributions, suggesting that the importance of the architecture-sculpture debate is yet to be fully recognized.
poser.” Ragon, Ou Vivrons-Nous Demain?, 111. Translated by the author. 20 His ideas related to the synthèse des arts, as well as those from his circle, will be further expanded in chapter 5, which addresses the Architecture-Sculpture movement and living in a sculpture. 20
Chapter 2, “Brutalism and the material Concrete in Sculpture and Architecture,” focuses on the history and diverse practices of brutalism. Although Bloc’s magazines used the term “béton brut” rather than “brutalism,” any attempt to describe architectural sculpture and sculptural architecture in connection to concrete needs to deal with brutalism in order to historically situate béton brut. How did the term “brutalism” originate? When and how was it used? And, more specifically, how was brutalism used to describe architecture as opposed to art? After outlining the history of the term, this chapter studies the history of reinforced concrete, discussing works and realizations in which architecture and sculpture came together. As previously mentioned, the organization of the two following parts of this dissertation is loosely based on the 1966 issue of Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, “Espaces Sculptés—Espaces Architecturés.” The examples I discuss show different ways of approaching architecture and sculpture, each viewing one through the lens of the other. This variation in disciplinary perspective is what I adopt in the second and third parts of my dissertation. These written parts are accompanied by a photo section depicting facsimiles of pages and spreads from the magazine that showcase the interrelations between architecture and sculpture, as seen in part two, “Espaces Sculptés,” and part three, “Espaces Architecturés.” Juxtaposing architectural sculpture with sculpted architecture, this section demonstrates how the two disciplines interconnect and even complement each other. Part 2, “Artworks and Espaces Sculptés (Sculptured Space),” addresses sculptures placed in an architectural environment (i.e., sculptured space). This part traces early examples of architecturally-scaled sculptures in concrete. Concrete played an important role in achieving such a large scale and in moving art from the museum into public space. The chapters of this part focus on artists who tested the possibilities of concrete in their large sculptural projects, such as Pablo Picasso in France, Mathias Goeritz in Mexico, Joop Beljon in the Netherlands, and Jacques Moeschal in Belgium. Chapter 3, “Picasso’s Encounter with Concrete: Carl Nesjar and Betograve,” reveals the links between little-known examples and canonical works of art by exploring Picasso’s somewhat understudied use of concrete in the late-1950s. It investigates how architecture as a discipline became crucial for Picasso’s artistic practice. Picasso inspired various artists in the same way Le Corbusier did architects. The material of concrete enabled artists to make larger sculptures in public spaces. As Pierre Gascar notes in Picasso et le béton, concrete has a special duality as something at once rigid and compact, but also capable of taking any 21
form.21 With their roughness, Picasso’s concrete sculptures share a formal resemblance with the béton brut architecture of that time. Together with Le Corbusier, Picasso exemplifies the mutual influence and crossover between art and architecture. Picasso’s sculptures and those of various other artists working in concrete show that this material—an ultimate symbol of modernity—had implications for architecture but also for art. From the 1960s onwards, a large number of both prominent and lesserknown artists started using concrete extensively in the wake of Picasso’s experiments. Chapter 4, “Concrete Sculptures Along the Road: Moeschal, Székely, and Goeritz in the 1960s,” examines a series of projects and proposals concerned with sculpture built alongside highways. It aims to illuminate an understudied history of architectural sculpture in béton (concrete). The form of these works was determined by the fact that they had to be seen from a distant and dynamic point of view, and therefore had to be monumental, yet minimal and expressive. In this way, concrete played an important role in the construction of a “dynamic” perception. This chapter also traces how the phenomenon of art along the highway was connected to the network of the International Sculpture Symposium, which took place from 1959 to the mid-1970s. Part 3, “Buildings and ‘Espaces Architecturés’ (Architectural Space),” views architecture through the lens of the sculpture. It explores examples of concrete constructions such as the private house and the museum, both of which tended to be sculptural but also had specific sheltering functions. Here, the standard thinking used in architecture was replaced by a mode of thinking that is more subjective and artistic. These sculptural examples reject the strict boundaries between architecture and sculpture because of their creative approach to the process of building. This greater creativity may be the reason why the structures are seen less in everyday architecture and are reminiscent of sculpture. Here again, it is not a matter of absolute categories but of degrees and intersections. Chapter 5, “The sculptural house,” discusses the idea of sculptural architecture and focuses on the notion of the home that was further developed from this synthesis in the arts. Throughout the 1960s, Bloc’s magazines featured concrete homes that looked as though they were carved from stone. These structures were extensively photographed using specific angles and close-up shots to emphasize the sculptural qualities of
21 Pierre Gascar and Daniel Gervis, Picasso et le béton (Paris: s.n., 1967). 22
the buildings. The architects would literally sculpt on site in order to create eccentric, yet functional spaces. Through a review of the literature on this topic, this chapter provides an overview of the idea of the sculptural house. It also considers a range of examples, from primitive, cave-like structures to futuristic houses that were often thought of as the epitome of sculptural architecture. Chapter 6, “Living in a Béton Brut Sculpture,” focuses on a specific subset of sculptural houses made in béton brut. Images of the sculptural house, as described in the previous chapter, were published in Bloc’s magazines. The sculptural house was often organic, and took its formal qualities from that of nature, specifically mimicking the forms of natural caves and caverns. The previous chapter approaches the sculptural house at a surface level—covering ideas developed in 1947 and 1949 at the sixth and seventh CIAM conference in Bridgwater and Bergamo—and defines what made a house sculptural. This chapter, in contrast, focuses on the experience of residing in these homes, particularly in the sculptural houses constructed of concrete, where the imprints of the wooden formwork boards were visibly pronounced. Pictures of this sort of architecture were reproduced in André Bloc’s magazines, with the structures differentiated from other forms of architecture and identified as béton brut architecture. Taking its cue from the 1962 issue of L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui entitled “Cent maisons d’Aujourd’hui” (“One Hundred Houses of Today”), this chapter investigates a more sculptural way of building concrete homes in the 1960s and refers to brutalism and the bunker. 