Juhani Pallasmaa

Alberto Perez-Gomez

Steven Holl

Phenomenology of Architecture

Questions of Perception

A vision of architecture that transcends concerns of form and function and finds the connections between the architect's wish to design a beautiful world and architecture's imperative to provide a better place for society. The forced polarity between form and function in considerations of architecture—opposing art to social interests, ethics to poetic expression—obscures the deep connections between ethical and poetical values in architectural tradition. Architecture has been, and must continue to be, writes Alberto Pérez-Gómez, built upon love. Modernity has rightly rejected past architectural excesses, but, Pérez-Gómez argues, the materialistic and technological alternatives it proposes do not answer satisfactorily the complex desire that defines humanity. True architecture is concerned with far more than fashionable form, affordable homes, and sustainable development; it responds to a desire for an eloquent place to dwell—one that lovingly provides a sense of order resonant with our dreams. In Built upon Love Pérez-Gómez uncovers the relationship between love and architecture in order to find the points of contact between poetics and ethics—between the architect's wish to design a beautiful world and architecture's imperative to provide a better place for society. Eros, as first imagined by the early lyric poets of classical Greece, is the invisible force at the root of our capacity to create and comprehend the poetic image. Pérez-Gómez examines the nature of architectural form in the light of eros, seduction, and the tradition of the poetic image in Western architecture. He charts the ethical dimension of architecture, tracing the connections between philia—the love of friends that entails mutual responsibility among equals—and architectural program. He explores the position of architecture at the limits of language and discusses the analogical language of philia in modernist architectural theory. Finally, he uncovers connections between ethics and poetics, describing a contemporary practice of architecture under the sign of love, incorporating both eros and philia.

Architectural Longing after Ethics and Aesthetics

Built upon Love

Saidye Rosner Bronfmanprofessor Director of the History and Theory of Architecture Program Alberto Perez-Gomez

This remarkable collection brings together a selection of essays by Alberto Pérez-Gómez, originally published in diverse periodicals and as chapters in books, over a period of twenty-five years. The essays have been revised and updated by the author, sometimes substantially modified to reflect more accurately the state of contemporary questions in the field of architecture. While the writing deliberately blurs the edges of history and theory, the essays have been collected in two separate volumes: the first focusing on architectural theories and practices both historical and recent, and the second on more general aspects of architectural philosophy.The untimeliness of these texts on architecture, history, and philosophy is a welcome departure from today's incessant demand for timely innovation. These articles engage with central and marginal figures from architecture's past, converse with contemporaries who hold a sympathetic stance, and engage diverse philosophical positions. The essays draw from other fields of inquiry: philosophy, theatre, literature, art, dance, and neuroscience, to name a few. It is through these interdisciplinary conversations and the questions they generate that the works manifest their full power, rendering visible many currently-ignored issues. Against some of our most assured convictions and protocols, Pérez-Gómez consistently seeks meaningful sites in which to re-negotiate the architect's task of imagining the world otherwise. This is done without affectation or pretense, acknowledging the task's difficulty in our late-modern world. By joining past, present, and future, the texts offer their gift: the hopeful shaping of a time to come. This remarkable collection is a testament to three decades of thinking, whose untimeliness will challenge and reward readers, placing the search for dwelling, belonging and love at the heart of architecture (Foreword by Peter Olshavsky).

Architectural Philosophy and Hermeneutics

Timely Meditations

Alberto Perez-Gomez

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