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Swinburne Research le:Wilken, RowanThe critical reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’swritings on Heidegger and place2013Architectural Theory yright 2013 Taylor & Francis. This is anAccepted Manuscript of an article published byTaylor & Francis in Architectural Theory Review in2013, available online: 875614This is the author’s version of the work, posted here with the permission of the publisher for yourpersonal use. No further distribution is permitted. You may also be able to access the publishedversion from your library.The definitive version is available burne University of Technology CRICOS Provider 00111D swinburne.edu.auPowered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)
Published as: Rowan Wilken (2013) “The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heidegger and Place,”Architectural Theory Review, 18:3, 340-355, DOI: 10.1080/13264826.2013.875614Title:The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heideggerand PlaceAuthor:Dr Rowan Wilken, Swinburne Institute for Social Research, Swinburne Universityof Technology.rwilken@swin.edu.auAbstract:This article draws from reception theory in its examination of the reception overtime by architectural theorists and historians of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s work,and specifically his treatment of Heidegger and place as developed in Genius Loci(1980) and other publications. Norberg-Schulz’s writings, and this book inparticular, have attracted consistently high levels of critical attention over morethan three decades. Having detailed this reception – which at times borders onhostile – my focus shifts to exploring which it is that this work has attracted sucha consistent level of persistent yet critical interest? Why is it that critics keepreturning to Norberg-Schulz’s work, and what might be revealed through thisconcern for and criticism of his work?Keywords:reception theory; Christian Norberg-Schulz; place; genius loci; HeideggerAcknowledgments:This article is an output of the Australian Research Council (ARC) funded project,“The Cultural Economy of Locative Media” (DE120102114). I wish to thank theARC for its financial support, and Jenny Kennedy for her invaluable researchassistance.1
Published as: Rowan Wilken (2013) “The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heidegger and Place,”Architectural Theory Review, 18:3, 340-355, DOI: 10.1080/13264826.2013.875614The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heideggerand PlaceSo reception theory, it seems to me, opens up the political discussion. Itraises important questions about text, reading, meaning, andunderstanding 1IntroductionInfluential Norwegian theorist Christian Norberg-Schulz trained as an architectat the Eidgenoessiche Technische Hochschule in Zurich, graduating in 1949. Hethen went on to study under Sigfried Giedion, Walter Gropius, and Mies van derRohe, before returning to Norway, “where he worked with the Modernist ArneKorsmo and where he remained [.] until his death” in 2000.2 He rose tointernational prominence with the publication of Intentions to Architecture(1963). Other major publications followed, including Existence, Space andArchitecture (1971), Genius Loci (1980), and The Concept of Dwelling (1985).In this article, I draw from reception theory to examine the reception of NorbergSchulz’s work by architectural theorists and historians, and specifically histreatment of Heidegger and place as developed in Genius Loci (1980) and otherpublications. His writings, and this book in particular, have attracted consistentlyhigh levels of critical attention over more than three decades. In addition todetailing this reception, my interest is also with asking why there is a consistentlevel of persistent interest? Why is it that critics keep returning to NorbergSchulz’s work, and what might be revealed through this critical concern for hiswork?Reception Theory and Architectural HistoryReception theory has its roots in literary theory and criticism, and is mostcommonly associated with the work of Wolfgang Iser, Stanley Fish, and HansRobert Jauss.3 According to Terry Eagleton’s rough periodization of modernliterary theory, reception theory constitutes the third of three phases. Thisprogression runs in chronological order as follows:a preoccupation with the author (Romanticism and the nineteenthcentury); an exclusive concern with the text (New Criticism); and amarked shift of attention to the reader over recent years.4“The reader,” Eagleton asserts, “has always been the most underprivileged of thistrio – strangely, since without him or her there would be no literary texts at all.Literary texts do not exist on bookshelves: they are processes of significationmaterialized only in the practice of reading. For literature to happen, the readeris quite as vital as the author.”5 One of the key insights of reception theory is inpointing out that, “all readers are socially and historically positioned, and how2
