Seminar
MONUMENT AND MONUMENTALITY

Seminar History of the Art and Architecture (051-0320-11)
Organizer: Chair of Prof. Ursprung
Lecturers: Prof. Dr. Philip Ursprung, Dr. Martino Stierli, Dr. Mechtild Widrich
 

Monuments, and monumentality in general, are in bad standing today: while historically, they were tools to shape political consciousness and construct collective memory of social groups and nations, they have been in crisis for the past 100 years. This course looks at this crisis of monumentality and the efforts for a modern monumental language from a historical perspective. Monuments continue to be built, and monumentality is still (and perhaps again) an essential concept in architecture; in this sense, we want to examine also the search for new monumental forms and concepts, look at the supposed anti-theses of monumentality such as counter-monuments, non-monuments, and anti-monuments, and examine the sites of monumentality as debates of the political and social function of art and architecture in the public sphere. We will discuss public space and site-specificity, eternity and mobility, the idea of the city as monument, and strategies of commemoration. Authors include architects such as Robert Venturi, Superstudio, and Aldo Rossi, artists such as Robert Smithson and Gordon Matta-Clark, as well as historians and theorists such as Alois Riegl and Reyner Banham. Starting in week three, students will give short presentations on case studies from art or architecture. In addition, all students are asked to write short statements on the reading assignments throughout the semester.

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Contact


Dr. Martino Stierli
Dr. Mechtild Widrich