A leading art theorist analyses the global style in art and architecture.
Hal Foster, author of the acclaimed Design and Crime, argues that a fusion of architecture and art is a defining feature of contemporary culture. He identifies a “global style” of architecture—as practiced by Norman Foster, Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano—analogous to the international style of Le Corbusier, Gropius and Mies.
More than any art, today’s global style conveys both the dreams and delusions of modernity. Foster demonstrates that a study of the “art-architecture complex” provides invaluable insight into broader social and economic trajectories in urgent need of analysis.
He starts by taking us through major architectural movements of the last half-century, including the way pop art influenced both postmodernism and what became the hi-tech architecture of Richard Rogers, Renzo Piano and Norman Foster, which then led to a "global style" of steel and glass, more or less the same everywhere. In the case of Rogers, this global style takes the form of "pop civics" – law courts and assembly buildings and our beloved Millennium Dome, which profess accessibility and public engagement. In the case of Renzo Piano the result is "light modernity": elegant, refined structures that might be a Hermès store in Tokyo or a cultural centre in New Caledonia.
Foster describes the influence of Russian suprematist and constructivist art on Zaha Hadid, and the effect of conceptual art on the Americans Diller Scofidio + Renfro, the creators of New York's High Line park. Also, the use of both minimalism and pop by the Swiss Herzog & de Meuron, creators of Tate Modern and the Beijing Bird's Nest stadium. He then examines the question from the other side, looking at the spaces and constructions of artists like Dan Flavin, Donald Judd, Robert Irwin and (especially) Richard Serra, before concluding with an extensive interview with Serra.
CREDITS.-
Author: Hal Foster.
Editorial.- Turner Noema.
Translator.- J. A. Vitier.
Pages: 352.
Format: 14 x 22 cm.
Binding: Paperback with flaps.
ISBN.- 978-84-15832-06-5.
PVP.- 24,90 euros.
In category.- Architecture, Art.
Edition.- Spanish.
