Differences between Housing Projects Proposed by Michel De Klerk and Le Corbusier in the 1920s - Coursework Example

Differences between Housing Projects Proposed By Dutch Architects, Michel De Klerk and Le Corbusier in the 1920s Name of Student Name of Institution Name of Professor Date of Submission Introduction Modern architecture continues to evolve into an issue of global concern as different countries struggle through strengthened efforts to achieve the best form of architectural designs. Since its inception in 1890s, the classical system of architecture and decorative arts faces systematic attempts of replacement. Different countries are now struggling to adopt the technologically advanced architectural systems. However, most of the countries end up borrowing much information from ancient architects such as Le Corbusier and De Klerk. The evolution of modern architecture had its roots in Dutch, referred to as Netherlands, before spreading to cover all developed nations such as Spain, United States, Germany and Serbo-Croat. According to the Museum of Modern Art, New York and University of Technology, Jamaica (2009), modern architecture refers to the new architectural style that evolved and emerged in many Western countries after the First Word World War1. Alternatively, Samuels, Panerai, Castex and Depaule (2012) ascertain that modern architecture depends on the rational use of modern and current materials coupled with the principles of functional planning and denial of ornament and historical precedent2. Western countries not only adopted the use of modern architecture but also utilized the labels international and functionalism. Different researchers, however, continue to conduct qualitative and quantitate studies to understand the origin as well the impact of modern architecture to economic development for the realization of the millennium development goals. This paper offers a detailed overview of housing projects proposed Michel de Klerk and those suggested by Le Corbusier in 1920. In addition, the paper will discuss the differences between the two proposals before providing a discussion of the impact of the ancient architect’s projects to modern architecture. Overview of Housing Projects Proposed By Michel De Klerk Born in 1884 and died in 1923, Bock, Johannisse, Stissi, and de Klerk (1997) ascertain that Michael De Klerk was the most popular and famous Dutch architect3. Michael de Klerk, in collaboration with his colleagues and his brief, but prolific, practice, was the creative, inspirational pillar for the Amsterdam School. According to Johnson and Langmead (2013), the school was a name primarily given to a group of young architects who advocated for advanced and interactive modernism around 19154. Contrary to the previous movements, Amsterdam school was not an organized one5. For instance, it had no manifesto, journal or official spokesman. Despite the assertion that De Klerk wrote almost nothing, he enjoyed wide recognition as the movement leader through esthetic and visionary examples of his completion entries, graphic designs, furniture design and built projects. In collaboration, the Amsterdam school members radically changed the city’s urban landscape. Their struggle aimed to advance conditions of architectural design expressing the personal esthetic visions of the architects to improve the conditions of modernity. The school contributed to an extension of Amsterdam’s urban, architectural and construction traditions (Sennott, 2004). Michael entered the studio at the age of fourteen to begin a long professional apprenticeship that suffered from two incidents of travel acting as interruptions6. One of the trips to Scandinavia was of great significance to his formation. In 1911, Michael designed a sober apartment building on the Johannes Vermeerplein for the developer Klaas Hille, who a few years later offered him the commission for his first residential block in the northwest of Amsterdam. As architecture of solid wall masses, Hille’s House showed a variety of creativity including the refinement of details and the articulated rhythms of the façade. De Clerk created three public-housing projects synthesizing many of the peculiar characteristics he owned. Furthermore, they remained to be the most appreciated results deriving from the applications of the housing law. Completion of Hilles between 1913 and 1915 was the first block while the other two for the housing society including Eigen Haard between 1914 and 1921 was a personal Hearth. Initially, scholars had divided critics about the treatment of the architecture as a sculpture of high plastic characteristics recognizing its vitality, playfulness, and modern appeal. However, they also feared the threat of individualism coupled with unmotivated transgression inherent in De Klerk works. The triangular block referred to as ‘the Ship’ by the tenants exhibited Michael’s most convincing evidence of his designing process. The building attracted comparisons with the medieval manor house such as