20513 Fig. 1 Chapel of Notre Dame du Haut, Ronchamp, 1950–4. Repro- duced from William J. R. Curtis, Modern Architecture Since 1900, 1982; 3rd edition, Phaidon, London and New York, 1996, ISBN 0- 7148-3356-8, p. 418.

ARCHITECT, TOWN PLANNER, DESIGNER, PAINTER, SCULPTOR, WRITER Training and influences by Le Corbusier began as a designer-engraver but was urged to Dr John W Nixon switch to architecture by the director of his school, the painter Charles L'Eplattenier. His architectural training (c. 1905–12) was largely self-directed, and comprised: Related Study Notes Le Corbusier (1887–1965) – born Charles-Édouard

Jeanneret, the son of a watch engraver in the Swiss Fig. 2 Maison Fallet, La Chaux-de-Fonds, 1905–7. Reproduced from town of La Chaux-de-Fonds – is generally regarded as William J. R. Curtis, Le Corbusier: Ideas and Forms, Phaidon, 10030 London, 1986, ISBN 0-7148-2790-8, p. 131. The order within: an the single most influential figure in mid-20thC world approach to pictorial analysis architecture. ‘Le Corbusier' was the name he adopted about 1920. He exerted influence not just through o actual commissions (his first house, the Maison Fallet was 10040 architectural works but through town-planning, furniture produced in 1905–6 when he was aged 18; this, the Classicism, Neoclassicism Maison Jaquemont, 1907–8, and other early works in his and Romanticism design, painting and a considerable body of writing. His home town of La Chaux-de-Fonds reveal L'Eplattenier's work of the 1920s and '30s was firmly Modern, rejecting Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau stylistic influence); 10060 the 19th century Arts and Crafts approach and embrac- From realism to abstraction ing a machine, or engineering, aesthetic. The functional o working with established architects, including: 20400 engineering of ocean liners, aircraft and cars strongly - 14 months (1908–09) with August Perret in Paris, here Architecture and technical influenced him and this is especially evident in his receiving a grounding in use of the reinforced concrete innovation designs of this time for villas around Paris. He did not frame (a major example of Perret's work is the Church simply design villas for the well-to-do. In his Maison of Notre-Dame at Raincy, 1922–23); 20445 Frank Lloyd Wright Domino, 1914–15, and Maison Citrohan, 1921, he pro- - 5 months (1910) with Peter Behrens in Berlin (Walter posed systems for mass-produced housing in reinforced Gropius and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe were also with 20521 concrete, but probably his most influential solution to Behrens about this time); De Stijl the mass-housing need was the Marseilles apartment o travel, establishing professional contacts (such as with 20522 block, the Unité d'Habitation of 1945–52 – a partial realis- Josef Hoffman and Adolf Loos in Vienna and Tony Gar- Bauhaus ation of his concept of a ‘vertical housing city'. The nier in Lyons) and viewing sites of architectural interest building inspired many 'homages' around the world but, (e.g., 1911, Classical sites in Greece and Turkey). 20527 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe as a model 'solution' to mass-housing needs, it has also It was not until his Villa Schwob of 1916, at La Chaux-de- attracted much criticism. ‘Brutalist' apartment blocks Fonds, that the characteristics of his mature work begin to 20711 influenced by it often proved decidedly unattractive to tentatively emerge: geometrical simplicity, harmonious Art Deco those having to live in them, particularly further north 30412 than the south of France, or when aesthetic and technic- Fig. 3 Villa Schwob, La Chaux-de-Fonds, 1916; south façade shortly Édouard Manet al problems were not solved with the master's flair, or after construction. Reproduced from Curtis, 1986, p. 45. when tight budgets impacted on aesthetic and other 30746 Pictorial analysis and considerations. The Unité d'Habitation also reveals an proportions, functional planning and construction, and a interpretation: a case study emphasis on the sculptural, non-functional treatment of ‘sculptural' treatment of forms and spaces. The Villa Schwob, form, something increasingly apparent in his work from although providing hints of these characteristics, is a notably 30820 the 1930s on. This tendency probably saw its most uneasy and unresolved mix of old and new approaches. Modernism and poetic expression in his pilgrimage Church of Notre Postmodernism Dame du Haut at Ronchamp, 1950–54. Theories and publications 40415 Le Corbusier exercised considerable influence through his New Brutalism AS and A2 content writings and he himself was much influenced by Nietzsche This Study Note covers Le Corbusier’s full career. Those (Z10060). The controversial German philosopher’s aphor-

