When is Architecture Art? : Architectural Representations and the Postmodern Artworld, or, Socioaesthetics

Kauffman, Jordan

Abstract

Concerns about the correlation between architecture and art found new life in the Postmodern era when architectural representations became entangled in the art world. The exhibiting and sale of architectural drawings and models at commercial galleries gained hold in the 1970s and 1980s in Chicago and New York. Art and architecture critics emphasized architectural drawings as artworks in their own right, while individuals, corporations, and institutions collected drawings. Architectural models, however, were not understood similarly. They were not emphasized as art within publications, by the press, by collectors, or by the public. Only institutions with a vested interest in architecture, building collections at this time, such as the Deutsches Architekturmusem and the Canadian Centre for Architecture, collected them.

This chapter explores the complicated, interwoven social factors responsible for the mechanisms through which architecture was or was not considered art. Research includes analyses of sale shows, critical reactions, architects' desires, the intentions of gallery owners, and the attention paid to architectural materials by individuals and institutions. What materialized is what the author coins as socioaesthetics, a moment in which economic, architectural, artistic, commercial, critical, institutional, and historical forces governed aesthetic judgment and produced the conceptualizations, perceptions, and values of architectural representations.

Citation

Kauffman, J. (2022). When is Architecture Art? : Architectural Representations and the Postmodern Artworld, or, Socioaesthetics. In The Routledge Companion to Architectural Drawings and Models: From Translating to Archiving, Collecting and Displaying (249-262). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003052623-20

• Publication Date: 2022
• Deposit Date: Mar 1, 2024
• Publisher: Routledge
• Pages: 249-262
• Book Title: The Routledge Companion to Architectural Drawings and Models: From Translating to Archiving, Collecting and Displaying
• Chapter Number: 18
• ISBN: 9780367511463
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003052623-20
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/31897267
• Publisher URL: https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Companion-to-Architectural-Drawings-and-Models-From-Translating/Goffi/p/book/9780367511463