Giedion, Sigfried

Date born: 1888 [NYT says 1893]

Place born: Prague, Czechoslovakia [NYT says Swiss canton of Aargau]
He received his Ph.D. in art history underHeinrich Wlfflin in Munich. Giedion was appointed professor at the
university in Zurich. His Norton lectures for 1938-1939 became his most famous book, Space, Time and
Architecture: the Growth of a New Tradition.
Congrs International d'Architecture Moderne
The Congrs internationaux d'architecture moderne CIAM (International Congresses of Modern Architecture)
was an organization founded in 1928 and disbanded in 1959, responsible for a series of events and congresses
arranged across Europe by the most prominent architects of the time, with the objective of spreading the
principles of the Modern Movement focusing in all the main domains of architecture (such as landscape,
urbanism, industrial design, and many others).
Thomas Kuhn
was an American physicist, historian, and philosopher of sciencewhose controversial 1962 book The Structure
of Scientific Revolutions was deeply influential in both academic and popular circles, introducing the term
"paradigm shift", which has since become an English-language staple. Kuhn made several notable claims
concerning the progress of scientific knowledge: that scientific fields undergo periodic "paradigm shifts" rather
than solely progressing in a linear and continuous way; that these paradigm shifts open up new approaches to
understanding what scientists would never have considered valid before; and that the notion of scientific truth,
at any given moment, cannot be established solely by objective criteria but is defined by a consensus of
a scientific community. Competing paradigms are
frequently incommensurable; that is, they are competing accounts of reality which cannot be coherently
reconciled. Thus, our comprehension of science can never rely on full "objectivity"; we must account for
subjective perspectives as well, all objective conclusions being ultimately founded upon subjective
conditioning/worldview.
Beatriz Colomina
Beatriz Colomina is an architecture historian. She has written extensively on questions of architecture and the
modern institutions of representation, particularly the printed media, photography, advertising, film and TV. She
is the author of numerous articles and has lectured extensively throughout the world, including the Museum of
Modern Art in New York; the Architectural Institute of Japan, Tokyo; the Center for Contemporary Art and
Architecture in Stockholm; and the DIA Art Foundation in New York.
Werner Oechslin
Werner Oechslin is professor of art history and architecture at the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich
(ETH).He studied art history, archeology, philosophy and mathematics in Zurich and Rome. He specializes in the
theory of architecture, in Baroque, modern architecture and in 18th century as well as in specific problems of
architectural drawing and typology and of ephemeral architecture.
Mark Wigley
Mark Antony Wigley is a New Zealand-born architect, author, and (from 2004 to 2014) Dean of Columbia
University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation,New York, United States. n 1988, Wigley
co-curated with Philip Johnson the MoMA exhibition Deconstructivist Architecture. The exhibition featured the
works of seven architects, who were already well-known at the time for a style of architecture that involved in
various ways "deconstructing" conventional notions of architectural convention: Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, Peter
Eisenman, Daniel Libeskind, Bernard Tschumi, Rem Koolhaas and Coop Himmelb(l)au.
Peter Behrens
Peter Behrens (14 April 1868 27 February 1940) was a German architect and designer. He was important for
the modernist movement, and several of the movement's leading names (including Ludwig Mies van der
Rohe, Le Corbusier and Walter Gropius) in earlier stages of their careers.
Walter Gropius
Walter Adolph Georg Gropius (18 May 1883 5 July 1969) was a German architect and founder of
the Bauhaus School,[1]who, along with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright, is widely
regarded as one of the pioneering masters of modern architecture.
In 1910 Gropius left the firm of Behrens and together with fellow employee Adolf Meyer established a practice in
Berlin. Together they share credit for one of the seminal modernist buildings created during this period:
the Faguswerk in Alfeld-an-der-Leine, Germany, a shoe last factory. Although Gropius and Meyer only designed
the facade, the glass curtain walls of this building demonstrated both the modernist principle that form reflects
function and Gropius's concern with providing healthful conditions for the working class. The factory is now
regarded as one of the crucial founding monuments of European modernism.