intending to take examinations in the subject should note that istic style of writing is reflected to an extent in Le Corbusier’s In the text, a Z symbol refers the work falls across several sections at AS and A2 – the own, some of his sayings being: “the house is a machine for to these Study Notes current specification should be consulted. living in”; “a curved street is a donkey track, a straight street, Examiners allow a measure of flexibility around specific- a road for men”; “architecture is the masterly, correct and ation chronological boundaries. Discussion of specific magnificent play of masses brought together in light”; and examples may range up to five years beyond any such “the city that has speed has success”. boundary without penalty: over five years and up to a maximum of fifteen, penalties are progressively imposed. Fig. 4 Domino skeleton, 1914-15. Reproduced from Curtis, 1986, p. Where the purpose of discussion is not to describe and 43. analyse specific examples but rather to establish general context or significance, no chronological restrictions apply.

1/5 20513u.doc: first published 2004; revised 2007 CCEA GCE HISTORY OF ART DOMINO HOUSING SYSTEM a machine for living in", he wrote) In 1914–15, a year or two before the Villa Schwob, Le o the need to satisfy intellectually and aesthetically through Corbusier made a decided step towards Modernism with his arrangements of abstract form. Domino, or ‘Dom-ino’, housing system design. The Domino house skeleton comprised three rectangular horizontal slabs, CITROHAN HOUSING SYSTEM The Domino was the skeleton of a house. The Citrohan, six slender columns supporting each of the upper two slabs developed in 1920–22 and described in Vers une Architect- and six blocks the bottom one, with the three slabs connect- ure, took this a stage further. Curtis: ed by reinforced-concrete stairs. The columns, or ‘pilotis’ as he later termed them, were set back from the outer edges of ‘Citrohan’ was a pun on ‘Citroën’ – a house like a car. Le the slabs, allowing freedom of treatment to the infill, non- Corbusier hoped to mass-produce the pieces of the load-bearing, walls. The basic Domino unit could be replicat- building by Taylorized methods like those being used in 3 ed indefinitely in any direction. The floor slabs apparently automobile factories. Housing shortages in post-war reminded Le Corbusier of the chips used in the game of France were a critical matter, and the architect was dominoes. This plus domus being Latin for house, and ino directing his ideas at government agencies and industrial- evoking innovation, led to the name. ists as much as at private clients… The Citrohan embod- ied the conception of a ‘machine à habiter’ – a ‘machine INTERNATIONAL STYLE for living in’ – a functional tool raised to the level of art While arguably anticipated in most, if not all, its essential through judicious proportions, fine spaces and the strip- elements,1 there is no denying that Le Corbusier’s Domino ping away of pointless decoration and purposeless habits. system quickly exerted major and widespread – international It was a utopian challenge to the status quo. – influence. William J. R. Curtis in his book Le Corbusier:

Ideas and Forms, 1986, writes: Fourteen years later, in the Oeuvre complète, volume I, Fig. 5 Model of the Citrohan House, 1920–22. Reproduced from Richard Weston, Modernism, Phaidon, London, 1996, ISBN 0-7148- Le Corbusier published the Dom-ino skeleton on its own. 2879-3, p. 110. By this time it had taken on the status of an icon of modern architecture. The formal characteristics of what The Maison Citrohan was cubic with a flat roof, a was later called the ‘International Style’ – hovering hori- double-height living room and a large area of factory zontal volumes, taut skins, regular lines of support – were glazing; in the later version the box was raised on stilts to based on analogous systems in concrete or steel… The liberate the soil beneath for parking but also to suggest Dom-ino was trabeation in an elemental form – pure the independence from the terrain… In line with Purist column and pure slab… One is not surprised by the pretensions to universality, the Citrohan was intended for legend that the ageing Le Corbusier kept a picture of the everyone everywhere: an abstract product of technology Dom-ino on his wall next to a photograph of the Parthen- above differences of region. In fact it seemed to be on: both were central to his lifelong production, and both directed at the habits of an artist monk: the Parisian studio embodied notions he regarded as fundamental.2 type of house (with large north glazing) cross-bred with the cell of the monastery of Ema. There were Mediterra- In 1916 Le Corbusier left Switzerland to settle in Paris and in nean overtones in the whitewashed cube and nautical 1918, with the painter Amadée Ozenfant, he launched the ones in the terraces like decks, but the section with a movement known as Purism. Purism embraced both the fine gallery slung along the back of a double-height living and applied arts and advocated: room was also inspired by a working men’s café in Paris.4 o a machine aesthetic

o the conscious refinement, perfection, of existing types. Fig. 6 Diagram illustrating, on the right, the ‘Five Points of a New The emphasis was thus essentially Classicist – aimed at Architecture’ contrasted against traditional masonry construction. gaining an aesthetic through evolution rather than revolution. Reproduced from Curtis, 1986, p. 70.