Published as: Rowan Wilken (2013) “The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heidegger and Place,”Architectural Theory Review, 18:3, 340-355, DOI: 10.1080/13264826.2013.875614they interpret literary works [and all works of cultural production for thatmatter] are socially and historically positioned.”6 As Eagleton further elaborates:It is not literary [or other cultural] works themselves that remainconstant, while interpretations of them change: texts and literarytraditions themselves actively altered according to the various historical“horizons” within which they are articulated.7This is to say that textual production and reception is a dynamic, two-wayprocess.The insights and perspectives produced by reception theory, while not withoutcriticism,8 have been influential and taken up and applied within a number ofdifferent fields, including classics, cultural studies, art and visual studies, gardenhistory, and architecture, to name a few. Architectural interest in receptiontheory has been wide-ranging.9 One key strand of this work has been concernedwith examining the public reception of an architect’s design. This is the explicitfocus, for instance, of Monteyne’s study of Boston City Hall. Drawing on receptiontheory, Monteyne argues that diverging interpretations of the building, andtherefore of the building’s place in Boston civic life, “depend on the identities andcontexts of different [receiving] audiences”.10 To date, less explicit attention hasbeen given to the reception of architectural theory by fellow architecturaltheorists. The concern of the present article is with tracing how ChristianNorberg-Schulz’s engagement with theories of place and the philosophicalwritings of Heidegger, and how both have been received within architecture. Inexploring this issue, my focus is diachronic rather than synchronic. That is to say,I am not so concerned with examining specific moments of reception as I amwith tracing this reception over time.Genius Loci: From “Crisis of Place” to “Strong Place”In order to set about building this picture, it is valuable to begin by sketchingNorberg-Schulz’s larger intellectual project as it pertains to his engagement withplace and phenomenological theory. Norberg-Schulz’s “phenomenological trilogyin architecture” consists of Existence, Space and Architecture (1971), Genius Loci(1980), and The Concept of Dwelling (1985). The focus here is on the second ofthese, Genius Loci, a book which crystallises many of his key arguments.Genius Loci develops an historical examination of place making and the basicproperties or characteristics that contribute to the “spirit” or “genius” of a place– its genius loci.11 The role of architecture, according to Norberg-Schulz, is toprovide a “means to visualize the genius loci, and the task of the architect is tocreate meaningful places, whereby he [sic] helps man to dwell”.12 The emphasisthat is placed on the idea of dwelling in this passage gestures towards theimportance of phenomenology, and especially Heidegger’s philosophical writings,in defining Norberg-Schulz’s ideas about place. As the philosopher Jeff Malpaswrites:The idea of a close connection between human “being-in-the-world” andspatiality, locality and embodiment, that can be discerned (throughdifferent ways and differing emphases) in the work of Heidegger and3
Published as: Rowan Wilken (2013) “The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heidegger and Place,”Architectural Theory Review, 18:3, 340-355, DOI: 10.1080/13264826.2013.875614Merleau-Ponty, reappears in the work of more recent thinkers working ina number of different fields. Something of that influence is to be seen inthe explicit thematisation of notions of place and locality.13Malpas goes on to add that this is especially evident in relation to theHeideggerian influence on architectural theory in the 1970s and 1980s, such asis to be found in the work of writers such as Karsten Harries, Kenneth Frampton,and, particularly, Christian Norberg-Schulz, who is the focus here.The shaping influence of Heidegger’s ideas on Norberg-Schulz’s own thinking isapparent. Underpinning Norberg-Schulz’s understanding of place andarchitecture is an extended engagement with Heidegger’s notions of “dwelling”,“gathering”, and “thing”.14 The meanings of these three terms, like so many ofHeidegger’s philosophical concepts, are intertwined in complicated ways. Yet, itis largely the first term in this trio, “dwelling”, which guides Norberg-Schulz’sstudy of place. “We have used the [Heideggerian] word “dwelling” to indicate thetotal man-place relationship.”15Dwelling is a decidedly opaque and elusive term in Heidegger’s writing. Themeaning of dwelling – or, more precisely, the meaning of its Germanic root bauen– appears to shift with each application, sometimes referring, it would seem, to akind of fundamental ontological category, and sometimes taking on a moreinstrumental sense of cultivation and construction – an ambiguity which raises anumber of issues that will be returned to later in this discussion. Both senses ofdwelling inform Norberg-Schulz’s statement that, “Dwelling [.] impliessomething more than ‘shelter’. It implies that the spaces where life occurs areplaces, in the true sense of the word.”16Place is thus understood by Norberg-Schulz to refer to “the concretemanifestation of man’s dwelling” and is constituted by material substance, shape,texture and colour, all of which give “character” or “atmosphere”.17 It is throughan understanding of all these factors – the “total phenomenon” of a place and“the meanings which are gathered by a place” – that an attentive reader oflandscape is said to be able to arrive at an understanding of genius loci. Inessence, Norberg-Schulz’s argument is to repeat Alexander Pope’s famouseighteenth century exhortation to “consult the genius of place in all”.18According to Gunila Jivén and Peter Larkham’s reading of Genius Loci, four“thematic levels” can be recognised in Norberg-Schulz’s treatment of the conceptof genius loci. These are:1.2.3.4.“the topography of the earth’s surface”;“the cosmological light conditions and the sky as natural conditions”;“buildings”; and,“symbolic and existential meanings in the cultural landscape”.19Norberg-Schulz’s application of these phenomenological principles is alsoframed by his reading of Heidegger’s concept of “the fourfold”, which unitesearth, sky, mortals, and divinities. As Heidegger explains:4
Published as: Rowan Wilken (2013) “The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heidegger and Place,”Architectural Theory Review, 18:3, 340-355, DOI: 10.1080/13264826.2013.875614“On the earth” already means “under the sky”. Both of these also mean“remaining before the divinities” and include a “belonging to men’s beingwith one another”. By a primal oneness the four – earth and sky, divinitiesand mortals – belong together in one.20“Dwelling” is said to unify these elements; it “preserves the fourfold by bringingthe presencing of the fourfold into things”.21 Thus, for Norberg-Schulz, regardlessof whether it is a natural or a constructed place, a Norwegian landscape or a“cluster village” in Puglia, “the character of the place is to a high extentdetermined by how this standing [earth] and rising [sky] is concretized”.22 Inother words, Norberg-Schulz “sees the skyline of the town and the horizontallyexpanded silhouette of the urban buildings as keys to the image of a place”.23This emphasis on horizontality and verticality is strongly evident in the imagesillustrating Genius Loci, many of which repeat this high/low, sky/groundinterplay through the extensive use of aerial photography that offers a bird’s-eyeview of human settlement and surrounding landscapes, and of horizon and sky.These images are also often juxtaposed with tightly framed ground-level views ofstreetscapes, architectural details, and so forth. Such is the reliance on andrepetition of this compositional pattern that the images can be read to serve keypolemical functions within the text; they work to support Norberg-Schulz’sreading of Heidegger by attempting to represent in visual form “the fourfold” of“earth and sky, divinities and mortals”. In addition, through sheer weight ofnumbers they add vital visual support to the notion of genius loci, andparticularly its four thematic levels, sketched earlier.Norberg-Schulz’s overarching claim is that, “when all the components seem toembody basic existential meanings, we may talk about a ‘strong’ place”.24 It issignificant that examples of “strong place” in a modern urban setting are few andfar between in his analysis. It is this concern for a lack of clear examples of“strong place” that connects Norberg-Schulz’s examination of genius loci with theearlier writing of Mumford25 and Jacobs26, and the ongoing issue of a “crisis ofplace” in urbanism. In taking up this theme, Norberg-Schulz argues that when afocus on the identity or genius of a place is absent or forgotten the result is “lossof place”.27Lost is the settlement as a place in nature, lost are the urban foci as placesfor common living, lost is the building as a meaningful sub-place whereman may simultaneously experience individuality and belonging. Lost isalso the relationship to earth and sky. Modern buildings exist in a“nowhere”; they are not related to the landscape and not to a coherent,urban whole, but live their abstract life in a kind of mathematicaltechnological space which hardly distinguishes between up and down.28Moreover, as he elaborates elsewhere, in his book Architecture:The loss of things and places makes up a loss of “world”. Modern manbecomes “worldless”, and thus loses his own identity, as well as the senseof community and participation. Existence is experienced as“meaningless”, and man becomes “homeless” because he does not anylonger belong to a meaningful totality.295
