All posts by Jessica Aberle

Florence Lost

Giovanni Fanelli. Florence Lost: As Seen in the 120 Paintings by Fabio Bortottoni. Translated by Forrest Selvig. Introduction by Italo Calvino, translated by William Weaver. Milan: Franco Maria Ricci, 1985.

The silence entered the city in the early afternoon. It slipped through the turreted, battlemented gates, occupied the loggias arch by arch, flowed along the streets grazing the walls, huddled against the embankments, filled the ramparts.

Italo Calvino’s short essay, “Silence and the City”, is included in the work on the paintings of Fabio Bortottoni (1820-1901). The sentence quoted above opens both the essay and the larger work. After a passage describing the fall of silence across the city, Calvino describes the material of silence.  He writes:

Silence is made of stone; it is something that is inside walls, in building materials. It is the living of a masonry world, all facades, rough and smooth, rusticated, stuccoed. Silence is a solid: it speaks through volumes, edges, outcrops, and niches in the surfaces, through tympana and apses. It expresses itself in the multiple facets of those opaque crystals, the concretions of buildings in the taciturn cities. Those who attempt to make walls talk by sticking written words onto them have missed the whole point of walls: walls express themselves in the long silences of light and shadow that fall on their uniform surfaces, in the blind stare of rows of windows. (pg 14-15)

Through the lens of Calvino, the reader comes to the paintings of Borbottoni. One cannot help but feel that Calvino’s silence has befallen the city of Florence. Borbottoni included figures in many of his paintings; however, it is the mass of the buildings, the light and shadow that dominate the paintings. Even in the busy markets, there is a quietness among the people.

According to Fanelli, Borbottoni hoped to document the lost and changing fabric of the city of Florence with his 120 paintings. Fanelli argues, however, that these images are not accurate representations of the city. Borbottoni used various documents to create paintings for the no longer extant structures. Even with those buildings or parts of the city that he would have known first hand, Borbottoni used artistic license. Fanelli concludes, “Together the pictures in the collection constitute a long tale of lights and shadows.” (pg 19-26)

For those interested in the architecture and the city fabric of Florence, the two volume set would be most useful so long as one follows Fanelli’s cautionary remarks. And for those that are not, Borbottoni’s works are beautiful studies of light, shadow, and silence.

Arnold Lyongrün

Arnold Lyongrün. Neue Ideen für Dekorative Kunst und das KunstgewerbeBerlin: Kanter & Mohr, [n.d.].

Neue Ideen für Dekorative Kunst und das Kunstgewerbe is part of the Martin S. Kermacy Collection. Martin Kermacy was a  professor at the Architecture School at UT from 1947-1983. The collection reflects an interest in the Vienna Secession and Jugendstil. According to Oxford Art, Arnold Ernest Lyongrün falls into the latter art movement.

Lyongrün created of a series of twenty-four monochromatic plates of blues, greens, and browns.  Each plate mixes natural motifs of various species of plants and animals, whether real or fantastic, with human figures and stylized decorative patterns. The layout of the plates appears symmetrical; however, upon closer observation the decorative patterns are in conflict with the perceived symmetry.  Lyongrün invites careful study of his motifs. What the eye initially takes in as pattern yields many delights and surprises. Looking upon the plates reminds me of the Book of Kells or other similar medieval manuscripts, though the style and intent are different. It will be quite difficult to choose which plates to share!

“LYONGRÜN, Arnold Ernest.” Benezit Dictionary of ArtistsOxford Art Online. Oxford University Press, accessed September 4, 2014,http://www.oxfordartonline.com/subscriber/article/benezit/B00113028.

Shades and Shadows

William R. Ware. Shades and shadows, with applications to architectural details, and exercises in drawing them with the brush and penScranton: International textbook company, [c1912-c1913].

