fascism 6 (2017) 196-227 brill.com/fasc The Le Corbusier Scandal, or, was Le Corbusier a Fascist? Simone Brott Creative Industries Faculty, Queensland University of Technology Australia
[email protected] Abstract In 2015 an essay by the architect Marc Perelman was printed in Le Monde claiming Le Corbusier was a fascist and that the French academy had whitewashed this from archi- tectural history. The 2015 exhibition Le Corbusier: Mesures de l’homme, a major retro- spective of the architect, held at the Centre Pompidou was adduced as evidence since it did not mention Le Corbusier’s politics, despite three French books on Le Corbusier’s fascism appearing in 2015, and the scandal that erupted around them. The letter was signed by myself, Zeev Sternhell, Xavier de Jarcy, Marc Perelman, and Daniel de Roulet; and reprinted in English by Verso in January 2017. The Fondation le Corbusier, who are unhappy with this turn of events, wrote to me asking me why I signed the letter. This essay will attempt to answer the question by evaluating the French quarrel, on both sides, and allegations about Le Corbusier’s fascism. Keywords France – fascism – Le Corbusier – architecture – François Chaslin – Marc Perelman – Xavier de Jarcy * I am grateful to Marc Perelman and François Chaslin who answered my questions in great detail, and to Xavier de Jarcy and Mark Antliff who read my essay and provided important insights and historical details. © Brott, 2017 | doi 10.1163/22116257-00602003 This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the prevailing cc-by-nc License at the time of publication.