22 It focuses specifically on homes designed by Juliaan Lampens in Belgium and some of his contemporaries in Morocco, Switzerland, and Italy such as JeanFrancois Zevaco, Hans Demarmels and Vittoriano Vigano, all of whom shared similar ideas about living and building. Together, these dwellings demonstrate the international scope and variation of brutalism, bringing to light the often-overlooked, yet unique, sculptural qualities, forms, and characteristics that emerged among concrete architecture. Chapter 7, “A Sculptural Environment for Art,” explores how museum buildings and exhibition designs created sculptural environments for art at the end of the 1950s and into the 1960s. The early issues of André Bloc’s magazine reveal the outspoken interest Bloc and his peers had in museum and exhibition design. Prominent examples explored Claude Parent’s exhibition displays and Aldo van Eyck’s pavilion in Sonsbeek. These examples showcase the various mutual influences between art and
22 “Cent Maisons d’Aujourd’hui,” L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, no. 103 (1962). 23
architecture. The first part of this chapter deals with exhibition design for sculpture in the 1960s. The second part of the chapter examines the museum building itself as a work of sculpture. Claude Parent, Aldo van Eyck and Marcel Breuer’s work brings us to the conclusion of this dissertation, “Concrete Synthesis,” which gives an overview of how Bloc’s visual and written work contributed to the development of the synthesis of the arts that itself developed into the promotion of the new phenomenon known as “sculptural architecture” or “architectural sculpture.” After studying Bloc’s contribution and various archi-sculpture projects in concrete, four themes emerge. First, the significant conceptual links between Sigfried Giedion and André Bloc; second, the specific role of Bloc’s magazines and their impact on disseminating the exchange between architecture and sculpture; third, the presence of art in public spaces; and, fourth, the use of béton brut and the reciprocal influence between architects and sculptors.
Rationale and Methodology The impetus for this research was the fact that many aspects of midcentury brutalism are still under-studied: the experiments with concrete by canonical artists such as Picasso; large, roadside public sculptures in concrete; the international sculpture symposium; the specificity of postwar interactions between art and architecture that clearly differ from pre-war experiments; the living in béton brut structures; the experiments with museum spaces within brutalism; the role played by André Bloc; the specificity of Bloc’s magazines with their concise texts and abundant use of illustrations; and the international dissemination of Bloc’s ideas. Bloc was a prolific and versatile artist, architect, engineer, publisher, and writer as well as cofounder of Groupe Espace. However, after his death in 1966, he became somewhat forgotten, with the exception of a 1967 special issue of Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture published in his honor.23 This issue included documentation of his work as an artist and architect, as well as a survey of his contributions to the magazine. This 1967 issue was the first publication to bring attention to Bloc’s work as a whole, exploring his distinct contribution to editing the magazine. Since then, no monograph has appeared on his work, nor has there been significant new scholarship on his oeuvre; studies considering Bloc’s work relating to the relationship between sculpture and architecture are especially sparse.
23 Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture 10, no. 59–60 (December 1967). 24
Apart from the special issue and the letters between Josep Lluís Sert and Giedion, Bloc’s seminal contributions have been overlooked in scholarship on post-war architecture-sculpture and the synthesis of the arts. Most research has instead highlighted Le Corbusier. Giedion is often not named either, and in discussions on CIAM 6 and 7, he is only mentioned sporadically, for example, in the writings of Nicola Pezolet and Romy Golan.24 Joan Ockman’s article, “A Plastic Epic: The Synthesis of the Arts Discourse in the Mid-Twentieth Century,” comes closest to describing the development of the synthesis of the arts in France from the 1940s until the end of the 1960s.25 However, even though Ockman’s interpretation focuses on a French context, Bloc does not play a major role in the essay. Fernand Léger, Le Corbusier, and Félix del Marle are, instead, at the center of her discussion. In Ockman’s interpretation, the synthesis ended more or less in 1957, so its aftermath and the architecture-sculpture debate between Giedion and Bloc are left out. As stated above, a cross-disciplinary approach was suggested by architectural historian Frédéric Migayrou, who noted that the magazines were a medium for experimentation across the arts. Migayrou briefly referred to the architecture-sculpture movement in the catalogue for the French pavilion of VI Mostra International d’Architecture de Venice, held from 15 September to 16 November 1996.26 More recently, the exhibition catalogue of L’été 1954 à Biot looks at Groupe Espace and the role of André Bloc within it.27 Prior to this, there was no study that charted Bloc’s influence on artists and architects working at the intersection of art and architecture. Still, there is some interesting scholarship that looked at one of the journals in particular, such as the work of Corine Girieud. Girieud’s doctoral dissertation examined the thirty-six issues of Art d’aujourd’hui published between June 1949 and December 1954. She examined how the magazine was founded to promote geometric abstraction and the synthesis of the arts, as well as its main role in bringing the avant-garde to everyone. She identified the ideas that were disseminated in the magazine, including, for example: art in everyday life, art education in schools, and
24 Nicola Pezolet, Reconstruction and the Synthesis of the Arts in France, 1944–1962 (London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2018). Or the chapter All-Redeeming Synthesis in: Romy Golan, Muralnomad: Aura and Instability of the Wall Painting in Europe 1918– 1960 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009). 25 Joan Ockman, “A Plastic Epic: The Synthesis of the Arts Discourse in the Mid-Twentieth Century,” in Art + Architecture: New Visions, New 6 Strategies, ed. Eeva-Liisa Pelkonen and Esa Laaksonen (Helsinki: Alvar Aalto Foundation, 2007), 30–55. 26 Migayrou, Bloc: Le Monolithe fracturé, 9. 27 L’Été 1954 à Biot: Architecture, Formes, Couleur: Biot, Musée National Fernand Léger, 25 Juin–26 Septembre 2016 (Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, 2016). 25