a locomotive ship. The building had 102 apartments, a post office, a small room for tenant meetings in the courtyard and a school. Consequently, the building exemplified the model of a new type of construction quoted as the ‘workers palace. The apartment complex that De Klerk designed in collaboration with Piet Kramer for the building society known as De Gerard-The Dawn dates from 1920 to 1923. Situated in an area planned by H.P. Berlage the building bears its actual location in Amsterdam. Despite the two harmonious working relations, De Klerk’s contribution is evident in the surprising variety of solutions. The apartment blocks in the form of ‘big houses’ reveal the unmistakable mark of Michael’s gorgeous formal imagination charged with symbolic associations. According to Heer and Hall (2009), the vivacious use of color distinguishes the building’s entirely bricks7. The building’s roof has orange tiles, rose colored wall blocks with a brown basement level to indicate an evolution in architecture. Michael goes on to create one section of the apartment block constructed by the help of Amstel building a society with the arrow of protruding balconies linked at various levels by small cylindrical volumes. Consequently, on the posterior façade, on the ground floor, are two curved volumes containing shops that form an ideal entrance to the central area of the complex. Overview of Housing Projects Proposed By Le Corbusier Officially known as Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris, Le Corbusier was born in La Chaux de Fonds, Switzerland in 1887. Le Corbusier trained as an artist and conducted extensive travels through Germany, France and the East. The most memorable journey that Le Corbusier made was his visit to Paris, France where he studied while absorbing the cultural and artistic life of the city of Paris. Le Corbusier, therefore, developed a keen interest in the synthesis of various arts evident in Paris, France, a move that saw him change his original name from Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris to Le Corbusier in early 1920s. Despite his early works being related to nature, Le Corbusier managed to develop the Maison-Domino implying a basic prototype of building rigid, stable floors with free-standing pillars. Settling in Paris in 1917, Le Corbusier published his book ‘Towards a New Architecture.’ He started working with his brother, Pierre Jeanneret as his idea began taking physical form by creating houses as machines for living in that incorporated his driving and inspiring trademark the five points of architecture. Driven by utopian ideas and ideals Le Corbusier he did little during the Second World War. However, Le Corbusier developed more agitation in 1947 where he formed the united habitation. Despite the relieved of highly colored walls and sculptural roof-lines, Le Corbusier’s massive post-war dwelling blocks received a lot of justifiable criticism. In addition, his post-war building utilized vernacular materials, articulated structures and brute concrete accounting for Le Corbusier rejection of his earlier industrial forms. However, Le Corbusier’s sculptural forms and brutal materials saw him work on a number of projects in India. For instance, Le Corbusier continuously readopted the expressive staircases, recessed structural column and the flat undecorated plane of his celebrated five components of the architecture8.Bacon, Mardges and Le Corbusier (2001) actually states that a number of the downfalls mentioned above incapacitated Le Corbusier’s performance in international competition9. Alternatively, Sharp (1991) argues that Le Corbusier went on producing town building plans and schemes for several parts of the world as an adjunct to his often lecture tours10. Differences of Michael De Klerk’s and Le Corbusier Projects There are several number of differences deduced from the projects suggested by the two architects described above. This section analyses the difference inform of the implications the two proposals had to the contemporary society. Muller (2013) accounts that De Klerk left a testament to the current architecture with his imagination and extraordinary talents as a draftsman in a vast collection of drawings done in pastels, charcoal, and colored inks11. Contrary, most of Corbusier works received more critics from people as they viewed them to be of utopic nature. De Klerk’s works not only teaches on how to make portraits capturing the attention of clients but also showed how to create sketches for furniture and decorations particularly in architectural drawings. He perfectly provides details of plans of different building with rapid recording of spatial and formal ideas relating to realized buildings and imagined objects. Contrary, Le Corbusier’s projects are of critical nature. He specifically envisioned demolishing Paris, France to come up with the best structure. However, the cities he criticized turns up to be the prettiest in the modern architecture. De Klerk won several awards at the National