Architecture
Architecture the art of building in
which human requirements and construction materials are related so as to
furnish practical use as well as an aesthetic solution, thus differing from the
pure utility of engineering construction. As an art, architecture is essentially
abstract and nonrepresentational and involves the manipulation of the
relationships of spaces, volumes, planes, masses, and voids. Time is also an
important factor in architecture, since a building is usually comprehended in a
succession of experiences rather than all at once. In most architecture there
is no one vantage point from which the whole structure can be understood. The
use of light and shadow, as well as surface decoration, can greatly enhance a
structure.
The
analysis of building types provides an insight into past cultures and eras.
Behind each of the greater styles lies not a casual trend nor a vogue, but a
period of serious and urgent experimentation directed toward answering the
needs of a specific way of life. Climate, methods of labor, available
materials, and economy of means all impose their dictates. Each of the greater
styles has been aided by the discovery of new construction methods. Once
developed, a method survives tenaciously, giving way only when social changes
or new building techniques have reduced it. That evolutionary process is
exemplified by the history of modern architecture, which developed from the
first uses of structural iron and steel in the mid-19th cent.
Until
the 20th cent. there were three great developments in architectural
construction—the post-and-lintel, or trabeated, system; the arch system, either
the cohesive type, employing plastic materials hardening into a homogeneous
mass, or the thrust type, in which the loads are received and counterbalanced
at definite points; and the modern steel-skeleton system. In the 20th cent. new
forms of building have been devised, with the use of reinforced concrete and
the development of geodesic and stressed-skin (light material, reinforced)
structures.
See
also articles under countries, e.g., American architecture ; styles, e.g.,
baroque ; periods, e.g., Gothic architecture and art ; individual architects,
e.g., Andrea Palladio ; individual stylistic and structural elements, e.g.,
tracery , orientation ; specific building types, e.g., pagoda , apartment house
.
Architecture
of the Ancient World
In
Egyptian architecture, to which belong some of the earliest extant structures
to be called architecture (erected by the Egyptians before 3000 BC), the
post-and-lintel system was employed exclusively and produced the earliest stone
columnar buildings in history. The architecture of W Asia from the same era
employed the same system; however, arched construction was also known and used.
The Chaldaeans and Assyrians, dependent upon clay as their chief material,
built vaulted roofs of damp mud bricks that adhered to form a solid shell.
After
generations of experimentation with buildings of limited variety the Greeks
gave to the simple post-and-lintel system the purest, most perfect expression
it was to attain (see Parthenon ; orders of architecture ). Roman architecture,
borrowing and combining the columns of Greece and the arches of Asia, produced
a wide variety of monumental buildings throughout the Western world. Their
momentous invention of concrete enabled the imperial builders to exploit
successfully the vault construction of W Asia and to cover vast unbroken floor
spaces with great vaults and domes , as in the rebuilt Pantheon (2d cent. AD;
see under pantheon ).
The
Evolution of Styles in the Christian Era
The
Romans and the early Christians also used the wooden truss for roofing the wide
spans of their basilica halls. Neither Greek, Chinese, nor Japanese
architecture used the vault system of construction. However, in the Asian division
of the Roman Empire, vault development continued; Byzantine architects
experimented with new principles and developed the pendentive , used
brilliantly in the 6th cent. for the Church of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople.
The
Romanesque architecture of the early Middle Ages was notable for strong,
simple, massive forms and vaults executed in cut stone. In Lombard Romanesque
(11th cent.) the Byzantine concentration of vault thrusts was improved by the
device of ribs and of piers to support them. The idea of an organic supporting
and buttressing skeleton of masonry (see buttress ), here appearing in embryo,
became the vitalizing aim of the medieval builders. In 13th-century Gothic
architecture it emerged in perfected form, as in the Amiens and Chartres cathedrals.
The birth of Renaissance
architecture (15th cent.) inaugurated a period of several hundred years in
Western architecture during which the multiple and complex buildings of the
modern world began to emerge, while at the same time no new and compelling
structural conceptions appeared. The forms and ornaments of Roman antiquity
were resuscitated again and again and were ordered into numberless new
combinations, and structure served chiefly as a convenient tool for attaining
these effects. The complex, highly decorated baroque style was the chief
manifestation of the 17th-century architectural aesthetic. The Georgian style
was among architecture's notable 18th-century expressions (see Georgian
architecture ). The first half of the 19th cent. was given over to the classic
revival and the Gothic revival .
New World, New Architectures
The architects of the later 19th
cent. found themselves in a world being reshaped by science, industry, and
speed. A new eclecticism arose, such as the architecture based on the Ecole des
Beaux-Arts , and what is commonly called Victorian architecture in Britain and
the United States. The needs of a new society pressed them, while steel,
reinforced concrete, and electricity were among the many new technical means at
their disposal.
After more than a half-century of
assimilation and experimentation, modern architecture , often called the
International style , produced an astonishing variety of daring and original
buildings, often steel substructures sheathed in glass. The Bauhaus was a
strong influence on modern architecture. As the line between architecture and
engineering became a shadow, 20th-century architecture often approached
engineering, and modern works of engineering—airplane hangars, for
example—often aimed at and achieved an undeniable beauty. More recently,
postmodern architecture (see postmodernism ), which exploits and expands the
technical innovations of modernism while often incorporating stylistic elements
from other architectural styles or periods, has become an international
movement. |