About the topic:

1968 is known as a year of upheaval: of student revolt, anti-war protests and civil rights demonstrations. The revolutionary sentiment was reflected in a questioning of Modernist practices, such as functionalist architecture and urbanism, and in new cultural expressions. The epochal shift can be seen in the emergence of pop music, pop art and what was initially coined ‘pop architecture.’ Put succinctly, Modernist purism was replaced by a plurality of expressions. This can be exemplified by Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown’s seminal research on Las Vegas, of which preliminary conclusions were published in The Architectural Forum in the spring of 1968. The article was a plea for symbolism in architecture and was the beginning of the international reception of Venturi and Scott Brown. The text was re-published in several languages, including a German translation in the Swiss journal Werk in 1969.

The main focus of the brief presentation by Frida Grahn will be on the use of symbols, references, metaphors and analogies. The article in Werk (and the book Learning from Las Vegas that followed in 1972) would stress the importance of learning from built precedent and from the existing landscape. The use of references has since been an integrated part of architectural practice, especially in Swiss architectural culture, but has been questioned on various occasions. What is the role of historical precedent today? What sources are valid references? Are architects obliged to aim for ‘newness’ and how can this be achieved? Is it possible to disconnect architecture from history? How can architecture improve the existing urban fabric without turning utopian?