Published as: Rowan Wilken (2013) “The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heidegger and Place,”Architectural Theory Review, 18:3, 340-355, DOI: 10.1080/13264826.2013.875614This, for Norberg-Schulz, is what is at stake in the “crisis of place” for us as socialbeings. The appropriate response to this apparent “crisis of place”, especially in acontemporary urban context, he argues, is to respect the “spirit of place” andwork towards the creation of “strong places”. This involves realising that “citieshave to be treated as individual places, rather than abstract spaces where the‘blind’ forces of economy and politics have free play”.30The Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writing on Place andHeideggerHaving given this necessarily brief account of Norberg-Schulz’s thesis, I movenow to consider the reception of his work, especially his theories of place and hisreliance on Heidegger as found in Genius Loci and elsewhere. Two things arenoteworthy about this reception: the first is the enduring interest in NorbergSchulz’s work, with consistent engagement with his writings over three decades;the second is the robust, at times hostile, reception his work has attracted.At the time of its publication Genius Loci enjoyed a mixed reception. In a 1981review by Harris Forusz for the Journal of Architectural Education, the book wasreceived largely positively. The central contention of the book, Forusz writes, isNorberg-Schulz’s belief that “beyond the pragmatic and the experiential aspectsof architecture there is a specific need for a metaphysical belief in architecture,an aspect which can contribute to the architect’s understanding of the existential‘meaning’ of place”. For Forusz, the book is most rewarding when read as “ametaphysical view on the problem of the ‘recovery of place’”.Other critics, however, have been less receptive to Norberg-Schulz’sdevelopment of the idea of genius loci. For instance, despite Norberg-Schulz’sown claim that “to respect the genius loci does not mean to copy old models”,31his understanding of place and his vision for its (urban) revitalisation has beenviewed by some critics as strongly traditional and nostalgic. As Jivén andLarkham note in a 2003 article, “he promotes the traditional form of towns andbuildings, which he sees as the basis for bringing about a deeper symbolicunderstanding of places”.32 It comes as no surprise, then, that in expounding theprinciples needed for achieving “strong place”,33 Norberg-Schulz appears morecomfortable in his analysis of “old world” models of place-making – such asPrague, Khartoum, Rome, and his native Norway – than when applying the sameprinciples to what Melvin Webber has termed the “non-place urban realm” of“new world cities”.34A similar critique can be applied to the use of images in Genius Loci. In order toexplore how this is the case, it is necessary to return to reception theory. Onefield where the insights generated by reception theory have found specificpurchase is within visual studies.35 The value of reception approaches in thestudy of visual images, Gretchen Barbatsis argues, is that they orient us “towardunderstanding the outcomes of encoding work”.36 That is to say, “the analytictools of reader-oriented criticism direct attention to the manner in which apicture-text organizes and guides a reading-viewer’s acts of ideation” and sensemaking.376
Published as: Rowan Wilken (2013) “The Critical Reception of Christian Norberg-Schulz’s Writings on Heidegger and Place,”Architectural Theory Review, 18:3, 340-355, DOI: 10.1080/13264826.2013.875614As noted earlier, visual examples of so-called “strong place” dominate Genius Loci,and Norberg-Schulz appears far more comfortable in his handling of thecomposition and analysis of these images to support his arguments. Whereas thevisual examples used to illustrate “loss of place” are rather more contentious. Acase in point is the two illustrations used to highlight “visual chaos” in GeniusLoci. The first (plate 327, printed on page 188 of the book), represents a winterscene in suburban Oslo. What is noteworthy about this particular image is theway that it has been composed so as to heighten the effect of visual chaos. Theeven spacing of the power poles in the foreground closes the image in and drawsthe eye towards the centre and then in two competing directions: down thecentral line of power poles and out to the vanishing point at right, and betweenthe two centre left poles to the clustering of houses on the hill. Focusing on thisurban infrastructure, the overall impression is of visual – and, perhaps moresignificantly, of urban – clutter.38 The second image of American roadsidesignage (plate 332, printed on page 190 of the book) is framed to similar effect,and is used as an unproblematic example of “visual chaos”. It is,
and, particularly, Christian Norberg-Schulz, who is the focus here. The shaping influence of Heidegger’s ideas on Norberg-Schulz’s own thinking is apparent. Underpinning Norberg-Schulz’s understanding o
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