public recognition in contemporary art museums.28 Furthermore, Cécilia Braschi, whose recent dissertation examined the relationship between artistic production in Brazil and France documented through art and architecture magazines from 1930 to 1960, is also significant. Braschi discusses how André Bloc, whose magazines were widely distributed in South America, played a role in spreading geometric abstraction and the synthesis of the arts in Brazil. In the prologue, she gives a historical overview of the synthesis of the arts, which she believes to have a long history, citing earlier examples, such as Richard Wagner’s model of the Gesamtkunstwerk or the Arts and Crafts movement. Focusing on the relationship between France and Brazil, her dissertation shows Bloc’s presence in Brazil through various exhibitions and lectures, such as the Congress of the Association Internationale des Critiques d’Art organized in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro in 1959 with Brasília, New City, and the synthesis of the arts as core themes. Braschi’s work, however, deals with Franco-Brazilian cultural relationships in general, rather than specifically with the work of artists and architects. Further, she does not discuss examples of the relationship between sculpture and architecture.29 My contribution and method are rooted primarily in art and architectural history; my analysis, therefore, relies chiefly on historical texts such as the magazines of Bloc and his contemporaries, and understudied publications by figures in Bloc’s network such as Beljon, Damaz and Ragon. In addition, I use archival material related to artists and architects that has yet to be fully researched. The methodological starting point was then also the study of the dissemination of art and architectural hybrids through their publication in Bloc’s magazines. I examined the magazines of André Bloc: L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, Art d’ Aujourd’hui, and Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, as well as documents related to Groupe Espace and catalogues written and published by Bloc. I looked for examples of crossovers between architecture and sculpture and followed the lead of projects where these crossovers were more prominent and, most importantly, were made of concrete. In the issues of L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, Art d’Aujourd’hui and Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, I examined cases marked by an interaction between sculpture and architecture.
28 Corine Girieud, “La Revue Art d’Aujourd’hui (1949–1954): Une vision sociale de l’art” (PhD diss., Université Paris-Sorbonne, 2011). 29 Cécilia Braschi, “Espaces construits: abstraction et synthèse des arts au Brésil, autour des revues d’André Bloc (1930–1960)” (PhD diss., Université Panthéon-Sorbonne, 2019). 26
An important focal point are those cases that evoke the notion of a “public art.” Initially, these journals only sporadically referred to sculptures in public space. From 1954 onwards, however, such examples became more prominent in Art d’Aujourd’Hui.30 Issue 5 included an article by Roger Bordier entitled “L’Art est un service social” (Art is a Social Service), which specifically dealt with the integration of art in architecture and public space.31 As appendix 1 shows, the magazines featured more integrations in the 1950s than in the 1960s, and the integration projects were followed by architectural sculpture in the 1960s. Another focal point of my research is the private house. Concrete architecture in the 1960s is usually associated with public buildings in Europe, the United Kingdom, and the United States. This leaves the whole area of private houses rather understudied by architectural historians. Examples of concrete dwellings merit study because they explore ideas integral to twentieth-century notions about domestic life. Another typology that was widely covered in the magazine is that of the museum building and of exhibition design. Bloc’s magazines dealt extensively with these typologies, and having Bloc at the center of my research enabled me to analyze private houses as well as museum and exhibition spaces. Appendix 1 includes graphics with the subthemes. From these graphics, we can deduce that museum buildings and exhibition designs were more prominent in the 1950s, only to be gradually replaced by the presence of sculptural houses and sculptural architecture in general in the decade that followed. It is also during this period of decline for interest in museum building and exhibition design that we begin to see the decline of interests in the synthesis of the arts. The methodological starting point of this dissertation became the journals themselves, which I mapped and indexed. In my analysis of the magazines, I came across 291 articles on the relationship between art and architecture (see repertory and data visualization in appendix). These articles show the importance of discussions about the integration of sculpture and architecture in the magazine, and discussions about béton brut and museum display. These articles could be divided into five major theme: architecture sculpture, sculptural architecture, synthesis of the arts, André Bloc, and béton brut. Architectural sculpture includes subthemes such as those integrating art and architecture and those that might be considered
30 Art d’Aujourd’Hui 5, no. 4–5 (June 1954). 31 Roger, Bordier, “L’Art est un service social,” Art d’Aujourd’Hui 5, no. 4–5 (June 1954): 13–30. 27
sculptural environments, architecturally-scaled sculptures, or scale models. Under the category of sculptural architecture, I identified museum buildings, museum displays, and private houses. The theme of Béton brut, included cases where photography focused on the tactility of béton brut or focused on sculptural details. The category of works by Bloc is further organized according to the following subthemes: his own practice and writings, and his involvement in Groupe Espace. The number of articles related to the relationship between art and architecture indicates that the magazine was a tool for spreading these types of interactions from the 1950s until André Bloc’s death in 1966. I extended my research through archival work, on-site visits, and interviews. I consulted contemporaneous as well as more recent literature including journals such as the Architecture Review, Werk, Abitare, Domus, Architectural Design, Spazio, and Artforum. I started my research from key publications by Le Corbusier, CIAM, Sigfried Giedion, Reyner Banham, Michel Ragon, Paul Damaz and Marcel Joray to name a selection of those that were most important. I researched the archives of the Fondation Le Corbusier and Fonds André Bloc in the Bibliothèque Kandinsky-MNAMCCI-Centre Pompidou, Paris; the Sigfried