Le Corbusier
was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now
called modern architecture. He was born in Switzerland and became a French citizen in 1930. His career
spanned five decades, with his buildings constructed throughout Europe, India, and America.
Dedicated to providing better living conditions for the residents of crowded cities, Le Corbusier was influential
in urban planning, and was a founding member of the Congrs International d'Architecture Moderne (CIAM).
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Along with Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright, he is widely regarded as one of the pioneering masters
of modern architecture.
Mies, like many of his post-World War I contemporaries, sought to establish a new architectural style that could
represent modern times just as Classical and Gothic did for their own eras. He created an influential twentiethcentury architectural style, stated with extreme clarity and simplicity. His mature buildings made use of modern
materials such as industrial steel and plate glass to define interior spaces. He strove toward an architecture with
a minimal framework of structural order balanced against the implied freedom of free-flowing open space. He
called his buildings "skin and bones" architecture. He sought a rational approach that would guide the creative
process of architectural design, but he was always concerned with expressing the spirit of the modern era. He is
often associated with his quotation of the aphorisms, "less is more" and "God is in the details".

Jacobus Oud
Jacobus Johannes Pieter Oud, commonly called J. J. P. Oud (9 February 1890 - 5 April 1963) was
a Dutch architect.[1] His fame began as a follower of the De Stijl movement. After World War II, Oud designed
the Dutch National War Monument in Amsterdam and the monument of the Military War Cemetery Grebbeberg.
By then, he had mostly let go of any Stijl influences. He continued to take a highly individualistic stance against
mainstream modernism. He designed projects such as the Spaarbank in Rotterdam, office-building De Utrecht in
Rotterdam and the Children's health-centre in Arnhem (Bio-herstellingsoord).
Bruno Taut
Bruno Julius Florian Taut (4 May 1880 24 December 1938) was a prolific German architect, urban planner, and
author active during the Weimar period. He is known for his theoretical works as well as for his realized designs.
Heinrich Wlfflin
Heinrich Wlfflin (21 June 1864, Winterthur 19 July 1945, Zurich) was an important Swiss art historian, whose
objective classifying principles ("painterly" vs. "linear" and the like) were influential in the development
of formal analysis in art history in the early 20th century. He taught at Basel, Berlin and Munich in the
generation that raised German art history to pre-eminence. His three great books, still consulted,
are Renaissance und Barock (1888), Die Klassische Kunst (1898, "Classic Art"), and Kunstgeschichtliche
Grundbegriffe(1915, "Principles of Art History").
Werkbund Exhibition (1914)
The first Werkbund Exhibition of 1914 was held at Rheinpark in Cologne, Germany. Bruno Taut's best-known
building, the prismatic dome of the Glass Pavilion of which only black and white images survive today, was in
reality a brightly colored landmark. Walter Gropius and Adolf Meyer designed a model factory for the exhibition.
The Belgian architect Henri van de Velde designed a model theatre.
Vers une architecture
translated into English as Toward an Architecture (but commonly known as Towards a New Architecture) is a
collection of essays written by Le Corbusier (Charles-Edouard Jeanneret), advocating for and exploring the
concept of modern architecture. The book has had a lasting effect on the architectural profession, serving as
the manifesto for a generation of architects, a subject of hatred for others, and unquestionably a critical piece of
architectural theory.
International Architecture(Internationale Arkitektur)
International Architecture is a picture book of the modern art of building. It will in concise form give a survey of
the works of the leading modern architects of the cultured countries of the world and make the developments of
todays architectural design familiar.
Der moderne Zweckbau
sets the contexts for modernist polemics of architecture. Unlike later theorists such as Henry-Russell Hitchcock
(q.v.) and Philip Johnson (q.v.), and to a lesser extent Gropius, who all saw modern architecture as a "style" ( i.e.,
the International Style), Behne emphasized functional building as a set of ideologies. Der moderne
Zweckbau draws on modernist architectural traditions from across the genres of the early twentieth century.