TOWARDS A NEW ARCHITECTURE FIVE POINTS Beginning in 1920, when he also adopted the name ‘Le In his book Les 5 Points d'une Architecture Nouvelle, 1926 Corbusier’, and continuing to 1925, he and others published (Five Points for a New Architecture), Le Corbusier gave the magazine L'Esprit Nouveau (The New Spirit) in which he specific structural guidelines as to how his ‘new architecture' formulated his ideas on architecture and aesthetics. These could be achieved: ideas were brought together in the most influential book by o pilotis (columns) elevating the mass of the building off the any 20thC architect, Vers Une Architecture, 1923 (published ground in English as Towards a New Architecture, 1927). Le o free plan, achieved through the use of columns, thereby Corbusier's ‘new architecture' aimed to hold in balance: relieving walls of a load-bearing function o the need to satisfy functional requirements ("the house is o free façade, also achieved through non-load-bearing walls

o strip windows 1 The Oriel Chambers offices, Liverpool, of 1864 by Peter Ellis, and the Fagus Factory, Alfeld-an-der-Leine, of 1911 by Gropius and Meyer, are among earlier works which could be cited (Z20522). 3 2 William J. R. Curtis, Le Corbusier: Ideas and Forms, Phaidon, The American Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856–1915) was one of London, 1986, ISBN 0-7148-2790-8, p. 43. See our Classicism, the earliest to subject management – the way work was done – to Neoclassicism and Romanticism (10040) Study Note for a brief scientific study and analysis. 4 introduction to Ancient Greek architecture. Curtis, p. 54.

2/5 20513u.doc: first published 2004; revised 2007 CCEA GCE HISTORY OF ART o roof terrace, or roof garden, thereby ‘regaining' the ground buildings produced from about this time. covered by the building. PAVILION DE L’ESPRIT NOUVEAU The Pavilion de l'Esprit Nouveau was built for the 1925 Fig. 7 Skyscrapers in the heart of the ideal industrial city; , Exhibition of Decorative Arts in Paris. John Donat and John 1925. Reproduced from Curtis, 1986, p. 62. Killick write:

TOWN/CITY PLANNING Town or city planning was a longstanding interest of Le Fig. 11 Pavilion of L’Esprit Nouveau, Exhibition of Decorative and Industrial Arts, Paris, 1925. Reproduced from Weston, p. 111. Corbusier’s. Among his books on the subject are Urbanism, 1925 (The City of Tomorrow, 1929), in which ideas were put The Pavilion de L’Esprit Nouveau... very nearly never got forward for reshaping cities to make use of recent develop- built at all, not surprisingly perhaps, since its central ments in transport and technology, and La , theme was that 'Decorative Art' was irrelevant and a 1935 (The Radiant City, 1967) his principal contribution to waste of time! Le Corbusier's exhibit was in two parts, an town-planning theory. exposition of his town-planning theories and a full size

mock-up of an apartment. The object was to demonstrate Fig. 8 The , 1948. Reproduced from Curtis, 1986, p. 164. that architecture itself embraced every detail of the environment from furniture to the street and the city itself. THE MODULOR The design of this dwelling embraces one of the most In his book Le Modulor, 1948 (The Modulor, 1954), Le persistent themes in Le Corbusier's work – the pursuit of Corbusier set out his ideas for what his subtitle describes as an 'ideal home' for man... “a harmonious measure to the human scale universally The principles behind the Esprit Nouveau apartment applicable to architecture and mechanics”. His ‘Modulor' were that standardisation and mass-production – industry ergonomic or proportioning system factorises a six-foot – would produce pure forms of their own which would measure – an idealized man’s height – using the Fibonacci have intrinsic values as art. The exploitation of the struct- Series or Golden Section ratio (Z10030).5 In the preface to ural and spatial potentialities of steel and concrete could the second edition he wrote in 1951: create a minimum dwelling that would be a comfortable, elegant and practical 'machine for living in'.