Giedion papers and CIAM archive at the GTA Archives in the ETH Zurich; and the Jacques Moeschal papers in the Moeschal Archive, Corroy-le-Grand. Rather than using a monographic treatment or a discipline-specific study, I have chosen to bring the disciplines of art and architecture together and compare a larger sample of practitioners—from the famous to the lesser-known figures on a set of specific themes. By doing so, I highlight their interconnectivity and their participation in broader debates on architecture and public space. Considering the impossibility of conducting an exhaustive survey of cases from around the world, I made a selection that exemplifies significant aspects of the relationships between sculpture and architecture. These can be linked to André Bloc and his influence through the international distribution of his magazines. Combining onsite visits with archival research, I selected a range of artists who acted as exemplars of the abiding themes of sculpture and architecture in concrete. Today, the use of concrete raises critical questions regarding its ecological impact and concerns around sustainability. The Guardian’s global environment editor, Jonathan Watts, writes: “After water, concrete is the most widely used substance on Earth. If the cement industry were a country, it would be the third largest carbon dioxide emitter in the
28
world with up to 2.8bn tons, surpassed only by China and the US.”32 Furthermore, Watts mentions that, according to the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate in 2050, global cement production will emit 470 gigatons of carbon dioxide (if we were to adapt this to the modern population, this would be the same emission as twenty-two cars for each human being on earth.)33 So, today concrete has a detrimental connotation and we cannot encourage its usage to the extent we might have in the past. Nevertheless, it is important to acknowledge that in the past, concrete was seen as an appropriate material because of its abundance, plasticity, and endurance that enabled artists and architects to create cutting-edge works. The great architectural and sculptural value of these works allows us to realize the unique ways in which these fields interacted with each other and shaped the brut aesthetics of the post-war era.
32 Jonathan Watts, “Concrete: The Most Destructive Material on Earth,” Guardian, accessed June 11, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/feb/25/concrete-the-most-destructivematerial-on-earth. 33 According to the Fod Mobiliteit en Vervoer (Fod Mobility and transport), the average Belgian today drives 15000 km a year, which corresponds to an emission of 2.8 tons of carbon dioxide. When the emission of concrete would be converted to the 15 000 km average for the world population, that would come to twenty-two cars for each human being on earth who would drive 15,000 km with each of the twenty-two cars a year or 330,000 km a year with one car. 29
Fig. 1.1 Cover of L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, no. 1 (November 1930). Fig. 1.2 Cover of Art d’Aujourd’Hui series 5, no. 6 (september 1954). Fig. 1.3 Cover of Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, no. 1 (January 1955).
32
chapter one: andré bloc and the architecture– sculpture debate
Il serait bien souhaitable que les sculpteurs ne limitent pas leurs travaux à des sculptures objets destinées à des collections privées ou à des musées. La réintégration des artistes et en particulier des sculpteurs dans la vie du monde moderne pourrait avoir une excellente influence. Encore faudrait-il que leur lent et difficile travail de recherche soit encouragé par les architectes, les urbanistes et aussi par les responsables des grands travaux.1 – André Bloc
Many pieces of sculptural architecture appeared in France and the Francophone world in the 1960s, including works by key figures, such as Jacques Couëlle, Pascal Häusermann, Claude Häusermann, Daniel Grataloup, Claude Parent, and Pierre Székely. This desire to combine sculpture with architecture and create a synthesis of the arts (synthèse des arts) was particularly strong from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s, when it resulted in the so-called “architecture-sculpture debate,” which stood for the phenomenon of architects and artists working at the intersection of art and architecture. This debate can be largely connected to André Bloc (1896–1966), who worked in Paris in the first half of the twentieth century and who served as an instrumental and intermediary figure in the promotion of the interrelations of the arts through the magazines he founded: L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui (Architecture of Today; 1930– present) and its spin offs, Art d’Aujourd’hui (Art of Today; 1949–1954) and Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture (Today Art and Architecture; 1955– 1967). These magazines distributed both ideas about and images of the 1 It would be good if sculptors did not limit their work to sculptural objects for private collections or museums. The reintegration of artists, and in particular sculptors, into life in the modern world could have an excellent influence. It would still be necessary for their slow and difficult research process to be encouraged by architects, town planners, and also by those responsible for major works. André Bloc, “La recherche architecturale,” Architecture formes fonctions: revue annuelle Suisse d’architecture, d’art et d’urbanisme, no. 2 (1964): 15 – 21. Translated by the author. 33
overlaps between architecture and sculpture. In these journals, readers came into contact with the basic concepts of the debate—especially the idea of the “synthesis of the arts” and the social role of aesthetics—as well as with examples of architectural sculpture and sculptural architecture. After Bloc’s death in 1966, a special issue of Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture was published in his honor. This issue included a retrospective of his own work as an artist and architect, as well as a survey of his contributions to the journal. However, Bloc’s influence on artists and architects had not yet been addressed as such. This issue was the first publication to bring attention to Bloc’s work as a whole, exploring his distinct contribution to the field. No monograph has appeared on his work since, nor has there been much literature on his oeuvre in the years that followed, although many articles and small exhibition catalogues were published on his work during his lifetime.2 In this chapter, I will recover the importance of Bloc’s contributions, addressing how the crossover between art and architecture was spread through Bloc’s magazines, both within France and internationally. I will examine the role of L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, Art d’Aujourd’hui, and Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, as well as Groupe Espace and, most importantly, Bloc himself, in the development of
