Le Corbusier

Authored by:Gregory Capone

Ryan CaswellDaniel LovelessMatthew Perch

Camille

Biography

The Life of Le Corbusier

Early Life

• Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris was born in La Chaux de Fonds, Switzerland, 1887. Trained as an artist, he travelled extensively through Germany and the East. In Paris he studied under Auguste Perret and absorbed the cultural and artistic life of the city. During this period he developed a keen interest in the synthesis of the various arts. Jeanneret-Gris adopted the name Le Corbusier in the early 1920s.

• In 1917 he settled in Paris where he issued his book Vers une architecture [Towards a New Architecture], based on his earlier articles in L'Esprit Nouveau. . He believed that architecture had lost its way. From 1922 Le Corbusier worked with his cousin Pierre Jeanneret. During this time, Le Corbusier's ideas began to take physical form, mainly as houses which he created as "a machine for living in" and which incorporated his trademark five points of architecture.

War Times

• During World War II, Le Corbusier produced little beyond some theories on his utopian ideals and on his modular building scale. In 1947, he started his Unite d'habitation. Although relieved with sculptural roof-lines and highly colored walls, these massive post-war dwelling blocks received justifiable criticism.

• Le Corbusier's post-war buildings rejected his earlier industrial forms and utilized vernacular materials, brute concrete and articulated structure. Near the end of his career he worked on several projects in India, which utilized brutal materials and sculptural forms. In these buildings he readopted the recessed structural column, the expressive staircase, and the flat undecorated plane of his celebrated five points of architecture.

Time Line

1887- October 6, birth to the 38 street of the Greenhouse, the Lime-of-Bottoms, of Charles-Edouard Jeanneret (Corbusier) , wire of George Edouard Jeanneret, engraver and enameller of watches, and Marie Charlotte Amélie Jeanneret-Perret, musician. 1891- Primary school of the Lime-of-Bottoms. 1902- Diploma of honor to the International exhibition of Arts 1913- First exposure of the ten watercolours " the language of 1916- Construction of the villa Schwob (Lime-of-Bottoms) and of 1923- Publication of "Worms an Architecture" - Exposure 1929- Voyages in South America - Cycle of ten confere1938- Exposure of painting to Kunsthaus of Zurich and the Gallery nces 1944- "Discussions with the students of the Schools of Architecture" and "the Charter of Athens" - Research on the Housing units . 1946- Travel to the United States - Meeting with Albert Einstein 1965- Le passes away

Villa SavoyeVilla Savoye

Designed in 1931, is to be considered an architectural icon. Also said to be one of the last purest Villas built with a reinforced concrete frame. This structure is based on his new architectural five point system. The Entire volume is raised on pilotis, sheathed by simple planes disengaged from the columns within. A single, elemental window dominates each side of the facades. The Free plan culminates in the roof plan. He consider this to be an object- type villa refined and standardized for the elite.

Pavillon de l’Esprit Nouveau

Started as an exhibit in the International Exhibition of Arts held in Paris in 1925, but not actually built till 1977. This pavilion has two parts, one full-scale mock of the maisonette dwelling unit, the other is a rotunda with dioramas of urban scheme where the apartment building belongs. Used machine-age culture in all aspects, even when designing the furniture.

Assembly Building (Parliament)

It was built in 1961 for the Indian government. The forms for this building came from both Indian culture and the conceptualization of the functions of a government assembly. In plan, the u-shaped office blocks and front portico together form the perimeter of the concourse. The general assembly room is a circular space contained inside this volume, and the governor’s council is two cubes that rise through the building to the roof. This he thought would “make a great space for favorable encounters among law-givers.”

Chapel of Notre Dame-du-Haut

Constructed in 1955 in Lure, France. This chapel is dedicated to the Virgin Mary and is very sculptural. This chapel is not given away as a place of worship but the shapes used to design this, evoke the earliest for of ancient deities. Many architects were shocked and saw this chapel as an irrational, expressionist aberration.

Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris was designing his most powerful work in the 1920’s, after he took on his pseudonym Le Corbusier. At this time he took his place among one of the most infamous post-modernist architects in Europe. During the 1930’s and 1940’s Le Corbusier was highly disliked for his stark forms and radical cubed shapes. Postmodernism was the return to classical architecture which at the time was very unpopular with many critics and underwent severe persecution.

