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Multiplicity
On Constraint and Agency in Contemporary Architecture
Edited by Pari Riahi, Laure Katsaros and Michael T. Davis
Published by: University of Massachusetts Press
320 Pages, 5.50 x 8.50 in, 55 illus.
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Today, the field of architecture faces a reckoning. While there is no longer consensus on what defines an architectural work, theorists, historians, and practitioners are grappling with urgent issues—among them the impact of climate change, the dynamics of power and race in relation with the built environment, and the technological, practical, and ethical dimensions of architecture. As established practices, academic objectives, and professional expectations come under scrutiny, architecture is in search of new definitions, identities, and voices.
Inspired by Italo Calvino’s memos about literature in the twenty-first century, this volume—the second in a series— situates architecture within a broad framework, exploring its complex interactions with environmental, cultural, political, social, artistic, and technological forces. The editors’ objective is to spur conversation across the boundaries that divide architecture’s theorists and historians from practitioners. In addition to the editors, the contributors include Sanford Kwinter, Aleksandra Jaeschke, Jennifer Mack, Rahul Mehrotra, Charles Waldheim, Kristi Cheramie, Jesse Reiser, Julian Harake, Jenny E. Sabin, Charles Davis, Esra Akcan, and David Karmon.
PARI RIAHI is a registered architect and associate professor of architecture at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is author of Ars et Ingenium: The Embodiment of Imagination in Francesco di Giorgio Martini’s Drawings.
LAURE KATSAROS is professor of French at Amherst College, where she is also affiliated with the program in architectural studies. Most recently, she is author of New York–Paris: Whitman, Baudelaire, and the Hybrid City.
MICHAEL T. DAVIS is professor emeritus of art history and founder of the program for architectural studies at Mount Holyoke College. He has published extensively on French Gothic architecture.
“This volume directly addresses the issues that most interest architecture readers today, namely environmental sustainability and racial and social justice, and taken together these essays emphasize the importance of continuing critical thought and reflection to better understand them. The collection significantly advances the multiplicity of voices in an essential way.”—Paul Emmons, associate dean for graduate studies at the Washington-Alexandria Architecture Center, Virginia Tech
“I believe this important book takes architectural discourse well beyond the old debate and disparity between prescription and invention and beyond the challenging of disciplinary boundaries.”—Teresa Stoppani, author of Unorthodox Ways to Think the City: Representations, Constructions, Dynamics
"As an idea, a design, a construction process, a cultural object and an economic investment, architecture is intrinsically multiple. Developments such as the advent of digital technology, new constraints and opportunities arising from the environmental crisis, and the diversification of the architectural profession, have led to a discipline that seems to have multiplied to the point of appearing as a kaleidoscopic reality. Instead of seeing this multiplicity as a weakening, the authors of this rich and rigorous book propose to see it as the beginning of a recentering. After all, as one of the contributors reminds us, the ancient Greeks saw multiplicity as a foundational principle, the promise of a harmonious blossoming. Multiplicity thus offers an essential insight into architecture under its various guises."—Antoine Picon, author of Digital Culture in Architecture: An Introduction for the Design Professions
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