Iconography and Electronics upon a Generic Architecture: A View from the Drafting Room

Venturi, Robert

ISBN 10: 0262720299 / ISBN 13: 9780262720298

Published by The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1998

About this Item

First Edition, First Printing. Trade PB in illustrated wraps. Near Fine w/bent corners intruding lightly into book, else About Fine and unmarked. 374pp; illustrated in 91 plates. 390 p.

Seller Inventory # 036658

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Iconography and Electronics upon a Generic Architecture: A View from the Drafting Room
• Publisher: The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
• Publication Date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0262720299
• ISBN 13: 9780262720298
• Binding: Trade Paperback
• Edition: 1st Edition.
• Condition: Near Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Wraps
• Book Type: Book
• Seller catalogs:
  • History
  • Non-Fiction

About this title

Synopsis

Robert Venturi's Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture and Learning from Las Vegas (the latter coauthored with Denise Scott Brown and Steven Izenour) are among the most influential books by any architect of our era -- the one celebrating complexity in architecture, the other the uses of symbolism in commercial and vernacular architecture and signage. This new collection of writings in a variety of genres argues for a generic architecture defined by iconography and electronics, an architecture whose elemental qualities become shelter and symbol.The voice is personal -- eloquent in expounding on the unglamorous side of practice; sometimes vituperative and corrective in addressing clients, theoreticians, and critics; often amusing and humorous in looking back on past projects and opportunities; instructive in describing early influences and tastes; and reflective in assessing his own impact on the profession.The essays include Venturi's 1950 M.F.A. thesis, published here for the first time -- a work that foreshadows many of the themes that were later to make him a controversial and ground-breaking architect and writer -- and a series of vintage Venturi aphorisms.

About the Author

Robert Venturi, FAIA, Hon. FRIBA, is a Principal in Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates, Inc.