Le Corbusier and Post Modernism

Le Corbusier was deeply involved in the purist movement which focused on seeing objects in the world and rendering them exactly as they appear in their purest forms. At this time the purist movement went hand in hand with the post-modern style of architecture and suited Le Corbusier for a short period of time while he developed his theories on the layout of urban dwelling known as Unite d’habitation. This was the architects way of rationalizing his unique style of housing. Much of his radical design was centered on the basic shape and form of the cube.

Le Corbusier as a Purist

The effects and influences of Le Corbusier’s work

- Le Corbusier has influenced many by the use of manipulating light and his concept of Unite d’Habitation, a large housing complex in Marseille. His influence with light can be found in a church he designed in Ronchamps and in the work of Joost van Santen.

The effects and influences of Le Corbusier’s work

- In the Unite d’Habitation, Le Corbusier designed the apartments on two floors because of the extremely tight area he had to work within. The Maisonette Towers is an example of a building who used a similar concept based on the Unite d’Habitation.

Technological InnovationsLe Corbusier Revolutionized the

world of Architecture by applying The Golden Section

into his Work. By using varieties of vertical and horizontal planes and

arranging them according to human proportions, he brought Architecture closer to humans . Also all of his work is mounted

on to a flat ground plane keeping a certain distance from all nature elements to

emphasize the significance of human in Architecture. He also

introduced a technique of building without using load-bearing walls but just simple

dividers to created the separation between spaces.

Non-Architectural work of Le Corbusier

Le Corbusier was an artists as well as a sculptor in edition to being an architect. From a young age, Le Corbusier was involved in the arts, working as a clock painter in the local clock shop. He soon attended art school where he developed his own personal styles. Le Corbusier’s ideas expressed in his art are Purist in nature utilizing geometry and sketch as tools of conveying space and form. While studying at art school, he permutated ideas of looking to nature for inspiration into ideas of looking at nature as a source of patterns as well as utilizing certain governing rules as systems of applying order as well as variety. Subdividing his work allowed him to organize his work according to the elements in the subject of the work; a practice he began in in 19191.

Images from 35works of Le corbusierUne Biche Nature MorteLa Femme a

L’Accordeon et le Coureur

Furniture of Le CorbusierLe Corbusier is perhaps some of the most influential

work of the early nine-teen hundreds. Unlike other furniture from the period or prior to, Le Corbusier designed his furniture with the general framing systems as metal and on the exterior. The cushions are free of any type of connection to any other element of the whole. Le Corbusier also incorporates Golden Section into his armchair and Grand 2 seat sofa, a practice also evident in his architecture.2

Images from www.sunsetsettings.com and www.modernliving.com

Resting Chair

Arm chair

Table

Works Cited

1 35 Works by Le Corbusier. Sotheby. London: 1987. 429. 420, 412, 414

Baker, Geoffery H. Le Corbusier – The Creative Search, The Formative Years of Charles-Edouard Jeanneret. Van Nostrand Teinhold, New York: 1996 247 – 263

Gans, Deborah. The Le Corbusier Guide. Princeton Architectural Press, New York: 1987.

Lyon, Dominique. Le Corbusier Alive. Vilo Publishing, Paris: 1999.

LC10 – P <http://www.modernliving.com/meda/lc10.pdf> accessed on 3/17/2004

2 <http://www.sunsetsettings.com/furniture/cassina/corb_grand_armchair.html> accessed on 3/17/2004

Work Cited (cont.)

http://westworld.dmu.ac.uk/architecturenew/express/express. Html accessed on 2/17/04

http://home.wanadoo.nl/~joostvansanten/RONCHAMP/roncha .htm accessed on 2/17/04

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/audiointerviews/profilepages/l ecorbusierc2.shtml accessed on 2/17/04

http://www.bwk.tue.nl/architectuur/dmw/group4/le%20corbu sier%20unite.htm accessed on 2/17/04

http://www.chbooks.com/online/eastwest/046.html accessed on 2/17/04