Academy of Arts in Amsterdam from 1917 to 1918 while chronicles show no award won by Le Corbusier architectural works. The most celebrated award for De Klerk sprouts from the cemetery design after its submission to the Reincarnation competition with its happy inclusion and fusion of symbolic significance and monumental character. In addition, everyone including critical judges acknowledged the national academy design with the motto ‘Great Amsterdam’. The plan contained an artistic spirit capable of matchless virtuosity. According to (Sharp, 1991) Le Corbusier work ended up attracting criticism from all experts including scholars of current architecture12. The first block developed by De Klerk’s at Spaarndammer is a direct prediction of most of the elements that would end up recurring motifs for the Amsterdam School architects. Despite the building having five stories, it lacks not only a half story but also a mansard roof. Le Corbusier continuously insists on five fundamental areas that in deed reveal no appealing results in the modern architecture studies. Le Corbusier insists on building with building with vernacular materials, articulated structures and brute concrete while De Klerk spends more time to develop the best structures while using a number of attractive designs. It is exhilarating to realize that the top story of De Klerk’s building has a full façade faced in a flat tile. The tile contrasts with the texture and color of the brick below it. For instance, the structure displayed by the entire veneer at the top has the effect of depressing the apparent visual height without sacrificing interior space. The title story leads to interruption with parabolic tables displaying rhythm and variation in the long façade. However, the design remains within the front wall plane. The lighting of main rooms by the use of horizontal-format windows leads to the development of ancillary rooms with small windows in odd shapes. Joseph (1993) argues that the windows with curved-panes form part of the brick cylinders seeming to bulge from the façade13. The infusion and swelling effect exhibited by the window panes is a direct manifestation of current scientific knowledge used in most of the modern architecture works. Le Corbusier’s use of vernacular material in building has little to do with attractiveness to the eye. Interpretation of the second and third blocks reveals that De Clerk targeted to serve a housing foundation, “Eigen Haard”. Furthermore, the most notable difference from the first block is in the ornament that is more varied and wildly organic. There is a high likelihood that De Klerk developed the need to break up the massive facade. De Klerk, therefore, used cylindrical forms of two sizes to achieve his concern. For instance, the larger ones besides the southeast corner had tile facings were efficient sculptural manipulations of the total building mass. The use of pre-described windows is an active part of the decorative scheme and appears in a variety of shapes and sizes. Furthermore, Von Moos (2009) ascertain that the development of the ship (Het Schip) is a direct literal implication of the flagship used at the Amsterdam School building14. The flag establishes De Klerk as the best famous and modern architects who were members of the Amsterdam School. Contrary, to De Klerk’s views, Bacon, Mardges, and Le Corbusier (2001) were surprised to note that regardless of the many great modernist architects’ designs made by Le Corbusier most of them never attained the implementation stage15. Furthermore, they are found lying in the Le Corbusier’s expiration at the museums of modern art. For instance, the radical nature of Le Corbusier’s project proposal ends up attracting a lot of public criticism. According to Muller (2013), the radical nature saw none of Le Corbusier’s project plans implemented by many countries rather than the 1925 proposal to demolish two square miles of downtown Paris16. Contrary, De Klerk’s works receive applause and everyone gains interest of implementing them. Indeed, chronicle literature accounts reveal that Le Corbusier could cause more harm and destroy most of the attractive city areas including the third and fourth arrondissement besides the right bank of Seine. Ironically Seine suspected to face demolish according to the recommendations of Le Corbusier, is one of the current hippest, prettiest and the most architecturally relevant neighborhoods in the city. In addition, scholars have continuously criticized what Le Corbusier claimed to be organic urban areas. However what he referred to as organic urban towns gained enormous new developments since 1960. Starting to demolish central Paris made more sense in the 1920s as the recommendation was in line with formerly aristocratic Morais distrinct characterized with disease infection, poor sanitation and overcrowding. This led to the declaration of 250 houses among the 276 total available houses as uninhabitable due to contamination from tuberculosis. Le Corbusier targeted to replace