Whenever I select a book to share from Special Collections, I tend to keep my focus rather narrow to reflect my research interests in either Medieval Architecture or more broadly British Architecture. Today, however, I am breaking with tradition because I made a delightful find- a piece of architectural history- in Special Collections. The library’s copy of Shades and Shadows was the personal copy of Goldwin Goldsmith (1871-1962), who was a member of the Department of Architecture at UT between 1928-1955. He presented his copy to the library.

According to the note pasted inside the cover and dated March 18, 1914, William Ware (1832-1915) sent Goldsmith copies of Perspective, American Vignola, and Shades and Shadows. Ware writes:

This I have done, not only to testify my personal confidence and regard, but to make sure that your new undertakings have the benefit of whatever there is in these books of interest and novelty. But the only thing that will be new to you is what was new to me. I was surprised to find in writing out the Shades and Shadows that the phenomena attending Concave Surfaces and [Re-centering?] Angles had escaped the vigilance of pervious writers.

Ware concludes his brief letter with a personal note:

Some time when you are at leisure I shall be glad to know how you find things where you are.

I keep pretty well, though I have no longer any fist for penmanship, and find my legs quite untrustworthy. So I hardly walk at all, though I drive about, an hour or so, two or three times a week. 

Yours most sincerely, 

William R. Ware.

Thomas Tresham

J. Alfred Gotch. A Complete Account, illustrated by measured drawings, of the buildings erected in Northamptonshire, by Sir Thomas Tresham, between the years 1575 and 1605. Together with many particulars concerning the Tresham family and their home at Rushton. Northampton: Taylor & son, 1883.

I first encountered Thomas Tresham (1543-1605) in the second half of the architectural survey course and sadly have not since crossed his path until today. Tresham’s Triangular Lodge is one of those delightfully enigmatic buildings that remains with you, so I was most excited to discover two other buildings associated with Thomas Tresham– Rothwell Market House and Lyveden New Building.

J. Alfred Gotch’s sought both to document the three structures and to study them as an architectural unit under the patronage of Thomas Tresham. He concludes that Triangular Lodge at Rushton Hall, Rothwell Market House, and Lyveden New Building should be attributed to the architect John Thorpe, who designed three houses in Northamptonshire during this period. He writes:

It is highly probable that the leading ideas, the curious emblems, the legends, and the insoluble enigmas were supplied by Tresham, being wrought into practicable form by Thorpe; all the buildings have clearly been worked out by an expert, and are free from the makeshifts and crude errors of the amateur. (pg 44)

While Gotch identifies the Triangular Lodge as a garden folly, he also argues that the symbolism contained within and the inscriptions upon the building are a reflection of Tresham’s religious beliefs. Tresham was a devout Catholic under the rule of Queen Elizabeth I, and the folly is an expression of the Trinity (pg 30). The building is a study of three.  It is an equilateral triangle with three floors, while the various details are groupings of three or multiples of three. Over the doorway the inscription reads, TRES. TESTIMONIVM. DANT., which Gotch translates as There are three that bear record. (pg 23) Gotch leaves us with this final thought regarding the Triangular Lodge:

…the Triangular Lodge is now and always must have been of very little practical use….It must always have been a “Folly;” an elegant, quaint, and expensive freak of its author; and therein lies its chief significance to us- in the light it throws on the manners and modes of the thought of the age in which it was built. (30)

Mudejar

Georgiana Goddard King. Mudejar. Bryn Mawr: Bryn Mawr College, 1927.

New territory again this week: Medieval Spain. I must confess that I know little about this subject. Whenever I teach medieval survey, my discussion of medieval Spanish architecture has been limited. I only tend to lecture on the architecture of Spain as it relates to Compostela and the Pilgrimage Routes or to the Architecture of Islam with the Great Mosque of Cordoba as an example. After my last round of medieval survey, I resolved to revamp my course to include more diverse topics, to expand further into areas in which I am less knowledgeable, and to move away from the traditional canon. So I bring you Georgiana Goddard King’s Mudejar.