The Victory of the New Building Style
The architect and theorist Walter Behrendt was involved with public housing and urban development as a
designer and administrator for the German government after World War I. From 1925 to 1926 he edited the
journal Die Form for the German Werkbund and led an articulate and well-orchestrated campaign in support of
the Modern Movement. A friend and colleague of Lewis Mumford, he immigrated in 1934 to the United States
where he taught courses on city planning and housing at Dartmouth College and the University of Buffalo.
This book--Behrendt's principle theoretical work in German and the precursor to Modern Building--presents a
revisionist concept of style that places equal emphasis on form and function. Here, Behrendt calls for architects
to return to basic geometries and to articulate explicitly the new social and economic realities. Now available in
English for the first time, this incisive treatise boldly advocates international modernism to the general public.
Building in France, Building in Iron, Building in Ferroconcrete
presents Sigfried Giedion's provocative vision of architecture in the industrial era and his response to
technological advances in the production of key building materials.
Giedion shows how iron and reinforced concrete allowed the construction of buildings of unprecedented size and
openness in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Focusing on the radical possibilities of
skeletal support structures, he celebrates innovative uses of these materials in buildings from the Eiffel Tower
and the Crystal Palace to glass-canopied railroad stations, department stores, and exhibition halls.
Modern Architecture: Romanticism and Reintegration(Henry Russel Hitchcock)
Originally published in 1929, this book demonstrates the architecture of the 1920s as the product of over a
century of architectural development, despite the visual evidence that seemed to indicate that it had made a
radical break with the past. This book crystallized the history and theories behind the "international style" for an
American audience. The author was only 27 at the time, and this was his first book; yet it would substantially
reshape the way subsequent generations would view modern architecture and its history. This is also the book
that established Henry-Russell Hitchcock as a pre-eminent American historian of modern architecture.
The International Style: Architecture Since 1922,(Hitchcock&Philip Johnson)
the book played a crucial role in giving a permanent validity to the exhibition, complementing its content rather
than documenting it. The book catalogued the morphological and compositional elements of the new style, thus
serving not only as an important historical document, but also as a guide book for Modern architecture.
Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius(Nikolaus Pevsner)
One of the most widely read books on modern design, Nikolaus Pevsners landmark work today remains as
stimulating as it was when first published in 1936. This expanded edition of Pioneers of Modern Design
provides Pevsners original text along with significant new and updated information, enhancing Pevsners
illuminating account of the roots of Modernism. The book now offers many beautiful color illustrations;
biographies and bibliographies of all major figures; illustrated short essays on key themes, movements, and
individuals; a critique of Pevsners analysis from todays perspective; examples of works after 1914 (where the

original study ended); a biography detailing Pevsners life and achievements; and much more.
Pevsner saw Modernism as a synthesis of three main sources: William Morris and his followers, the work of
nineteenth-century engineers, and Art Nouveau. The author considers the role of these sources in the work of
early Modernists and looks at such masters of the movement as C.F.A. Voysey and Charles Rennie Mackintosh in
Britain, Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright in America, and Adolf Loos and Otto Wagner in Vienna. The
account concludes with a discussion of the radical break with the past represented by the design work of Walter
Gropius and his future Bauhaus colleagues.
The Zeitgeist
The Zeitgeist (spirit of the age or spirit of the time) is the intellectual fashion or dominant school of thought that
typifies and influences the culture of a particular period in time. For example,
the Zeitgeist of modernism typified and influenced architecture, art, and fashion during much of the 20th
century. The German word Zeitgeist is often attributed to the philosopher Georg Hegel, but he never actually
used the word. In his works such as Lectures on the Philosophy of History, he uses the phrase der Geist seiner
Zeit (the spirit of his time)for example, "no man can surpass his own time, for the spirit of his time is also his
own spirit."
