Abstract
Although not always considered the absolute masterpiece by Le Corbusier, even scornfully received by a journalistic critique such as “a serious plane crash”, the Philips Pavilion (1958) is instead a very complex and significant work, because of the pivotal role it plays, not only along Le Corbusier’s production, but also as the fulcrum of several relevant issues.
The paper, basing upon archive sources, does not reconstruct the events of the pavilion, already published and faced by extensive bibliography, but it focuses on the disciplinary approach that the protagonists of this story gradually adopt in the phases of the project.
Methodologically, the paper aims to place the existing documentation on the Pavilion, which tends to be focused on “how it is done”, in relation to its production and location context, that is, “what it represents”.
Following some considerations on the general sense of Architecture, especially in the context of the Brussels Expo, many other issues arise from the confluence of different technical and artistic involved disciplines: graphics, technical-scientific disciplines, music and visual arts.
The different role played by the protagonists can be strictly related to the consequent methodological solutions: a multidisciplinary approach, advanced by the client, Philips, reference industry in the advance of the post-war world progress; the interdisciplinary approach, of which the composer and architect Iannis Xenakis takes on the pivotal role; and finally, Le Corbusier’s transdisciplinary expansion, able to extend the mere functional data to much more open outcomes.
Starting from a transversal reading of the Philips Pavilion, the paper tends to show how this work can be considered a forerunner of some design trends, current even nowadays, able to offer a prophetic vision of its role in the future of architecture.
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Notes
- 1.
“The Atomium, at the center of the exhibition, indicates a trend, a contagious disease, the mania to realize in each pavilion a construction of exceptional boldness”. In a later issue of the magazine “L’Architettura, cronaca e storia”, Zevi expressed other doubtful opinions [2], although years later he would revise his positions.
- 2.
The original Eindhoven headquarters is now transformed into a museum, while the new Philips headquarters is located in Amsterdam.
- 3.
The phrase refers to an unpublished text by Ettore Sottsass presented at the exhibition “There is a Planet” at the Triennale Design Museum, from 15 September 2017 to 11 March 2018.
- 4.
The less known Pavillon des Temps Neuveaux, is related to the celebratory themes from Ci- madomo/Lecardane [10] and with the themes of the nomadic tent and the enclosure from Ca- panna [11, pp. 30–32, 38].
- 5.
“It is not the right angle that attracts me, nor the straight, hard, inflexible, man-made line. What attracts me is the free and sensual curve, the curve I find in the mountains of my country, in the winding course of its rivers, in the waves of the sea, in the body of the beloved woman. Of curves is made the whole universe, Einstein’s curved universe”.
- 6.
It consists in three movies, Koyaanisqatsi: Life out of balance (1982), Powaqqatsi: Life in transformation (1988) and Naqoyqatsi: Life as war (2002), directed by Godfrey Reggio. The soundtrack was by Philip Glass.
- 7.
“The discourse necessarily falls on the psychology of architects, who find themselves creating ex-novo, without limits and external conditions, a building representative of a system or a civil aspiration: in short, on the problem that Erich Fromm called «the anguish of freedom»”.
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Centineo, S. (2023). “A Serious Plane Crash”.. In: Raposo, D., Neves, J., Silva, R., Correia Castilho, L., Dias, R. (eds) Advances in Design, Music and Arts II. EIMAD 2022. Springer Series in Design and Innovation , vol 25. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-09659-4_55
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