2 As mentioned in the introduction, a cross-disciplinary approach was addressed by architectural historian Frédéric Migayrou, who mentioned that the magazines were a medium for experimentation across the arts. He also briefly referred to the architecture–sculpture movement in the catalogue for the French pavilion of VI Mostra International d’Architecture de Venice, 15 September–16 November 1996. Migayrou, Bloc: Le Monolithe fracturé, 9. More recently the exhibition catalogue of L’Été 1954 à Biot looks at Groupe Espace and the role of André Bloc within it. L’Été 1954 à Biot: Architecture, Formes, Couleur: Biot, Musée National Fernand Léger, 25 Juin–26 Septembre 2016 (Paris: Réunion des musées nationaux, 2016). Prior to this, there was no study that charted Bloc’s influence on artists and architects working at the intersection of art and architecture. Still, there were some interesting studies that looked at one of the journals in specific, such as the work of Corine Girieud. Girieud’s dissertation studies the 36 issues of Art d’Aujourd’hui, published between June 1949 and December 1954. She examines how it was founded to promote geometric abstraction, the synthesis of the arts, as well as how the publication’s main role was to bring the avant-garde to everyone. She speculates the contemporary role of the ideas that were disseminated in the magazine, for example, art in everyday life, art education in schools, and public recognition of art through institutional support in contemporary art museums. See Corine Girieud, La Revue Art d’aujourd’hui (1949-1954): Une vision sociale de l’art (PhD diss., Université Paris-Sorbonne, 2011). Furthermore, it is possible to mention the research of Cécilia Braschi, whose dissertation examines the relationship between artistic production in Brazilian and French scenes, as documented through art and architecture magazines from 1930 to 1960. She put on evidence how a figure like André Bloc, with his magazines widely distributed in South America, played a role in spreading the ideas of geometric abstraction and synthesis of the arts, as well as his influence on the Brazilian magazines and artistic production. Cécilia Braschi, Espaces construits: abstraction et synthèse des arts au Brésil, autour des revues d’André Bloc (19301960) (PhD diss., Université Panthéon-Sorbonne, 2019).
34
Fig. 1.4 Cover of no 17, Le Corbusier, L’Esprit nouveau, 1920 -1925.
Fig. 1.5 Letter from André Bloc to Le Corbusier. January 7, 1923 [Folder E1-8 43 Fondation Le Corbusier Paris, France].
architectural sculpture and sculptural architecture (referred to as the architecture–sculpture debate). This chapter will also address the discussion of art in the public realm and the influence of that discussion on the development of public art; art built for public spaces was an important topic in the architecture-sculpture debate. André Bloc’s Role in the Architecture–Sculpture Debate André Bloc was born on May 23, 1896 in Algiers, to parents from Lorraine, France. In 1898, the family moved back to France and Bloc attended school in Paris.3 Bloc was best known for combining painting and sculpture with architecture, towards the goal of creating a new monumental form of art. Although he was trained as an engineer at the École Central de Paris and worked fixing rubber problems in turbines during the 1920s, Bloc quickly shifted his dedication to architecture.4 His interests in art and architecture began when he met Le Corbusier and became acquainted with the magazine l’Esprit Nouveau (October 1920– January 1925.5 Founded by Le Corbusier in collaboration with Amédée 3 See Addendum Biography André Bloc for an overview of Bloc’s life. 4 Pierre Vago would later state that Bloc changed much over time; Vago mentions in the introduction to his homage to Bloc how those who knew him at a time when the authority of A. A. was already firmly established would have had difficulty recognizing the André Bloc of the early days in the 1920s to mid-1940s. Pierre Vago in Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture 10, no. 59–60 (Dec. 1967): 3. From the 1940s onwards Bloc began experimenting with architecture, sculpture and painting. It is also during this time that he started to promote a synthesis of the arts and the integration of the arts into architecture. 5 In 1921, he met with Le Corbusier, Frantz, and Francis Jourdain, in addition to Henri Sauvage and Auguste Perret. See “Entretien avec André Bloc,” Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture 35
Fig. 1.33 Mounting of the sculpture Signal, Place d’Iéna, 1949 [3482 Bloc 2 Fonds André Bloc in Bibliothèque Kandinsky - MNAM-CCI Centre Pompidou, Paris].
75
Fig. 2.21 Olivier Seguin, sculpture in béton brut in front of Teatro Experimental, Guadalajara, published in Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, no. 47 (October 1964): 24.
135
Fig. 2.22 Le Corbusier, Construction site Unité d’habitation, 1949, published in Art d’Aujourd’hui 1, no. 2 (July- August 1949): n.p. 136
137
Fig. 3.1 Carl Nesjar in front of the concrete walls of government buildings in Oslo, published in John- Eastwick Field and John Stillman, “Out of the Form,” Architectural Review 125, no. 749 (June 1959): 386.
142
chapter three: picasso's encounter with concrete: carl nesjar and betograve
Jusqu’ici le sculpteur modelait les formes ou cherchait à les dégager de la matière où elles étaient enfermées. Avec le béton, l’artiste, devenu bâtisseur, les crée à partir du vide et se trouve affranchi d’une assignation à l’intérieur d’une matière pré-existante.1 - Daniel Gervis and Pierre Gascar
This chapter will explore Picasso’s work with concrete and how it led to the introduction of architecture in his sculptural work. This will be revealed through his relationship with Le Corbusier, who was both inspired by and respected by the Spanish artist. Furthermore, Picasso was deemed to be of great value for the art world, as other artists looked to him for inspiration. This discussion will focus on his importance for the architectural–sculpture debate and for artists working in concrete in the 1960s by looking closely at how his monumental sculptures were constructed Picasso inspired and became a model for various artists—namely, André Bloc, Mathias Goeritz, Joop Beljon, and Herbert Bayer—in the same way that Le Corbusier became a model for architects, especially because of his choice of material and scale. Nevertheless, his work first and foremost reflects the Zeitgeist of his era. It should be also noted that Picasso was prominently featured in the 1 “Up until now, the sculptor has modeled forms or sought to free them from the material in which they were enclosed. With concrete, the artist, who has become a builder, creates them from the void and finds himself free from an assignation within a pre-existing material.” Daniel Gervis and Pierre Gascar, epigraph to Picasso et le beton (Paris: Galerie Jeanne Bucher, 1966). 143
Fig. 3.2 André Bloc in front of photograph of Picasso [3482 Bloc 2 no 406 Fonds André Bloc in Bibliothèque Kandinsky - MNAMCCI - Centre Pompidou, Paris].
