内容简介

Principles of Modern Architecture is not a history of modern archi- tecture. Its aim is theoretical and it represents an attempt to explain the basic tenets of the new architecture that came into being around the turn of the century. The many misunderstandings currently in cir-culation make such an attempt a timely one.
Modern Architecture represents an answer to the spatiality of theopen world. "Pre-modern" currents, such as art nouveau and thenew building technology paved the way for Le Corbusier's concept of the "free plan" in 1926, later supplemented by Mies van der Rohe's idea of "clear construction."Modern architecture became a "movement" with the institution of the ClAM (Congres Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne) in 1928 and has remained the only true expression of the open world of plu- ralism and global interaction.In this volume Christian Norberg-Schulz investigates the basic prin- ciples of modern architecture including the "free plan" and the "open form," as well as the manifestations of modern life in the terms "house," "institution," and "city." He also discusses the prob- lems of "regionalism" and "monumentality" (meaning), and con- cludes with a summing up of the endeavours of modern architecture under the heading "The New Place."
This book is a thoroughly revised edition of the author's Roots ofModern Architecture and is illustrated with his own photographs. It is a clear, concise, accessible account of what the modern movement really wanted and what it achieved by one of the world's leading architectural critics.