Fig. 9 Applications of the Modulor illustrated. Reproduced from Le Corbusier, The Modulor, 1954; Faber, London, 1961 edition, p. 67. Fig. 12 Double house, Weissenhof Siedlung, Stuttgart, 1926–7. Reproduced from Curtis, 1986, p. 138. Architects everywhere have recognized in it, not a mystique, but a tool which may be put into the hands of creators of form, with the simple aim, as Professor Ein- stein has put it so well, of ‘making the bad difficult and the good easy’. The Modulor is a scale. Musicians have a Its principal features were a glass wall two storeys high scale; they make music, which may be trite or beautiful.6 lighting a double-height studio/living space beside a two- storey high garden terrace – only remarkable when you realise that the intention was to stack up these dwellings Fig. 10 Analysis by Le Corbusier of façade of Michelangelo’s Capitol into vast apartment blocks – a vertical garden city.7 Building (Palazzo dei Senatori), Rome, c. 1538-64. Reproduced from Le Corbusier, The Modulor, p. 26. WEISSENHOF SIEDLUNG Le Corbusier designed a pair of semi-detached houses for Among the many illustrations in Le Modulor, Le Corbusier the 1927 Weissenhof Siedlung, Stuttgart, international includes a simple geometrical analysis of the façade of housing exhibition organised by the Deutscher Werkbund Michelangelo’s Capitol Building (or Palazzo dei Senatori) in and overseen by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. They exempli- Rome, c.1538–64. The analysis comprises only three right- fied Le Corbusier's interest in industrial methods of building. angles but it well illustrates the kind of thinking behind much The houses were raised on slim columns, or 'pilotis'. There architectural and fine art design, past and present (Z10030, were various service rooms at ground level. At first floor 30412, 30746). level, the living area could be changed into a sleeping area by rearranging moveable storage units. The flat roof function- Partnership with Pierre Jeanneret ed also as a sun-terrace. In 1922 he went into architectural practice with his cousin Pierre Jeanneret, a partnership which lasted until about Fig. 13 Maison Stein, Garches, 1926–7. Reproduced from Curtis, 1939–40. The following are among the most important 1986, p. 140.

MAISON STEIN 5 The Fibonacci Series is a sequence of numbers with each number being the sum of the previous two, thus: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21… The Again, in the Maison (or Villa) Stein, Garches, 1926–7, the further the series progresses the closer it approximates to the Golden Section ratio. 6 Le Corbusier, Le Modulor, 1948 (The Modulor, 1954), translated by 7 John Donat and John Killick, “Architecture in the 20th Century”, The Peter de Francia and Anna Bostock, Faber and Faber, London, 1961 History of Western Art, Visual Publications, Cheltenham, 1987, Series edition, p. 5. 19, Part 1, p. 21.

3/5 20513u.doc: first published 2004; revised 2007 CCEA GCE HISTORY OF ART structural system of reinforced concrete columns and floor ure in the Twentieth Century, Taschen, Cologne, 1991, ISBN 3-8228- slabs enabled great freedom of design. Donat and Killick: 0550-5, p. 260. ...Double-height spaces pierced through the floor slabs to on the balcony and window niches. The 7th and 8th storeys extend space vertically inside, curved screens and parti- of the building were intended as a small internal mall – tion walls created long diagonal vistas extending the comprising shops, a restaurant, hairdresser’s, etc – and, in a space horizontally and uninterrupted by structure. The sense, to be the civic centre of this ‘vertical city'. However, house was a tour de force of solid, void, space and as Peter Gössel and Gabriele Leuthäuser observe: movement.8

Fig. 18 Chapel of Notre Dame du Haut, Ronchamp, 1950–4. Repro- Fig. 14 , Poissy, 1927–31. Reproduced from Curtis, duced from David Watkin, A History of Western Architecture, 1986; 1986, p. 142. Laurence King, London, 3rd ed., 2000, ISBN 1-85669-227-2, p. 652.