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel ;( August 27, 1770 November 14, 1831) was a German philosopher, and a
major figure in German Idealism. His historicist and idealist account of reality revolutionized European
philosophyand was an important precursor to Continental philosophy and Marxism.
Hegel developed a comprehensive philosophical framework, or "system", of absolute idealism to account in an
integrated and developmental way for the relation of mind and nature, the subject and object of
knowledge, psychology, the state, history, art, religion, and philosophy. In particular, he developed the concept
that mind or spirit manifested itself in a set of contradictions and oppositions that it ultimately integrated and
united, without eliminating either pole or reducing one to the other. Examples of such contradictions include
those between nature and freedom, and between immanence and transcendence.
Adolf Loos
Adolf Franz Karl Viktor Maria Loos (10 December 1870 23 August 1933) was an Austrian and
Czechoslovak architect. He was influential in European Modern architecture, and in his essay Ornament and
Crime he abandoned the aesthetic principles of the Vienna Secession. In this and many other essays he
contributed to the elaboration of a body of theory and criticism of Modernism in architecture.
Adolf Behne
Adolf Behne (13 July 1885 22 August 1948) was a critic, art historian, architectural writer, and artistic activist.
He was one of the leaders of the Avant Garde in the Weimar Republic.
Hans Scharoun
Bernhard Hans Henry Scharoun (20 September 1893 25 November 1972) was a German architect best known
for designing the Berlin Philharmonic concert hall and the Schminke House in Lbau, Saxony. He was an
important exponent of organic and expressionist architecture. As an architect, Scharoun was a main proponent
of organic architecture whose modern architectural works strive to create a balance and harmony between
nature and architecture.
Hugo Hring
Hugo Hring (11 May 1882 17 May 1958) was a German architect and architectural writer best known for his
writings on "organic architecture", and as a figure in architectural debates about functionalism in the 1920s and
1930s, though he had an important role as an expressionist architect.
Neue Sachlichkeit(New Objectivity)
The New Objectivity (in German: Neue Sachlichkeit) is a term used to characterize the attitude of public life in
Weimar Germany as well as the art, literature, music, and architecture created to adapt to it.The New
Objectivity (a translation of the German Neue Sachlichkeit, sometimes also translated as New Sobriety) is a
name often given to the Modern architecture that emerged in Europe, primarily German-speaking Europe, in the
1920s and 30s. It is also frequently calledNeues Bauen (New Building). The New Objectivity remodeled many
German cities in this period
Bruno Zevi
Bruno Zevi (22 January 1918 - 9 January 2000) was an Italian architect, historian, professor, curator, author and
editor. Zevi was a vocal critic of 'classicising' modern architecture and postmodernism.
Colin St John Wilson
Sir Colin Alexander St John ("Sandy") Wilson, FRIBA, RA, (14 March 1922 14 May 2007) was a British
architect, lecturer and author. He spent over 30 years progressing the project to build a new British Library in
London, originally planned to be built inBloomsbury and now completed near Kings Cross.
Peter Blundell Jones
Peter Blundell Jones AA Dipl MA (Cantab) is a British architect, historian, academic and critic. He trained as an
architect at the Architectural Association school, London and has held academic positions at the University of
Cambridge and London South Bank University. He has been Professor of architecture at the University of
Sheffield since 1994.He is a prolific author on architectural history and theory.
Kenneth Frampton
Kenneth Frampton (born 1930, Woking, UK), is a British architect, critic, historian and the Ware Professor of
Architecture at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia
University, New York.