Fig. 3.3 Picasso with André Bloc and his wife [3482 Bloc 2 no 407 Fonds André Bloc in Bibliothèque Kandinsky - MNAM-CCI Centre Pompidou, Paris].
144
pages of Bloc’s magazines, which were one of the only magazines to show his concrete sculptures. Pablo Picasso was an exceptionally versatile artist, familiar with many disciplines. Or as art historian Christopher Green summarizes: “Picasso was the compulsive inventor of an always-changing art.”2 It is therefore unsurprising that he showed an interest in architecture. His oeuvre includes several architectural drawings, and early drawings and paintings that incorporate architectural components. In his well-known piece Guernica of 1937, for example, there are several architectural elements including interior fixtures and exterior features that range from a door to windows, bricks, lighting, floor, and walls. Architectural historian Sigfried Giedion said that Picasso’s painting “forecast things to come,” referring to the fact that the modern Cubist language would be brought into architecture and also in architectural sculpture (sculpture in public spaces).3 Furthermore, he stated: “Picasso around 1930 painted his figures with strange abbreviations and sometimes terrifying lines which most of us did not understand until these forms and expression were verified by later events.”4 Giedion exemplifies this with Picasso’s Monument in Wood (1930)—a monumental biomorphic head that Giedion refers to as “terrifying.”5 “It is a sketch for a modern sculpture of enormous scale,” he says, “Picasso did not specify for what purpose these 1930 studies for a monument were meant. But it is now clear that these sketches forecast the reality and the inherent significance of the symbol did not reveal itself until later.”6 When he was writing this text in 1943, Giedion included a remark that, “it declared what was to come … [and] symbolises our attitude toward war.”7 Picasso is perhaps most notable in architectural history for his Cubist influence. The architectural forms in his Cubist masterpieces of the early twentieth century precede his more monumental work from 1950s onwards and forecast the tendency in general. Art and architecture historians frequently cite Picasso as a formative inspiration for architects.
2 Christopher Green, Picasso Architecture and Vertigo (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2005): 3. 3 Sigfried Giedion, Architecture You and Me (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1958): 34. 4 Giedion, 34. 5 Giedion, Architecture You and Me, n.p. 6 Giedion, 34. 7 Although the text was published in 1958, the caption was written in 1943. Part of description with caption for Monument in Wood in Giedion, Architecture You and Me, n.p 145
Fig. 3.4 Picasso, CONSTRUCTION, 1958, feuille de carnet, dessin a la mine de plomb, 27 x37 cm, published in Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso, vol. 18 oeuvres de 1958 à 1959 (Paris: Éditions “Cahiers d’Art,” 1967): 38–42.
Fig. 3.5 Picasso, CONSTRUCTION, 1958, feuille de carnet, dessin a la mine de plomb, 27 x37 cm, published in Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso, vol. 18 oeuvres de 1958 à 1959 (Paris: Éditions “Cahiers d’Art,” 1967): 38–42.
146
His work opened the way for new possibilities in building for sculptors and architects ranging from Vladimir Tatlin to David Smith, and Le Corbusier to Richard Rogers.8 Compared with Picasso’s Cubist paintings, Green states that the first metal Guitar sculpture (1912) was a key moment: “Not only has this construction been identified as the starting point for generations of sculptors and architects, it has also been identified as the starting point for a newly aware manipulation of visual art’s representational powers by artists in all media, both flat and three dimensional.9 While these works were immensely influential for architects, they were also important to the development of Picasso’s own conception of the monument. It wasn’t until Construction, a series of 18 drawings of identical dimensions made on 8 May 1958 (Feuille de carnet. Dessin à la mine de plomb. 8 mai 1958), that this interest became openly evident.10 The drawings have a futuristic, biomorphic, and even fantastical component to them. The first four have the outlines of organic architectural shapes, while the remaining drawings are more detailed and developed, including elements such as windows. These drawings clearly allude to social housing blocks and modernist architecture. Above all, they reference discoveries originating from Le Corbusier’s Unité d’habitation: namely, the massive pilotis and the flat roof terrace, as seen in a drawing depicting a crowd on a rooftop.
Fig. 3.6 Picasso, CONSTRUCTION, 1958, feuille de carnet, dessin a la mine de plomb, 27 x 37 cm, published in Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso, vol. 18 oeuvres de 1958 à 1959 (Paris: Éditions “Cahiers d’Art,” 1967): 38–42.
Fig. 3.7 Le Corbusier, Unité d’Habitation, Marseille, 1952 (photograph: A.C).
