ROBERT VENTURI COMPLEXITY AND CONTRADICTION IN ARCHITECTURE
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INTRODUCTION
Robert Venturi’s design theory is all about architecture and modernism. Venturi's key points generally outlined in non-straight forward architecture: A general manifesto. Venturi also touches on the concept that richness can contrast with clarity and urges architects to leave the tenets of traditional modernism behind in pursuit of "truth in its totality", a sort of organic messiness that he perceives as more real and useful than overly planned hyper logical modernist constructions. "Complexity and contradiction versus simplification or picturesqueness" criticizes "orthodox modern architects" and their treatment of complexity eventually feels that diversity in architecture represents a type of sophistication. Simplicity doesn't always work because it often results in an architectural "blandness”, "less is bore". "Both-and" architecture promotes hierarchy within it, which leads to contrast layers and levels of meanings. Venturi encourages architects you consider how they can use principles of standardization in a nonstandard way. Finally, we reached the obligation towards the difficult whole. Venturi believes that variety in the cityscape and individual buildings creates certain type of tension that not only promotes many levels of interpretation but also forms a sophisticated unity. Ambiguity and tension are easily found in complex and contradictory architecture. Architecture is a form and substance - abstract and concrete its meaning is from the interior characteristics and its popular context. An architectural element is perceived as form and structure, texture and material. These oscillating relationships, complete and contradictory are the source of the ambiguity and tension characteristic to the medium of architecture. It seems that many of Venturi's principles work effectively in a graphic design contest: variety, inclusion and tensions are all key components to compelling works. We can also think about our design work as individual entities as also as well as parts of a whole by considering how they fit in with both contemporary and historical examples of graphic design. Certainly, his ideas of proposing historical / traditional elements also applies to graphic design postmodernism would not exist without this concept. In 1962, Venturi wrote Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture under a grant from the Graham Foundation. It was re-published by the Museum of Modern Art (New York) in 2002 as part of a series of occasional papers on the theoretical background of modern architecture. The re-publication of the book was not to accompany a museum exhibition, rather its purpose was to recognise the importance of Complexity and Contradiction as a critical and historical expression of a turning point in modern architectural history. The book is a about architecture beyond modernism. By the middle of the twentieth century, some began to see modernism as a languishing system. Its simplicity, modularity and internationalism were becoming stale, and functional flaws were starting to show. Modernism’s fall from grace led architects in America and across Europe to reconsider the programmes and systems they employed. One such architect was Robert Venturi.
BHAKTI SHET B-44 | INDIRA COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN | FOURTH YEAR B. Arch. | 2018-19
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