Frampton is well known for his writing on twentieth-century architecture. His books include Modern Architecture:
A Critical History (1980; revised 1985, 1992 and 2007) and Studies in Tectonic Culture (1995). Frampton
achieved great prominence (and influence) in architectural education with his essay "Towards a Critical
Regionalism" (1983) though the term had already been coined by Alexander Tzonis and Liliane
Lefaivre. Also, Frampton's essay was included in a book The Anti-Aesthetic. Essays on Postmodern Culture,
edited by Hal Foster, though Frampton is critical of postmodernism. Frampton's own position attempts
to defend a version of modernism that looks to either critical regionalism or a 'momentary' understanding

of the autonomy of architectural practice in terms of its own concerns with form and tectonics which
cannot be reduced to economics (whilst conversely retaining a Leftist viewpoint regarding the social
responsibility of architecture).
Alvar Aalto
Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto (3 February 1898 11 May 1976) was a Finnish architect and designer, as well as a
sculptor and painter.[1]His work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and glassware. Aalto's early
career runs in parallel with the rapid economic growth and industrialization of Finland during the first half
of the twentieth century and many of his clients were industrialists; among these were theAhlstrmGullichsen family.The span of his career, from the 1920s to the 1970s, is reflected in the styles of his
work, ranging fromNordic Classicism of the early work, to a rational International Style Modernism
during the 1930s to a more organic modernist style from the 1940s onwards. His furniture designs were
considered Scandinavian Modern.What is typical for his entire career, however, is a concern for design
as a Gesamtkunstwerk, a total work of art; whereby he together with his first wife Aino Aalto would
design not just the building, but give special treatments to the interior surfaces and design furniture,
lamps, and furnishings and glassware. The Alvar Aalto Museum, designed by Aalto himself, is located in
what is regarded as his home city Jyvskyl.
Rudolph Schindler
Rudolph Michael Schindler (born Rudolf Michael Schindler (1887 Vienna - 1953 Los Angeles) was Austrianborn American architectwhose most important works were built in or near Los Angeles during the
early to mid-twentieth century.Although he worked and trained with some of its foremost practitioners, he
often is associated with the fringes of the modern movementin architecture. His inventive use of
complex three-dimensional forms, warm materials, and striking colors, as well as his ability to work
successfully within tight budgets, however, have placed him as one of the true mavericks of early
twentieth century architecture.
Luis Barragn
Luis Ramiro Barragn Morfn (March 9, 1902 November 22, 1988) was a Mexican architect. He studied as
an engineer in his home town, while undertaking the entirety of additional coursework to obtain the title of
architect.
Barragn attended lectures by Le Corbusier and became influenced by European modernism. The buildings he
produced in the years after his return to Mexico show the typical, clean lines of the Modernist movement.
Nonetheless, according to Andrs Casillas (who worked with Barragn), he eventually became entirely
convinced that the house should not be "a machine for living." Opposed to functionalism, Barragn strove for an
"emotional architecture" claiming that "any work of architecture which does not express serenity is a mistake."
Barragn always used raw materials such as stone or wood. He combined them with his incredibly creative use
of light.
Oscar Niemeyer
was a Brazilian architect who is considered to be one of the key figures in the development of modern
architecture. Niemeyer was best known for his design of civic buildings for Braslia, a planned city that became
Brazil's capital in 1960, as well as his collaboration with other architects on the United Nations
Headquarters in New York City. His exploration of the aesthetic possibilities of reinforced concrete was highly
influential in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Art Nouveau
Art Nouveau or Jugendstil is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art
especially the decorative artsthat was most popular during 18901910. English uses the French name Art
nouveau ("new art"), but the style has many different names in other countries. A reaction to academic art of
the 19th century, it was inspired by natural forms and structures, not only in flowers and plants, but also in
curved lines. Architects tried to harmonize with the natural environment.
Art Nouveau is considered a "total" art style, embracing architecture, graphic art, interior design, and most of
the decorative artsincluding jewellery, furniture, textiles, household silver and other utensils and lighting, as
well as the fine arts. According to the philosophy of the style, art should be a way of life. For many well-off
Europeans, it was possible to live in an art nouveau-inspired house with art nouveau furniture, silverware,
fabrics, ceramics including tableware, jewellery, cigarette cases, etc. Artists desired to combine the fine arts and
applied arts, even for utilitarian objects.
