Jean-Louis Cohen 2012. Architecture´s Outer Boundaries

“While certain architects were stimulated during the last two decades of the twentieth century by technological challenges and by questions concerning the future form of the city , many others focused their thinking on the discipline´s own aims, distinguishing characteristics, and degree of autonomy. Active in the changing market for an architecture that was both technically expert and formally experimental –a marginal segment of building production, but one with increasing visibility- they predicated their practices less on revolutionary new theories that on the shared conviction that a critical practice was possible.
This analytical approach was encouraged by several centers of architectural thought that emerged in the 1970s. The first was the Architectural Association in London, a “finishing school” under Alvin Boyarsky´s direction that was open to talented students from around the world. It produced the intellectual culture that subsequently allowed Rem Koolhaas, Bernard Tschumi or Zaha Hadid to shape their individual approaches. Another essential center was the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies in New York and its journal Oppositions (1973-1984), which introduced a critical vision of modernity to the United States that was notably indebted to Manfredo Tafuri´s writings and teaching, but also propagated ideas coming out of emerging design practices in Spain and Japan.
Some of the orientations arising at this time may be seen as a continuation of the Modern Movement by other means, so to speak, and they have been labeled (among other things) “supermodern”. Yet these were actually new strategies, which led to a redefinition of the architectural field and its objects. Despite the fears of the critics of globalizations, the results have been extraordinarily varied, and they can be identified not only with the architects who have been in the forefront of the international scene since the 1980s but also with innovative design strategies that have permeated wider professional circles…”
Extracto inicial del capítulo Architecture´s outer boundaries, del flamante libro de Jean-Louis Cohen. The Future of Architecture. Since 1889. Londres, Phaidon 2012.
Seleccionado por el arq. Martín Lisnovsky