Architects and their Societies
Architects and their Societies
Cultural Study on the Habsburg-Slavic Area (1861-1938)
Contributor(s): Anna Kobylińska (Editor), Maciej Falski (Editor)
Subject(s): History, Fine Arts / Performing Arts, 19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: architects; Habsburg Monarchy; social elite;history of architecture;
Summary/Abstract: The idea of looking at the architects operating within the cultural framework of the Habsburg Empire, embedded in this book, stems from our previous research. It has its roots in the research on Slavic peripheral narratives, conducted by the Research Group on the Slavic Cultures in the Habsburg Monarchy (http://uwhabsburgstudies.uw.edu.pl/), which has operated since 2011 at the Institute of Western and Southern Slavic Studies of the University of Warsaw. We studied the issue of peripheral attitudes towards both national narratives, created after 1861 by the Slovak, Czech and Croatian elites, and the imperial project imposed by Vienna and Budapest. Faithful to the microlevel approach, we looked at figures, spaces and social phenomena that do not fit into the stereotypical view of national historiography. (Anna Kobylińska, Maciej Falski)
- E-ISBN-13: 978-83-235-4991-8
- Print-ISBN-13: 978-83-235-4983-3
- Page Count: 250
- Publication Year: 2021
- Language: English
Seismographs of culture. Prolegomena
Seismographs of culture. Prolegomena
(Seismographs of culture. Prolegomena)
- Author(s):Anna Kobylińska, Maciej Falski
- Contributor(s):Katarzyna Wieleńska (Translator)
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:8-34
- No. of Pages:27
- Keywords:architecture; architects; Habsburg empire; cultural biography; social space
- Summary/Abstract:The article demonstrates the relevance that research into professional biographies can have for understanding cultural and social change. By analysing the biographies of architects: their backgrounds, educational paths, professional contacts, as well as their entire professional milieu, it is possible to better recognise the causes and course of profound social, political or even civilisational changes in the Habsburg monarchy, during the crucial period of its existence and disintegration. It was the architects who found ways of creating space that responded to changing perceptions and expectations, both individual and collective, tangibly co-creating social space. Coming from different regions of the monarchy, architects practised their profession within the framework of an imperial state whose administrative apparatus and legal system had to be, in principle, constantly adapted to a dynamic and extremely diverse socio-cultural reality. It was made up of many ethnoses, religions, languages and even geophysical factors (always, after all, influencing the living conditions of specific communities). Authors believe that their biographies are - in themselves - already an important carrier of meanings and knowledge about the conditions of everyday life and the mentality of the people living at the time.
Gothic Revival at the borders of Catholic Christianity
Gothic Revival at the borders of Catholic Christianity
(Gothic Revival at the borders of Catholic Christianity)
- Author(s):Dragan Damjanović
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:36-72
- No. of Pages:37
- Keywords:Neo-Gothic; Croatia; Friedrich von Schmidt; Herman Bollé; Josip Vancaš; Zagreb; Osijek
- Summary/Abstract:Neo-Gothic emerged in Croatian architecture rather late in comparison to Great Britain and the majority of countries in mainland Europe. First buildings built with elements of this style appeared at the beginning of the 19th century, however only during the 1850s and 1860s first larger neo-Gothic churches began to be built in Croatia, primarily due to the efforts of the Viennese central administrative bodies. In the same time, Croatian aristocracy accepted this style for the restoration of their castles (Trakošćan, Novi dvori). By the mid-1870s, owing to the efforts of the Đakovo bishop Josip Juraj Strossmayer, Viennese architect Friedrich Schmidt started his work on neo-Gothic restoration of medieval buildings in Zagreb (St. Mark’s parish church and the cathedral). In the following decades, the neo-Gothic style reached the highest level of use in Croatian architecture. The most important architects that designed churches and other buildings with elements of neo-Gothic were Schmidt’s students Herman Bollé and Josip Vancaš. From the beginning of the 20th century, the use of Neo-Gothic in Croatian architecture became increasingly rare. Croatian architecture was slowly being overcome by the influence of secession from Vienna and other major cities in the monarchy (Prague, Budapest).