Although Art Nouveau was replaced by 20th-century Modernist styles, it is now considered as an important
transition between theeclectic historic revival styles of the 19th-century and Modernism.
Eileen Gray
Kathleen Eileen Moray Gray (9 August 1878 31 October 1976) was an Anglo- Irish furniture designer and
architect and a pioneer of the Modern Movement in architecture.
Victor Horta
Victor Horta (French: [ta]; Victor, Baron Horta after 1932; 6 January 1861 8 September 1947) was
a Belgian architect and designer. John Julius Norwich described him as "undoubtedly the key European Art
Nouveau architect." Indeed, Horta is one of the most important names in Art Nouveau architecture; the
construction of his Htel Tassel in Brussels in 1892-3 means that he is sometimes credited as the first to
introduce the style to architecture from the decorative arts. The French architect Hector Guimard was deeply
influenced by Horta and further spread the "whiplash" style in France and abroad.
Henry van de Velde
Henry Clemens van de Velde (3 April 1863 15 October 1957) was a Belgian painter, architect and interior
designer. Together with Victor Horta and Paul Hankar he could be considered as one of the main founders and
representatives of Art Nouveau in Belgium. Van de Velde spent the most important part of his career
in Germany and had a decisive influence on German architecture and design at the beginning of the 20th
century.
Josef Hoffmann

Josef Hoffmann (December 15, 1870 May 7, 1956) was an Austrian architect and designer of consumer
goods. Some of Hoffmann's domestic designs can still be found in production today, such as the Rundes Modell
cutlery set that is manufactured by Alessi. Originally produced in silver the range is now produced in high
quality stainless steel. Another example of Hoffmanns strict geometrical lines and the quadratic theme is the
iconic Kubus Armchair. Designed in 1910, it was presented at the International Exhibition held in Buenos Aires
on the centennial of Argentinean Independence known as May Revolution. Hoffmann's constant use of squares
and cubes earned him the nickname Quadratl-Hoffmann
Otto Wagner
Otto Koloman Wagner (13 July 1841 11 April 1918) was an Austrian architect and urban planner, known for
his lasting impact on the appearance of his home town Vienna, to which he contributed many landmarks.
By the mid-1890s, he had already designed several Jugendstil buildings. Wagner was very interested in urban
planning in 1890 he designed a new city plan for Vienna, but only his urban rail network, the Stadtbahn, was
built. In 1896 he published a textbook entitledModern Architecture in which he expressed his ideas about the
role of the architect; it was based on the text of his 1894 inaugural lecture to the Academy. His style
incorporated the use of new materials and new forms to reflect the fact that society itself was changing. In his
textbook, he stated that "new human tasks and views called for a change or reconstitution of existing forms". In
pursuit of this ideal, he designed and built structures that reflected their intended function, such as the austere
Neustiftgasse apartment block in Vienna.
Constructivist architecture
Constructivist architecture was a form of modern architecture that flourished in the Soviet Union in the
1920s and early 1930s. It combined advanced technology and engineering with an avowedly Communist social
purpose. Although it was divided into several competing factions, the movement produced many pioneering
projects and finished buildings, before falling out of favour around 1932. Its effects have been marked on later
developments in architecture.
Rationalism (architecture)
In architecture, rationalism is an architectural current which mostly developed from Italy in the 1920s1930s. Vitruvius had already established in his work De Architectura that architecture is a science that can be
comprehended rationally.[citation needed] This formulation was taken up and further developed in the
architectural treatises of the Renaissance. Progressive art theory of the 18th-century opposed the Baroque use
of illusionism with the classic beauty of truth and reason.
Twentieth-century rationalism derived less from a special, unified theoretical work than from a common belief
that the most varied problems posed by the real world could be resolved by reason. In that respect it
represented a reaction to historicism and a contrast toArt Nouveau and Expressionism.