Georgiana Goddard King (1871-1939) both studied and taught at Bryn Mawr. Her work was in the English Department initially, but she would eventually establish the Department of Art History at the college.  (“King, Georgiana Goddard,” Dictionary of Art Historians). Harold E. Wethey writes of her passing in Parnassus, “At Bryn Mawr Miss King became a tradition and cult; and now she is a legend.” (Wethey, 33) He discusses at length the contributions she made to the field of art history. He notes:

Mudejar, which the author considered her best book, is an inclusive study of that peculiarly Spanish style, which she analyzed in relation to history and culture, as well as to earlier Spanish monuments and to Islamic sources. (Wethey, 34)

Georgiana Goddard King’s works, especially that of Mudejar, seem like a natural place to begin for those interested in pursuing medieval Spanish architecture, as she was an founding member of the field of study. In the preface she positions this work against an earlier definition of “Mudejar” that she herself established. She quotes her initial definition:

Mudejar is a dangerous word, easier to use than to account for. It implies brickwork often, and plaster, being applicable to those forms of art where the material is contemptible and perishing, and the work is more utterly priceless; it implies cusping always, and usually an interlace of forms, and horseshoe arches where practicable. The character is apparent in the colored tile and cut plaster and inlaid wood of King Peter’s building at Tordesillas and in Alcazar at Seville; in the modified flamboyant of King Henry’s building in the region of Segovia, even to the strange fleeting and restlessly-recurrent yet baffling designs of the vault in the cathedral there; in the brick towers and apses at Toledo and Calatayud. Whenever and wherever it was executed it bears the sign that a different and non-European imagination was at work, in the use of color, in the invention of the composition, and in the very shape and curves and angles. It is visibly unlike to other things, as art-nouveau is, and steel structure. It can hardly be defined more exactly; but it can be recognized. It gives always a special pleasure, of delicacy, intricacy, subtlety, incredible elusive refinement. Like other things that came out of the East, it is always a little intoxicating. (King, vii-viii)

This is where we must begin. King organizes her work into sections which address the History, Characteristic Features, Materials, Secular Buildings, Style, and lastly Other Arts. The work is also highly illustrative with both photographs and drawings.

“King, Georgiana Goddard.” Dictionary of Art Historians (website). http://www.dictionaryofarthistorians.org/kingg.htm, accessed August 7, 2014.

Harold E. Wethey. “An American Pioneer in Hispanic Studies: Georgiana Goddard King.” Parnassus 11.7 (1939): 33-35.

Carcassonne

Viollet-le-Duc and Michel Jordy. The City of Carcassonne and A Visitor’s Guide. Paris: Albert Morancé, [n.d.]. Jean-Pierre Panouillé et al. The City of Carcassonne. [Paris]: Caisse nationale des monuments historiques et des sites, Ministère de la culture, c1984.

Today I broke into new call number territory in Special Collections: Medieval France. I discovered a small guide book to Carcassonne, which is on the list of places that I have not visited but would like to do so. It thus struck a cord. I was surprised to discover that the book had been written by Viollet-le-Duc. I had not realized that he had led the restoration of the fortification. UNESCO highlights Viollet-le-Duc’s importance as culturally significant to the monument: In its present form it is an outstanding example of a medieval fortified town, with its massive defences encircling the castle and the surrounding buildings, its streets and its fine Gothic cathedral. Carcassonne is also of exceptional importance because of the lengthy restoration campaign undertaken by Viollet-le-Duc, one of the founders of the modern science of conservation (UNESCO, “Historic Fortified City of Carcassonne, http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/345/, accessed July 31, 2014).

Viollet-le-Duc wrote the historical narrative of the site. His account is very much that of a military history as it relates to construction and destruction. Michel Jordy provides a brief description of the major architectural features of Carcassonne– the towers, the gates, the castle, and church. Jordy writes in the conclusion: This summary description of the City of Carcassonne may perhaps bring out the value of these remains, their interest and importance from preserving them from decay. I doubt whether there be elsewhere in Europe as complete and formidable an ensemble of 6th, 12th and 13th century defensive works, a more interesting subject of study, a situation more picturesque (pg. 29). While I was disappointed that Viollet-le-Duc did not discuss the restoration process, I understand that the authors’ purpose was rather to impress upon the visitors the historical and architectural significance of the site itself.