Architects from the periphery: Ján Nepomuk Bobula and Blažej Félix Bulla
Architects from the periphery: Ján Nepomuk Bobula and Blažej Félix Bulla
(Architects from the periphery: Ján Nepomuk Bobula and Blažej Félix Bulla)
- Author(s):Anna Kobylińska
- Contributor(s):Katarzyna Wieleńska (Translator)
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:74-101
- No. of Pages:28
- Keywords:Slovak architecture; localness; Blažej Félix Bulla; Ján Nepomuk Bobula; Turčiansky Svätý Martin
- Summary/Abstract:Using the example of the different professional paths of two architects, Blažej Félix Bulla and Ján Nepomuk Bobula (both of whom designed buildings intended to house the new institutions, crucial for Slovak national life and located in the provincial town of Turčiansky Svätý Martin), the article shows how the architects' work became a space for the manifestation of new values introduced into the public space and for the self-presentation and representation of the new social elites. Particular attention was paid here to the role of architectural investments confirming a real increase in the rank of a given place, appearing in semi-public and semi-private space, i.e. in a kind of internal space, partly hidden and at the same time open to subversive manifestations of one's own true identity (e.g. the discussed herein example of the temporary installation designed by Bulla – a wooden tower-gate added to the house of the Viliam Paulina-Tóth’s heirs for the time of the local ethnographic exhibition held in Martin in 1887). The examples of realised and unrealised architectural projects analysed in the article (also in terms of their exemplary impact on their surroundings, e.g. the case of architect Dušan Jurkovič, discussed here, who was fascinated by Bulla's designs) made it possible to trace the circumstances favouring the densification of communication at the local level and to analyse the phenomenon referred to here as the densification of locality, a manifestation of which was, among other things, the emergence in the area of so-called Upper Hungary of a new urban centre with a distinctly Slovak distinction and accumulated symbolic potential.
Zagreb after the 1880 earthquake – The revived city and its architect
Zagreb after the 1880 earthquake – The revived city and its architect
(Zagreb after the 1880 earthquake – The revived city and its architect)
- Author(s):Dominika Kaniecka
- Contributor(s):Katarzyna Wieleńska (Translator)
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:102-116
- No. of Pages:15
- Keywords:eartquake; Zagreb; Herman Bollé; city; urban space
- Summary/Abstract:The earthquake that struck Zagreb in 1880 has largely influenced the dynamics of the city's development. It has changed Zagreb, has changed the lives of its residents and has radically affected the professional career of an architect who at that time was at the beginning of his job in Croatia. Herman Bollé would be this "the other" architect whose entire output has remained within the borders of Croatia (mostly in Zagreb) and has become part of the national heritage. He has shaped the urban space and has educated new generations that has influenced the shape of the Croatian urban space. He has rebuilt the city, he has actually participated in the process of creating the city from scratch.
Architects of a provincial town
Architects of a provincial town
(Architects of a provincial town)
- Author(s):Maciej Falski
- Contributor(s):Katarzyna Wieleńska (Translator)
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:118-136
- No. of Pages:19
- Keywords:Osijek; Croatian architecture; Habsburg monarchy; urban modernisation
- Summary/Abstract:Architects in the Habsburg monarchy were a highly mobile professional group. The most important academic centres and centres of professional practice were Vienna, Prague and Munich (which already lay outside the state borders). This article traces the professional biographies of architects who were active in Osijek, a medium-sized city on the border of the monarchy, in Croatia-Slavonia. It shows that the provincial town was linked by networks with the rest of the monarchy, while modernisation processes and architectural fashions found their local expression there. The analysis of documents related to the most important investments at the turn of the 20th century makes it clear that the monarchy constituted a common general framework for social practices, and that the professional or economic activities of local social actors did not stop at the borders of the crown lands. It thus appears that the ethno-national perspective, still dominant in the narrative of social history, needs to be modified.
Tourism architecture by Czech architects on the Croatian Adriatic coast during the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy
Tourism architecture by Czech architects on the Croatian Adriatic coast during the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy
(Tourism architecture by Czech architects on the Croatian Adriatic coast during the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy)
- Author(s):Jasenka Kranjčević
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:138-151
- No. of Pages:14
- Keywords:Austro-Hungarian Monarchy; Croatian Adriatic; Czech architects; tourism architecture
- Summary/Abstract:The paper explores whether Czech architects, as Slavic architects, contributed to the contemporary tourism development on the Croatian Adriatic at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, when the eastern Adriatic coast was part of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.Designing basic tourism architecture (hotels, villas and bathing places), aside from giving them a shape, requires specialized functional, technical and technological knowledge. To draw a conclusion, tourism architecture designed by Czech architects is explored in the context of tourism expansion and tourism architecture progress, including its influence on the space and the forming of tourist landscape. In any case, built and unbuilt examples of tourism architecture by Czech architects on the Croatian Adriatic at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century contributed to the development of architectural thought on tourism architecture, as well as to the forming of a recognizable tourist landscape.