8 Green, Picasso Architecture and Vertigo, 153. Architectural critic Jonathan Glancey also refers to this in the article “Architecture: The Blue Period,” The Guardian, 22 March 2004, accessed 29 June 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2004/mar/22/architecture. 9 Green, 154. 10 Page from a notebook, graphite on paper, 8 May 1958; 27 x 37 cm. In Christian Zervos, Pablo Picasso, vol. 18 oeuvres de 1958 à 1959 (Paris: Éditions “Cahiers d’Art,” 1967): 38–42. 147
CorTen steel sculpture.43 This was the only sculpture that was intended to be in the public from the beginning. Here again he opted for a sculpture in post-Cubist idiom: a collage of a cut-out of two opposing female figures in profile on top of an animal-like mask. Other than the material, the most obvious difference is that it has more depth and is therefore more threedimensional, and that it is delicate and less massive (due the material) than the others. Here, the sculpture is placed in front of a skyscraper. The architecture of the building becomes the wall, or even décor, for the sculpture. In 1967, architect I. M. Pei asked Nesjar to propose a monumental sculpture for the outdoor plaza of New York University’s housing unit. It was at this time that Picasso chose to enlarge one of Sylvette’s busts to a height of 10.5 meters, the same model was used in Rotterdam in 1970.44 The implantation of this sculpture was different than the one in Rotterdam. Here, the sculpture has as a background, Pei’s Brutalist “Silver Towers,” and is therefore contextualized in a way that is better than in Rotterdam, where the sculpture had low-rise Dutch-looking architecture in the background. For the Lycée Sud (1965) and the Israel Museum in Jerusalem (1967), Picasso enlarged Figure (1961) to a height of six meters. These sculptures share an expressionist, biomorphic style, yet they retain an architectural appearance through the use of concrete and granite. These sculptural forms and sandblasting using the betograve technique are adopted from an architectural practice; the material, technique, process, roughness of the surface, as well as the scale contribute to the definition of the architecture sculpture debate.
Picasso and Architecture Picasso’s concrete sculptures have a formal connection with the contemporaneous international architectural idiom of Brutalism in regards to scale and the material’s finishing such as an aestheticization of rough concrete, the way it’s casted despite differences in shape and appearance. Picasso’s work is less simple or pure than what is considered Brutalist, although at first sight there is a visual connection Brutalist forms largely due to its concrete material. In the introduction to Picasso et le Beton, Pierre Gascar tells us of the duality of concrete. It is at once rigid and compact, but can take any form: “L’art du béton concilie l’audace, le délire des formes, le lyrisme 43 Temkin and Umland, Picasso Sculpture, 29. 44 Temkin and Umland, 162. 164
Fig. 3.23 Picasso with Le Corbusier at the building site of Unité d’habitation in Marseille, 1949. [Folder L 4-2-55 Fondation Le Corbusier Paris, France].
Fig. 3.24 Picasso with Le Corbusier at the building site of Unité d’habitation in Marseille, 1949. [Folder L4-2-46 Fondation Le Corbusier Paris, France].
165
Fig. 4.1 Mathias Goeritz, Torres de Satélite, Mexico City, 1957, concrete painted white, yellow, orange, height 33 to 55m, architect Luis Barragan (photograph: Tor Eigeland), published in Clive Bamford Smith, Builders in the Sun: Five Mexican Architects (New York: Architectural Book Publishing, 1967). 174
chapter four: concrete sculptures along the road and the international sculpture symposium
Moved by the car along an ordinary curvilinear ex-lane through fields; all vegetation on either side the usual strong green, viewed under the most typical sky of grey-overcast causing conditions of considerable glare …It is suddenly obvious that a passenger’s view is worth describing.1 - Alison Smithson
Introduction: Early Ideas Architectural sculptures are expansions of the domain of sculpture into the world of architecture. This is generally achieved in one of two ways: either by increasing the scale of sculptures to architectural size, or through the use of materials that automatically reference the built environment, such as concrete, brick, or wood. This chapter focuses on architectural sculpture during the 1960s, which it understands to be part of the architecture-sculpture debate and practice, when sculptors transformed the shape, surface, and proportions of their work in response to developments in architecture. Architectural sculpture in this time is most often thought of solely in relation to Minimalist art.2 And, 1 Alison Margaret Smithson, AS in DS: An Eye on the Road (Baden: L. Müller, 2001): 23. 2 Michael Benedikt states in his text Sculpture as architecture: New York Letter , 1966 ‘any Minimalist art is architectural’ 1967 in: G. Battcock, Minimal Art: a Critical Anthology, Berkeley, University of
Fig. 4.2 Image reflecting Jacques Moeschal’s ideas, with Signal by Moeschal in the background, 1963, published in Léon-Henri Franckart, “L’Aventure du siècle, Ce rébus géométrique?” La Dernière Heure, 15 May 1964. 175
Back of Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, no. 53 (May-June 1966).
260
part III
buildings and ‘espaces architecturés’ (architectural space)
261
Figs. 5.1 and 5.2 Herbert Goldman, Sculpture house, New Mexico, no date, this house is built with flat slabs of reinforced concrete, published in Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, no. 53 (Mai-juin 1966): 84.
262
chapter five: the sculptural house
Indeed, architecture has come nearer to sculpture, and sculpture nearer to architecture.” 1 – Sigfried Giedion
This section begins with Sigfried Giedion’s vision of sculptural architecture developed from his dedication towards the synthesis of the arts and the new monumentality, rooted in the early 1940s and linked to André Bloc, as discussed in chapter one. Sculptural architecture was defined in the 1960s through visual representations diffused by the architectural magazines of André Bloc, particularly L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui and Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture. Giedion theoretically shaped the genre, further defining sculptural architecture as evinced in the 1960s. Giedion describes the forms of his time as, “linked geometric structures to organic forms.”2 Sigfried Giedion contributed to the formation of the architecture–sculpture debate and played a crucial role in its diffusion. This chapter thereby focuses on the typology of the home that was further developed from this synthesis in the arts and Giedion’s thoughts. Bloc’s magazines featured homes built of concrete, that looked as though they were carved from stone. These structures were extensively documented, using specific angles and close-up shots to emphasize the sculptural qualities of the buildings. The architects would literally sculpt on site in order to create eccentric, yet functional spaces. I will show in the following examples how the concept of the home was reimagined beyond the tradition of four walls, toward a more sculpture-like structure. First however, the following inquiries must be addressed. What defines the facade of a domestic structure as sculptural? Can architecture function sculpturally? Can sculpture be inhabited? What triggered
1 Giedion, Sigfried, Architecture and the Phenomena of Transition: The Three Space Conceptions In Architecture (Cambridge (Mass.): Harvard university, 1971): 267. 2 Sigfried Giedion, Space, Time and Architecture: The Growth of a New Tradition (1941): 5th ed., enl. (1967) Cambridge: Harvard university, 2008): liv.