the urban blight with incredible things. According to Le Corbusier the management had to create a new district office to become the business center of the city, country and the whole world without looking downtown streets of New York City. The adjacent home was to serve as the home to business elites. Importance of Having Differences Sennott (2004) identifies various differences that exist between Le Corbusier and De Klerks major project proposals17. However, all these difference occur for the benefit of the current architects in the field. For instance, De Klerk’s project proposal components are basically in three divisions that are highly elaborative to offer the modern architects on the best form of current architecture. For instance, there are different proposals on the city; however, most of the aims and records targeted to the city by the two projects have similar objectives. They target to ensure establishment of a safe environment free from construction and general risks for mutual existence of people within the city. Despite the late inception of urbanization and industrialization in Holland, the country invested heavily in collaboration with different sectors to develop the 1901 Housing Act. The act has ever received an amendment to make it fit in the contemporary world (Bacon, Mardges, and Le Corbusier, 2001). The government passed and began enacting the new plan to address the need for organized planning and need to improve the poor housing conditions. Since then the government in collaboration with other sector manage to develop different strategies to address the issue of architecture in the society. In addition, the act provided financing arrangements with the consequent creation of cooperative housing associations to build proper housing as well as ensuring the safety of the residents. The corporations, therefore, are essential for the commission of a larger percentage of building new houses in Holland. Our Hearth organization referred to as “Eigen Haard" is one of the corporations with several number of skilled and professional workers within the housing sector built in the Spaarndammerbuurt district. In this regard, the small town is in the west of central Amsterdam along the IJ River had served as a proposal initially. Proposals are there to continue the sustainable existence of the De Klerk’s envisioned housing conditions. Conclusion Modern architecture has evolved into an issue of worldwide concern in the contemporary society. Ancient architects such as Le Corbusier and De Klerk played a vital role in providing the best approach for the evolving architects in the modern society. De Klerk’s architectural works revolved around three major project proposal Whereas Le Corbusier addressed five primary areas of concern. There are several differences between Le Corbusier and De Klerk works of architecture. De Klerk’s architectural proposal receives backup, support and wins an award to become incorporated into the contemporary building designs. However, Le Corbusier work receives several justifiable critics to render his plans ineffective. Nevertheless, all the experienced differences occur eminently for the benefit of the modern evolving architects who can deduce encouraging, inspiring and educating message from the two prominent architects. Bibliography Bacon, Mardges & Le Corbusier.Le Corbusier in America: Travels in the Land of the Timid. C A Century of Architecture in the Netherlands 1880–199ambridge: MIT Press, 2001 Bock, Manfred, Johannes, Sigrid, Stissi, Vladimir & de Klerk, Michel. Michel de Klerk: Architect and Artist of the Amsterdam School; 1884 - 1923; [this publication is appearing simultaneously with an exhibition of the same title, in the NAI from May 3 to August 3, 1997]. Rotterdam: NAI Publishers, 1997 Johnson, Donald & Langmead, Donald. Makers of 20th Century Modern Architecture: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook. Routledge, 2013 Muller, Sheila. Dutch Art: An Encyclopedia. Volume 1021 of Garland Reference Library of the Humanities. London: Routledge Publishers, 2013. Heer, Jan de & George Hall. The Architectonic Colour: Polychromy in the Purist Architecture of Le Corbusier. Rotterdam: 010 Publishers, 2009 Buch, Joseph. A Century of Architecture in the Netherlands 1880–1990, NAI Publishers, 1993 Von Moos, Stanislaus. Le Corbusier, Elements of a Synthesis. Rotterdam: 010 Publishers, 2009 Museum of Modern Art (New York) & University of Technology (Jamaica).Caribbean modernist architecture: UTech Jamaica, MoMA. Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic: AAA, 2009 Samuels, Ivor, Panerai, Phillipe, Castex, Jean & Depaule, Charles. Urban Form: the Death and life of the urban Block. London: Routledge, 2012 Sennott, Stephen. Encyclopedia of Twentieth Century Architecture. Volume One of Encyclopedia of 20th century Architecture. London: Taylor & Francis, 2004 Sharp, Dennis. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Architects and Architecture. New York: Quatro Publishing, 1991 Read More