Poets who moved the air
Poets who moved the air
(Poets who moved the air)
- Author(s):Michał Burdziński
- Contributor(s):Katarzyna Wieleńska (Translator)
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:152-176
- No. of Pages:25
- Keywords:Stanisław Witkiewicz; Dušan Samuel Jurkovič; vernacular architecture; Zakopane style; Central European modernism
- Summary/Abstract:The essence of this comparative study is to look closer, and simultaneously, at the intellectual profiles and creative practices of two outstanding representatives of vernacular architecture at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries in the Polish and Czech-Slovak milieux, in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, in Central Europe. The aesthetic being of Stanisław Witkiewicz and Dušan Samuel Jurkovič–in a way, men as institutions of their times–eventually gained the rank of all-cultural phenomena and inscribed themselves with nation-forming notes in the histories of their communities. The article deals with what mechanisms governed them and what processes they themselves managed, and moreover–what effects they evoked in both cases. It turns out, among other things, that the stagnant, invariably repeated statements about the similarities of the two casuses largely miss their internal distinctions. Ultimately, it goes to the point that reveals the great or unfavorable vicissitudes of people’s lives as well as their efforts and achievements.
Architects in Galicia and the city
Architects in Galicia and the city
(Architects in Galicia and the city)
- Author(s):Aleksander Łupienko
- Contributor(s):Katarzyna Wieleńska (Translator)
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:178-191
- No. of Pages:14
- Keywords:architects; 19th-century architecture; historicism; national styles; hygienic movement
- Summary/Abstract:The paper describes the dilemmas of architects, one of the important groups of professionals in Galicia at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The paper is based on Polish-language publications of architects, as well as art historians and others, who were interested in urban architecture in Galicia. The main topics covered here are the need of new aesthetics in architecture, freed from emulations of earlier styles and decorative motifs (including the question: what an architectural style really is), including the need for a more national (Polish) architecture. Another topic was the end of a ‘monopoly’, hitherto held by architects in the field of architectural critique, and the rise of an art-historical discourse. Finally such topics as modernity in architecture, rational city planning and an affirmation of pure aesthetic values in architectural practice attracted the attention of the authors of the sources.
Languages of interwar progressivism
Languages of interwar progressivism
(Languages of interwar progressivism)
- Author(s):Magdalena Bystrzak
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:192-208
- No. of Pages:17
- Keywords:Friedrich Weinwurm; Czechoslovakia; Bratislava; housing culture; Unitas; Nová doba
- Summary/Abstract:Interwar Bratislava was a dynamic, multicultural, small city searching for its new identity. Architects, including Friedrich Weinwurm (1885–1942), created its contemporary, modern shape. The article focuses on the main Weinwurm's socially engaged projects (Unitas and Nová doba) in the context of the local urban development and progressive architectural trends in interwar Czechoslovakia.
Beyond the limits – eccentric H.
Beyond the limits – eccentric H.
(Beyond the limits – eccentric H.)
- Author(s):Danuta Sosnowska
- Contributor(s):Katarzyna Wieleńska (Translator)
- Language:English
- Subject(s):19th Century, Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), Transformation Period (1990 - 2010), History of Art
- Page Range:210-236
- No. of Pages:37
- Keywords:Horodecki; architect; imperial biography; social biography; architecture of Kiev
- Summary/Abstract:This article presents the figure of the well-known Polish architect, Władysław Horodecki. He was primarily active in the lands of today's Ukraine, in Kiev, but also in other cities of Russia, and after Poland regained its independence his career dimmed. His biography is placed in the context of the non-obvious social space of the Russian Empire, which was perceived by the architect as a space of his own. The urban culture of Russia at the time exposes itself as a place of divisions distinct from contemporary national perspectives, revealing its integrative potential. Horodecki was also characterised by a high degree of mobility, accompanied by the crossing of both physical and social boundaries. His professional biography fits into the discussion of imperial biography as a relevant analytical model.