Robert Venturi and His Contributions to Postmodern Architecture.
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Date
2008-06-11Author
Kahl, Douglas
Advisor(s)
Kercher, Stephen
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Show full item recordAbstract
This paper examines the major contributions of architect Robert Venturi to
the field of Postmodern architecture during the 1970s. Many of Venturi’s buildings
were small in stature, designed for a specific location and site, and only large when
necessary. Designing for a specific site was not traditionally done during the first
half of the 20th century. The Modern movement was a stark, plain, and disengaging
form of architecture from which Venturi took enormous strides to distance himself.
Venturi’s interpretations of what Postmodernism should be included intense historical
symbolism from the particular region in which he intended to build. For him, a
schoolhouse being designed for the state of Georgia ought to be different from a school
being designed for Washington state. The cultural history that a community’s citizens
share varies intensely from city to city, a realization that Venturi worked to address
through Postmodernism. Eventually fed up with the generic feel Modernism projected,
Venturi took the quote “Less is more” from Mies van der Rohe, a staunch Modernist
architect, and mockingly declared that “Less is a bore.” Venturi’s brand of Postmodern
architecture was anything but boring.
Subject
Venturi, Robert
Postmodern architecture
Civilization, Classical
Architecture and society
Artists and architects
Permanent Link
http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1793/28244Description
Oshkosh Scholar, Volume 3, 2008 pp. 55-63
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