The library also posses in the lending collection a more recent guide book of Carcassonne, The City of Carcassonne, with more detailed information including a brief overview of the restoration and diagrams of the evolution of the site from the sixth century B.C. through the thirteenth century. Both UNESCO and Stephen Murray’s Mapping Gothic France have more extensive images of the site.

Modern British Domestic Architecture and Decoration

Charles Holme, ed. Modern British Domestic Architecture and Decoration. London: Offices of the Studio, 1901.

At the turn of the twentieth century, Charles Holme issued a call for a new architecture for the homes of Britain. He collected a series of essays on architecture, furniture, metal-work, stained glass, and decoration & embroidery. The treatise is highly illustrated with works by the Mackintoshes, the McNairs, and M. H. Baillie Scott- leaders in the Scottish Arts & Crafts Movement- among other architects and designers.

Edward S. Prior (1855-1932), architect & writer, wrote the essay  on domestic architecture, “Upon House-Building in the Twentieth Century,” for the publication, which was influenced by theories of the Arts & Crafts Movement. Like Holme, he issued a challenge to the architects of the twentieth century to abandon the adoration of the three great gods, Science, Commerce and Nature of the nineteenth century (pg. 10). He argues that through Science and Archaeology, architects reproduced the works of the past, latching onto various styles.  Prior suggests: A better understanding of his worth [Science] to us would cause him to be appreciated as the science of construction, not as the knowledge of other people’s ornament (10-11). Commerce too  had a detrimental effect on architecture. Houses were designed with profit as the driving force, loosing all individuality. The bottom line, Prior argues, has also affected the quality of workmanship and material. He writes: We have to take not only what does not suit us, but what is not the real thing at all- fatty compounds for butter, glucose for sugar, chemicals for beer: and just as certainly the sham house for the real building, its style a counterfeit, its construction a salable make-believe, its carved wood a pressing from machinery, its panelling linoleum, its plaster some pulp or other, its metal work a composition, its painted glass only paper- everything charmingly commercial and charmingly cheap (11-12). Finally, Prior is critical of the nineteenth century’s relationship with Nature. He proclaims: And to add insult to injury, we not only lay waste Nature’s palaces, but we talk glibly enough of taking her into our gardens, and to this end we set out puny landscapes in place of wide ones so rashly destroyed (12).

Prior hopes that the architects will reflect upon their relationship with the nineteenth century’s gods and overcome the challenges that such worship has imposed upon them. He concludes: And architects, delivered from the thralldom of design and required to provide neither orders nor styles, neither nooks nor symmetries, might be allowed the money for building with brains: that is to say, for a progressive experimental use of what science and commerce bring their hands, a controlling grasp of the new practices of construction, for the purposes not of champ construction but of good building. Thus alone may we cease to be purveyors of style. And when, at last, we shall have ceased to be artistic, perhaps we may grow, unselfconsciously, into artists (14).

Das sächsische Bauernhaus und seine Dorfgenossen

Bruno Schmidt. Das sächsische Bauernhaus und seine DorfgenossenDresden: Holze & Pahl [19–]. (There are several  editions listed in WorldCat with publication dates between 1900-1921.)

The text of Das sächsische Bauernhaus und seine Dorfgenossen may not be accessible to everyone. I will admit that my German is too rusty to translate this work; however, as the book was shelved with other works on farm buildings, I guessed that bauernhaus perhaps meant “barn”. Google Translate informs me that it means “farmhouse” and dorfgenossen is related to “villages”. Despite the linguistic barrier, the illustrations are accessible and informative. Some of the drawings illustrate traditional construction techniques, others appear to represent types and plans, and some are simply picturesque and a bit Arts & Crafts.

