Modernism in architecture is the most important new style and design of architecture that is associated with a logical approach to the function of buildings, a strictly balanced use of new materials, openness to architectural modernism, and the elimination of ornaments. The development of modernism in architecture could be traced back to the middle of the nineteenth century through the advent of the Bauhaus. The nineteenth century was a long period in the history of architecture because of which it is called the long 19th century. In this era, art and architecture were used in the old style that later on was eliminated and was done with a new approach. The word ‘modernism' in the field of architecture refers modernist movements that took place at the start of the 20th century. It initiated with attempts to accommodate the principles of architectural design with the modern society and new technologies for developing materials and construction.
It was the era of changes and architectural evolution in which architects reflected new social ideas and concepts being developed and shared. The era saw the return to the styles of past eras and highly innovative search for means of promoting unique ways of living and thinking. Archaeologist-architects like Nicholas Revett and James Stuart measured and drew the classical buildings of the Greece and Rome. They promoted their ideas of construction and covering all sorts of architectural designs and buildings. In the same era, some architects like Tienne-Louis Boull Èe and E. E. Viollet-le Duc moved away from the previous architectural patterns towards the modern architecture that was an abstract architecture derived from the imagination of the designers. It was seen a move in the direction of architecture which suggested the twentieth-century architects about the ways they could reject historicism and pursue a new modern style in the future. The era of modernism in architecture usually complemented the structure of the twenty and twenty-one century. It includes Bauhaus styles (often used to portray the architecture of Bauhaus) portray atrociousum. Modernization was the latest classy stylistic approach of the art, craft. Nonetheless, The German school portrayed Bauhaus during the period 1919-1933 founded by Walter Gropius was more concerned with the social part of the design influence arts and architecture making it an international style which was a symbol of the Capital.
The functionalism in the field of construction can be tracked back to the Vitruvian triad, where convenience, firmness, and beauty are the basic objects of an attractive project of architecture. Augustus Welby Pugin, in general, said that there is no need for decorating buildings with ornaments, every project should be designed and decorated with the basic concrete material.
The end of the nineteen-century and beginning of the twentieth century consisted of a rejection of the tradition, a self-conscious determination to reinvent the purposes and techniques of all the art rejection of the19th-centuryhistoricism and ornamentation were clearly seen in Josephs Hoffmann’s work. Modern architecture designers rejected decorative patterns in designs and preferred materials like steel and concrete with pure geometrical forms.
Antoni Gaudi, who was a modern architect, constructed Casa Mila starting from 1906 and ended in 1912. He gave a complete break from the past styles. According to him, everything comes out of nature, and anything created by a human being is already there .
1Antoni Gaudi, Casa Mila, 1906
Source: (Crippa)
Frank Gehry constructed Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in 1997 with modern techniques and materials like glass steel and eliminated ornaments .
2Frank Gehry, Guggenheim Museum Bilbao 1997
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Le Corbusier features of Modern architecture include the use of pilotis, or support columns to elevate the main building above the ground and allow the space under it to be used. It has a flat roof that uses a steel frame.
1Le Corbusier, Villa Savoye, Poissy, 1929
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Modern architects rejected the idea of decorating with ornaments as they were unnecessary. They focused on geometric to organic forms and on the-the values of uniformity, purity, simplicity, clarity, and order since the modernists believed that a new era has given rise to the modern age and they emphasized on a complete break with the past. American architects were very much devoted to advanced social developments, by not only focusing on the building but also on contemporaries such as Maher, Pool, Pond, and Wright. In the twentieth-century, the European movement in architectural design founded architectures that were appropriate to modern society by using modern technology (for example, the reinforced concrete frame) and denying historicism particularly that of the 19th century completely. Modern architectures introduced new materials and structural approaches such as steel frames and reinforced concrete. The development of the steel frame became an important material of modern architecture, which was basically from the iron frames, which started to appear in tall buildings of offices of Chicago. The height of the building should balance the thickness of the walls had to be thicker to bear the huge weight above them. Steel frames had considerable flexibility, with girders and steel beams allowing for the construction of wide interior spaces.In1930, there was a group of Modernist architects who believed that they were approaching design from a functionalist point of view that resulted in making buildings perfect, without unnecessary detailing’s or extra decorations. In 1932, a famous architect Philip Johnson and a professional architectural historian and critic Henry-Russell Hitchcock arranged an exhibition at New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MOMA). They introduced the new style, which they called the International Modernism with their three main characteristics which are rejection of symmetry, rejection decoration, and emphasizing on architectural quantity over mass
The Bauhaus was the most dominant and famous modern art school of the twentieth century. Its main idea was to teach and make everyone understand the relationship of art with society and technology, which had a major impact in the United States and the Europe. In the 19th and early 20th centuries’ movements and styles such as Arts and Crafts movement, Bauhaus played a vital role in simplifying art and with modern techniques. In the mid of 1920s, the medievalism emphasized on uniting industrial design and art, which ultimately came out as an important, prominent achievement of that era. Bauhaus school was also very famous for its faculty, and its contributions are highlighted due to hard work of great artists like Paul Klee, Josef Albers, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Wassily Kandinsky and Johannes Itten, Bauhaus great architects include Walter Gropius and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and the most famous designer Marcel Breuer. It could be concluded that architectures contributed a lot for modernism in architecture in every era by eliminating old styles and patterns and adopting fresh creative ideas with different material.
Works Cited
Baniotopoulou, Evdoxia. "Art for whose sake? Modern art museums and their role in transforming societies: the case of the Guggenheim Bilbao." Journal of Conservation and Museum Studies, 7 1.7 (2001). Print.
Benevolo, Leonardo. History of modern architecture. Vol. 2. Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States: Mit Press, 1977. Print.
Crippa, Maria Antonietta. Antoni Gaudí. From Nature to Architecture. Cologne, Germany: Taschen, 2003. Print.
Krier, Leon. The Architecture of Community. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2009. Print.
