100 years/100 books: School of Architecture Centenary, 1917-2017

Library Exhibition Series No. 5. Architecture + Photography

Currently on display at the Architecture and Planning Library is the fifth exhibition in the 100 years/100 books exhibition series. Architecture + Photography is guest curated by Dr Marian Macken, Senior Lecturer, School of Architecture and Planning.

This exhibition explores and provides examples of the different uses of architectural photography. As Macken says, the items on display show us that architectural photography can be both a tool and an outcome.

In Venezia forma urbis: Il fotopiano a colori del centro storico in scala 1:500 = Color photomap of the historic city, scale 1:500, unbound photographs taken in 1985 form a photomap of Venice. These architectural photographs are used as an exact science, aero photogrammetry, to survey and give graphic representation.

Photographs can show how a landscape has changed over time, as in New York changing: Revisiting Berenice Abbott’s New York. Here photographs were taken of the same sites, at the same time of day and year, but with 60 years between them. Architectural photography can give us access to restricted areas such as Ise: Prototype of Japanese Architecture, an unprecedented documentation of the Ise shrine which is entirely and identically rebuilt every twenty years. Another book, Building with light: An international history of architectural photography, includes the documentation of decay of a building in Berlin.

Providing access to restricted architecture or documenting buildings before they “disappear”, allows us to experience no longer existing buildings. These remind us of the temporality of architecture, while providing us with the means of its endurance.

The photography of architecture is a visual language which experiments with different photographic techniques. Several of these, including montage, are explored in Composite landscapes: Photomontage and landscape architecture and Human – Space – Machine: Stage experiments at the Bauhaus.

Architectural photography can be both an analytical representation as well as artistic expression. Visit the display to see examples and be inspired.

Architecture + Photography will be on display until the beginning of September.

Johanna Holzke, Library Assistant, Architecture and Planning Library

Bibliography

Becher, Bernd, and Hilla Becher. Typologies. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2004.

Binet, Hélène. Composing space: The photographs of Hélène Binet. London: Phaidon, 2012.

Burley, Robert, Geoffrey James, and Lee Friedlander. Viewing Olmsted. Montréal: Canadian Centre for Architecture, 1996.

Elwall, Robert. Building with light: An international history of architectural photography. London: Merrell, 2004.

Human – Space – Machine: Stage experiments at the Bauhaus. Leipzig: Spector, 2014.

Levere, Douglas. New York changing: Revisiting Berenice Abbott’s New York. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2005.

Lyden, Anne M. The photographs of Frederick H. Evans. Los Angeles: Getty Museum, 2010.

Pare, Richard. Photography and architecture: 1839-1939. Montreal: Centre canadien d’architecture/Canadian Centre for Architecture, 1982.

Parr, Martin. The photobook: A history, Vol. II. London: Phaidon, 2004.

Smith, Elizabeth A. T. Case Study Houses: The complete CSH program 1945-1966. Köln: Taschen, 2002.

Tange, Kenzō, and Noboru Kawazoe. Ise: Prototype of Japanese architecture. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1965.

Venezia forma urbis: Il fotopiano a colori del centro storico in scala 1:500 = Color photomap of the historic city, scale 1:500. Venezia: Marsilio Editori, 1985.

Waldheim, Charles and Andrea Hansen, eds. Composite landscapes: Photomontage and landscape architecture. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz, 2014.