263
espaces architecturés
Fig. 12 Spread from Aujourd’hui Art et Architecture, no. 53 (May–June 1966): 32 -33.
394
395
Fig. 1 Iza Genzken, ABC, Münster, 1987, concrete, 1485 x 1120 x 40 cm.
396
conclusion: concrete synthesis
Indeed, architecture has come nearer to sculpture, and sculpture nearer to architecture. 1 - Sigfried Giedion, 1971
The primary aim of this dissertation was to highlight the crossovers between sculpture and architecture through the building material of concrete, as well as to document the structures that employed this material, which reached an apogee in the 1960s. Many of the exchanges between sculpture and architecture in the 1960s can be linked to the notion of the synthèse des arts (synthesis of the arts), which was a crucial topic at the Congrès internationaux d’architecture moderne (CIAM) 6 and 7, with Sigfried Giedion as a pivotal figure. These concepts provide the basis for André Bloc’s ideas regarding the relationship between architecture and sculpture. Bloc negotiated this relationship through practice and debate, which led to the introduction of architecture-sculpture to the broader public, mostly through his editorial role. Bloc’s initial interpretation of the synthesis of the arts was to create a new monumental form of art by combining painting and sculpture with architecture. His ideas can largely be traced back to Giedion’s theories on 1 Sigfried Giedion, Architecture and the Phenomena of Transition: The Three Space Conceptions In Architecture (Cambridge (Mass.): Harvard university, 1971): 267.
397
Chronological overview Terminology magazines
Synthèse des arts (Synth (1946)
New Monumentality by Sigfried Giedion
Terminology Giedion and key moments
(1944)
Nine Points on Monumentality by Sigfried Giedion, Fernand Léger, and José L (1943)
Sixth CIAM Congr (1947)
Seven (1949)
André Artists and architects
Le Corbusier1,2,3,4
Oscar Niemeyer
Frede
F
Le Corbusier and Joseph
Fern Piet Magazines
Jean
l’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui 1
Hors Serie2
(1930-1967)
(1946-1949)
I
1930
I
II
1940
This is a chronological overview of the terminologies used and the artists-architects that appear in magazine articles on architecture-sculpture. Names and terms appear on the timeline when they were first mentioned. The more articles about an artist or architect, the higher the ranking on the page. The number in superscript refers to the magazines in which their work is featured. The number of articles is represented by the dashes on the timeline; the different shades of gray in the dashes refer to the magazine displayed in the same shades of gray.
Art d
(1949-
II IIIII I I I I I I I II II IIIII
Recherche d’expressions architecturales (research into architectural expressions)4 (1964)
hesis of the Arts)1,23,4 Intégration1,3,4
Architectures de sculpteurs (architectures of sculptors)1 (1964) Espaces sculptés (sculpted spaces)4 Espaces architecturés (architectural space)4
Sculpture monumentale (monumental sculpture)1,4
(1954)
(1958)
Sculptures habitacles (habitacle sculptures) 1,3,4
(1966)
(1954)
Sculpture et architecture (sculpture and architecture)1,4
Luis Sert
(1962)
ress in Bridgwater
Architecture sculpture (sculptural architecture)1,4
nth CIAM Congress in Bergamo
(1962)
La plastique architectural (architectural sculpture)1
Forme sculptée (sculpted form)4
(1964)
(1958)
é Bloc1,3,4
Architectures fantastiques (fantastical architecture)1
(1962)
Claude Parent1,4
Sculptural architecture (1962)
Groupe Espace1,,3,4 André Bloc & Claude Parent1,4
r1,3,4
Mathias Goeritz1,3,4 Pablo Picasso,3,4
erick Kiesler2,3,4
Marcel Breuer1,4
Franco Albini 1,4
Vittoriano Vigano4
Jean-François Zevaco1,4 Isamu Noguchi1,4 John Johansen1,4 Carlos Raul Villanueva 4 Pierre Szekely1,4 1,3 Burle Marx1,4 Felix Del Marle International Sculpture Symposium1,4 Joop Beljon 4 Félix Candela4 Herbert Goldman1,4 Theo Van Doesburg3 Jacques Coelle1,4 Picasso and Carl Nesjar4 Pascal Hauserman1,4 Jacques Moeschal1 Félix Roulin4 Walter Forderer, 1,4 Josep Lluís Sert4 Paul Rudolph1 4 De Stijl3 Alberto Galardi4 Carlo Scarpa4 Hans Scharoun Nicolas Schöffer4 4 4 Pier Luigi Nervi Atelier 51 Olivier Seguin4 Vittorio Giorgini Enzo Venturelli4 BBPR4 Giovanni Michelucci4 Herbert Bayer4 h Savina,2,3,4 Piotr Kowalski4 4 Gottfried Böhm 4 The Independent Group Lucio Fontana4 4 Sam Rodillo Costantino Nivola4 Architecture Principe4 nand Léger2,3, Constant Nieuwenhuys4 Sophie Taeuber-Arp4 Mondriaan,3 Maxime Descombin4 Hans Arp,3 Aldo van Eyck1 Philip Johnson4 4 Facteur Cheval n Dubuffet1,3 Renaat Braem1 Frank Lloyd Wright4 Donald Judd4 Robert Morris4 3 4 d’Aujourd’hui Aujourd’hui art et architetecture Sol LeWitt4 Affonso Reidy
1,,4
-1955)
(1955-1967)
II IIIIIIIIII IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
1950
1960
1970
413