De Stijl
De Stijl, Dutch for "The Style", also known as neoplasticism, was a Dutch artistic movement founded in 1917
in Amsterdam. The De Stijl consisted of artists and architects. In a narrower sense, the term De Stijl is used to
refer to a body of work from 1917 to 1931 founded in the Netherlands.
De Stijl is also the name of a journal that was published by the Dutch painter, designer, writer, and critic Theo
van Doesburg (18831931) that served to propagate the group's theories. Next to van Doesburg, the group's
principal members were the painters Piet Mondrian (18721944),Vilmos Huszr (18841960), and Bart van der
Leck (18761958), and the architects Gerrit Rietveld (18881964), Robert van 't Hoff (18871979), and J. J. P.
Oud (18901963). The artistic philosophy that formed a basis for the group's work is known as neoplasticism
the new plastic art (or Nieuwe Beelding in Dutch).
Proponents of De Stijl advocated pure abstraction and universality by a reduction to the essentials
of form and colour; they simplified visual compositions to the vertical and horizontal directions, and used
only primary colors along with black and white. Indeed, according to the Tate Gallery's online article on
neoplasticism, Mondrian himself sets forth these delimitations in his essay "Neo-Plasticism in Pictorial Art". He
writes, "this new plastic idea will ignore the particulars of appearance, that is to say, natural form and colour. On
the contrary, it should find its expression in the abstraction of form and colour, that is to say, in the straight line
and the clearly defined primary colour". The Tate article further summarizes that this art allows "only primary
colours and non-colours, only squares and rectangles, only straight and horizontal or vertical
line."[4] The Guggenheim Museum's online article on De Stijl summarizes these traits in similar terms: "It [De
Stijl] was posited on the fundamental principle of the geometry of the straight line, the square, and the
rectangle, combined with a strong asymmetricality; the predominant use of pure primary colors with black and
white; and the relationship between positive and negative elements in an arrangement of non-objective forms
and lines".
The ABC Group
A leftist, technologically oriented wing of the movement had formed in Switzerland and the Netherlands, the socalled ABC Group.
Glass Chain
The Glass Chain or Crystal Chain sometimes known as the "Utopian Correspondence" (German: Die Glserne
Kette) was a chain letter that took place between November 1919 and December 1920. It was a correspondence
of architects that formed a basis of expressionist architecture in Germany. It was initiated by Bruno Taut.
Louis Kahn
Louis Isadore Kahn was an American architect, based in Philadelphia. After working in various capacities for
several firms in Philadelphia, he founded his own atelier in 1935. While continuing his private practice, he
served as a design critic and professor of architecture at Yale School of Architecture from 1947 to 1957.
From 1957 until his death, he was a professor of architecture at the School of Design at the University of
Pennsylvania. Kahn created a style that was monumental and monolithic; his heavy buildings do not hide their
weight, their materials, or the way they are assembled. Louis Kahn's works are considered as monumental
beyond modernism. Famous for his meticulously built works, his provocative unbuilt proposals, and his teaching,
Kahn was one of the most influential architects of the 20th century. He was awarded the AIA Gold Medaland

the RIBA Gold Medal. At the time of this death he was considered by some as "America's foremost living
architect."
High-tech architecture
High-tech architecture, also known as Late Modernism or Structural Expressionism, is an architectural
style that emerged in the 1970s, incorporating elements of high-tech industry and technology into building
design. High-tech architecture appeared as a revampedmodernism, an extension of those previous ideas helped
by even more technological advances. This category serves as a bridge between modernism and postmodernism; however, there remain gray areas as to where one category ends and the other begins. In the
1980s, high-tech architecture became more difficult to distinguish from post-modern architecture. Some of its
themes and ideas were later absorbed into the style of Neo-Futurism art and architectural movement.
Office for Metropolitan Architecture
The Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) is an architecture firm based in Rotterdam that was founded
in 1975 by Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas and Greek architect Elia Zenghelis, along with Madelon
Vriesendorp and Zoe Zenghelis.