Verena Andermatt Conley (ed.): Rethinking Technologies (1993)
Filed under book | Tags: · art, autopoiesis, cyberspace, cyborg, philosophy, philosophy of technology, postmodern, science, technology, virtual reality
Grounded on the assumption that the relationship between the arts and the sciences is dictated by technology, the essays in Rethinking Technologies explore trends in contemporary thought that have been changing our awareness of science, technology, and the arts.
Contributors: Teresa Brennan, Patrick Clancy, Verena Andermatt Conley, Scott Durham, Thierry de Duve, Françoise Gaillard, Félix Guattari, N. Katherine Hayles, Alberto Moreiras, Jean-Luc Nancy, Avital Ronell, Ingrid Scheibler, Paul Virilio.
Edited by Verena Andermatt Conley on behalf of the Miami Theory Collective (Oxford, Ohio)
Publisher University of Minnesota Press, 1993
ISBN 0816622159, 9780816622153
248 pages
PDF (updated on 2012-9-3)
Comment (0)Jacques Barzun: Darwin, Marx, Wagner: Critique of a Heritage, 2nd ed (1941–)
Filed under book | Tags: · art, culture, darwinism, evolution, history, marxism, music, philosophy, politics, revolution, science
The nomination of Wagner rather than Freud in the trinity of emblematic modern minds is a sign of Barzun’s profound interest in music and the arts. He argued that these men achieved their reputations by catching the spirit of the age, like surfers on a wave, backed by the formidable public relations exercises mounted by their followers . This earned them the status of intellectual icons despite their lack of originality and the significant flaws in their systems. He described in some detail how all the leading ideas of evolutionary theory, socialism and the leading role of the artist were commonplace for decades before the big three started work.
Barzun was especially critical of the way that their adherents promoted determinism and scientism, with truly disastrous political consequences in the twentieth century. In addition to the shortcomings of their systems, two of the three titans were monstrously egocentric and unprincipled exploiters of their friends and denigrators of their enemies. These personal characteristics became prominent in the modus operandi of their followers, setting the tone for bad manners in transactions between intellectuals that have persisted to the present time.
Reprint of the revised 2nd edition, 1958, with a new Preface, 1981
Publisher University of Chicago Press
ISBN 0226038599
373 pages
PDF (updated on 2014-9-5)
Comment (0)Simon Sadler: Archigram: Architecture without Architecture (2005)
Filed under book | Tags: · architecture, avant-garde, city, london, social space
“In the 1960s, the architects of Britain’s Archigram group and Archigram magazine turned away from conventional architecture to propose cities that move and houses worn like suits of clothes. In drawings inspired by pop art and psychedelia, architecture floated away, tethered by wires, gantries, tubes, and trucks. In Archigram: Architecture without Architecture, Simon Sadler argues that Archigram’s sense of fun takes its place beside the other cultural agitants of the 1960s, originating attitudes and techniques that became standard for architects rethinking social space and building technology. The Archigram style was assembled from the Apollo missions, constructivism, biology, manufacturing, electronics, and popular culture, inspiring an architectural movement—High Tech—and influencing the postmodern and deconstructivist trends of the late twentieth century.
Although most Archigram projects were at the limits of possibility and remained unbuilt, the six architects at the center of the movement, Warren Chalk, Peter Cook, Dennis Crompton, David Greene, Ron Herron, and Michael Webb, became a focal point for the architectural avant-garde, because they redefined the purpose of architecture. Countering the habitual building practice of setting walls and spaces in place, Archigram architects wanted to provide the equipment for amplified living, and they welcomed any cultural rearrangements that would ensue. Archigram: Architecture without Architecture—the first full-length critical and historical account of the Archigram phenomenon—traces Archigram from its rediscovery of early modernist verve through its courting of students, to its ascent to international notoriety for advocating the “disappearance of architecture.””
Publisher MIT Press, 2005
ISBN 0262693224, 9780262693226
242 pages
PDF, PDF (11 MB, updated on 2016-5-7)
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