Deanston House, The Seat of James Smith Esquire

Edward W. Trendall. Original Designs for Cottages and Villas in the Grecian, Gothic and Italian Styles of Architecture. London: Published by the Author, to be had by J. Carpenter & Son, 1831.

Edward Trendall published a series of original plans, elevations, and details as a pattern book in 1831. In his address to his reading public, he notes that “excellent works exist on the subject of Cottage and Village Architecture, yet one of more detailed and simple nature still appeared to be wanted…” Thus, he hoped to fill this niche. In addition to the designs, Trendall also calculated the cost of each house, assuming that the highest quality of materials were employed. Prices ranged from 350-3000 pounds; a cottage in the Greek style at the low end, while an Italian villa at the high.

While Trendall’s pattern book is straight forward, the edition held by Special Collections of the Architecture and Planning Library contains a bit of a mystery. The book was added to the collection in 1991, possibly as part of the Weinreb Architectural Collection. Bits of the book’s history have been collected between its unassuming covers that cause both delight and speculation regarding its journey.

On the inside cover, the book contains two book plates. The original is apparent beneath the second though unreadable. The second plate indicates that the pattern book was once housed by the Royal Philosophical Society of Glasgow. On the free endpaper, a note has been pasted, which references three titles, including this one, and a series of dates. A bookseller has penciled the asking price in the corner of this page as well. On the title page, John Fisher has inscribed his name. A search in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography did not prove fruitful for Mr. Fisher; nor did searching for an architect of this name in Scotland during the nineteenth century. Plates 20 and 28 were altered. An unknown hand sketched slightly different profiles for two of the roofs on Plate 20, while also labeling the six examples of exterior cornices on Plate 28. On the inside of the back cover, a plan of the first floor of a house has been sketched. The plan was labeled as the Deanston House, the Seat of James Smith Esquire 1831, though the date has been corrected. Beneath the label, a second name was placed: Muir. Esquire 1887. Searching for “James Smith of Deanston” in DNB proved more useful. According to Hugh Cheape, James Smith (1789–1850), a graduate from the University of Glasgow, was a “textile industrialist and agricultural engineer”. He made significant contributions to the Industrial Revolution and agriculture. Smith left Deanstson permanently in 1842 for London. It seems plausible that Smith would have commissioned a house in Deanton, though I could not readily identify one.

Hugh Cheape, ‘Smith, James, of Deanston (1789–1850)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/25822, accessed 3 July 2014].

Flats, Urban Houses and Cottage Homes

W. Shaw Sparrow, editor. Flats, Urban Houses and Cottage Homes: A Companion Volume to the British Home of Today. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1906.

The collection contains a series of articles by Frank T. Vertity, Walter Shaw Sparrow, Edwin T. Hall, and Gerald C. Horsley. The highly illustrative text offers advice for designing and planning flats as well as a comparison between English, French, and Viennese types. The final article is an extended advertisement, written by an “expert” from Waring’s (Waring & Gillow, Ltd.) – a department store in England- who discusses the best way to decorate and furnish a flat. According to Waring’s expert:

But I cannot refrain from repeating the warning given above against crowding massive pieces of furniture, suitable for a large rooms, into the lilliputian apartments of ordinary flats. This applies particularly to such articles as sideboards, bookcases, cabinets and wardrobes. The users of the rooms must have some place in which to move about. It is not desirable to have to step on the dining table in order to get from one side to the other. An 8-ft. sideboard in a 10-ft. square room suggests the imprisonment of an elephant in a mouse-trap. In the average flat everything has to be more or less on the diminutive scale. A room blocked up with oversized pieces of furniture is in many ways more uncomfortable than a room without any furniture at all. So, let this be your watchword- “Don’t overdo it.” Let your arrangements err, if at all, on the side of modesty. Don’t entertain your bosom friend with a noble sideboard which he is compelled to use a dining chair, because there is no room for him to sit anywhere else. Don’t force your lady visitors to sit on each other’s laps in the drawing room because the grand piano occupies four-fifths of the floor. (“How to Furnish a Flat,” pg. 6-7)