Oxymoron and pleonasm. Texts of critical and projective theory of architecture.
Monika Mitášová
Publisher: VŠVU, Zlatý řez
Year of publication: 2011
ISBN: 978-80-903826-3-3
The book contains an editorial selection of 13 texts from 1983 - 2009, the authors of which are leading American theorists and historians of architecture, and thus reflects the shift that has taken place in the interpretation of architecture from the 1960s to the present. In the first decade of the 21st century, as a reaction to the critical theory of architecture, which dominated the academic discourse since the 1960s, the theory of the so-called projective architecture. If critical architecture and its theories have the ambition to contribute to the understanding and interpretation of the world through architectural creation and to take political positions on societal issues, projective architecture draws on management rather than philosophy and ideology, it has no ambition to change the world but pragmatically ensure that it works best. . Both directions of thinking are manifested to varying degrees in contemporary architectural practice and, of course, get into mutual encounters and conflicts. The reader will serve the basic orientation of readers in the current theoretical debate on architecture, as it has been profiled in the academic environment in the United States. The anthology is opened by an insider's introductory study by editor Monika Mitášová, who also supplemented each text with a commentary pointing out its meaning and place within the given discourse.