VILLA SAVOYE ...even assuming that all the families living here would The Villa Savoye at Poissy, 1927–31, is one of the clearest also shop here, 340 parties were simply too few to keep in statements of Le Corbusier's early maturity. The forms are business a whole range of stores with attractive select- smooth, white and severely geometrical – a square, shallow ions. The arcade soon became a wasteland with only one box-like structure, with strip windows,9 raised on slim store remaining. Further mistakes can be seen in the reinforced concrete pilotis (5 along each outside edge). design of its access areas... The indecisive territoriality of Between the pilotis is room for parking and, running up the the neither private nor public corridor system, plus its centre of the house, is a glass-enclosed elliptical ramp. A darkness, made leaving the apartment seem an excursion hall, servants' quarters and garages are also on the ground into "enemy" territory and created insecurity and fear. floor. The curvilinear theme reappears on the roof with an There is simply no development of the sense of home

which should ultimately accompany the communal ideal Fig. 15 Villa Savoye, Poissy, 1927–31; terrace. Reproduced from behind the "Unité". The architectural pose of this house Weston, p. 114. on stilts primarily allowed an all-round view of the large parking lot: what passes under the house is not "land- arrangement of screen-walls reminiscent of ships' funnels. scape" but strong winds and the noise of car engines.10 On the first floor, a sliding glass wall separates the large In passing, Donat and Killick remark of the Unité free-plan living area from the terrace roof garden. d'Habitation, "The machine-aesthetic – that pristine clarity of finish that photographed so well but weathered so badly – was abandoned".11 Fig. 16 Unité d’Habitation, Marseilles, 1945–52; axonometric drawing. Reproduced from Curtis, 1982, p. 439.

Fig. 19 Chapel of Notre Dame du Haut, Ronchamp, 1950–4; interior. UNITÉ D'HABITATION Reproduced from Curtis, 1982, p. 421. The apartment block known as the Unité d'Habitation, built in Marseilles in 1945–52, is a large rectangular structure of NOTRE DAME DU HAUT reinforced concrete, 17 storeys high and sitting on massive The pilgrimage church of Notre Dame du Haut at Ronchamp, pilotis. It houses just over 1,600 people. Its 337 apartments 1950–54, is one of the most innovative, distinctive and are of 23 types, accommodating from one or two up to about aesthetically accomplished buildings of the century. Set on a eight. Le Corbusier himself described the structure as like a hill, it is dominated by the complex catenary curves of its huge rack into which apartments slot like drawers. Each concrete shell roof, only tenuously connected to the walls. apartment extends the full depth of the building and includes The rough (‘brut') finish of the roof, textured by timber shutt- a second storey to half the depth. Room heights within each ering, is set off by the white of the massive walls. Small apartment are (a very low) 2.4 m/ 7'5" and (a very high) 4.8 windows pierce these walls with a calculated irregularity, m/ 15'9". The high part of each apartment is given over to an lending an air of sanctity and mystery. The church is as open-plan living room with a full-height window overlooking much a work of sculpture as of architecture. either mountains or the Mediterranean. This arrangement

permits two rows of interlocked apartments to open onto a corridor running through the centre of the building. On the Fig. 20 Monastery of La Tourette, Eveux-sur-l’Arbresle, near Lyons, roof are sculpted ventilation shafts and facilities for a crèche, 1953-60. Reproduced from Curtis, 1982, p. 422. paddling pool and gymnasium. Another notably 'sculptural' feature is the staircase at one end of the block. Decoratively, OTHER WORKS Among other notable late works are the , the board-faced concrete finish is relieved by little else than a system of red, blue, yellow and green coloured squares Fig. 21 Interior of one of the Maisons Jaoul, Neuilly, 1952–56 Repro- duced from Watkin, p. 653.

Fig. 17 Unité d’Habitation, Marseilles, 1945–52; roof terrace. Neuilly Sur Seine, 1952–56; the Dominican monastery of Ste Reproduced from Peter Gössel and Gabriele Leuthäuser, Architect-

10 Peter Gössel & Gabriele Leuthäuser, Architecture in the Twentieth 8 Donat and Killick, 19.2.8. Century, Taschen, Cologne, 1991, ISBN 3-8228-0550-5, pp. 259-63. 9 Also known as ‘ribbon’ windows. 11 Donat and Killick, 19.3.19.

4/5 20513u.doc: first published 2004; revised 2007 CCEA GCE HISTORY OF ART Marie de la Tourette at Eveux-sur-l’Arbresle, in France, 1953–60; and a number of major government buildings in Chandigarh, India, 1951–63.

5/5 20513u.doc: first published 2004; revised 2007 CCEA GCE HISTORY OF ART