Lithograph by Max Ernst for the book *Wunderhorn* by Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), dimensions 32 x 25 cm, printed in France by Pierre Chave, Vence, and published in Germany by Manus Press, Stuttgart, in 1970.

Thursday 14 May 2020

Launch of Bücher zur Architektur / Books on Architecture

Even in the state of so-called normality, architectural history and theory are connected to media. Both are the fruits of splendid solitude: the study of literature is just as individual as the process of writing scholarly works or essays. The ivory tower, the seclusion from the world in libraries and isolated places, has always been part of the existence of scholars and those who aspire to becoming so. The intense correspondence between inhabitants of the res publica literarum, from Erasmus and Thomas Morus, to the many letters that allow historians to trace the networks of 20th century architecture, often owes its emergence to a situation of spatial isolation, in writing rooms and other refuges. For this reason, the forced self-isolation here could also be understood as the democratisation of a privilege reserved for only a few.

At the same time, teaching and research also thrive on lively discourse, which now, in a state of exception, makes maximum use of the new communication possibilities. Lectures and seminars are never frontal teaching, but part of the never-ending threads of conversation between teachers and students. Lectures on communication platforms can provide us with new spatial and collective experiences in the summer semester, while teaching at a distance can open up new possibilities for cooperation with students and colleagues from other universities.

We would like to start with an experimental format of short reviews of publications that are important to us - an invitation to self-study reading.

Please click on the required Wunderhorn edition and type the password: "agtuniwuppertal2020"

Wunderhorn No.1

Reyner Banham

Theory and Design in the First Machine Age

read by Christoph Grafe

Wunderhorn No.2

Bernard Rudofsky

Architecture without Architects

read by Daniel Spruth

Wunderhorn No.3

Rudolf Wittkower

Architectural Principles in Age of Humanism

read by Filippo Cattapan

Wunderhorn No.4

Caroline Voet

Dom Hans Van der Laan: A House for the Mind

gelesen von Mara Traub

Wunderhorn No.5

Christopher Alexander

A Pattern Language

read by Helen Thomas and Adam Caruso

coming up soon:

Wunderhorn No.6

Kenneth Frampton

Modern Architecture - a critical history

read by Christoph Grafe

Wunderhorn No.7

Andrea Palladio

I quattro libri dell´architettura

read by Christopher Woodward

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