02/04/2018

LE RATIONNEL

LE DOMESTIQUE

LE PLASTIQUE

LE SPATIAL

LE FONCTIONNEL

L’EXISTENTIEL

LE FORMEL

LE FONCTIONNEL
​
1926-1946

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PRINCIPES

PRELUDE AMERICAIN, 1850-1900

Horation Greenough, Louis Sullivan

LITTÉRATURE DU FONCTIONNALISME, 1896-1926

Otto Wagner, Hermann Muthesius, H. P. Berlage, Adolf Behne, Le Corbusier

SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT, 1913-1936

Margerete Schütte-Lihotzky, Alexander Klein, Walter Gropius, Ernst Neufert

FONCTION ET « SACHLICHKEIT », 1925-1928

Hannes Meyer, Petersschule

FONCTIONNALISME SYNTHETIQUE, 1935-1945

Beaudouin, Lods, Prouvé, Maison du Peuple, Clichy
Buckminster Fuller, Dymaxion House

PRINCIPES

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PRINCIPE DE CORRÉLATION DES FORMES

(1812)

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« On peut observer la même marche [l’anatomie

comparée], pour déterminer l’usage des diverses parties
d’un organe, et pour reconnoître celles qui sont
essentielles, et les distinguer de celles qui ne sont
qu’accessoires. Il suffit de suivre cet organe dans toutes
les classes qui l’ont reçu et d’examiner quelles sont les
parties qui s’y trouvent toujours, et quel changement
opère dans les fonctions relatives à cet organe,
l’absence de celles qui manquent dans certaines
classes. »

G. Cuvier, Leçons d’anatomie comparée, T. I. Les

organes du mouvement, Paris, 1805, p. vi

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PRINCIPE D’EFFICIENCE STRUCTURELLE

(1821)

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PRINCIPE DE « SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT »

(1903)

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« This paper has been written:

[…] To try to convince the reader that the remedy for this
inefficiency lies in systematic management.
[…] To prove that the best management is a true science
resting upon clearly defined laws, rules, and principles, as
a foundation. And further to show that the fundamental
principles of scientific management are applicable to all
kinds of human activities. »

« […] Scientific management, on the contrary, has for its

very foundation the firm conviction that the true interests
of the two are one and the same; that prosperity for the
employer cannot exist through a long term of years unless
it is accompanied by prosperity for the employé, and vice
versa. »

« […] In a word, that maximum prosperity can exist only

as the result of maximum productivity. »

Frederick Winslow Taylor, The Principles of Scientific

Management, New York, Harper & Brothers, 1911, pp. 7,
10, 12

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PRELUDE AMERICAIN
1850-1900

Horatio Greenhough, 1843

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« Instead of forcing the functions of every sort of building

into one general form, adopting an outward shape for the
sake of the eye or of association, without reference to
the inner distribution, let us begin from the heart as the
nucleus, and work outward. The most convenient size
and arrangement of the rooms that are to constitute the
building being fixed, the access of the light that may, of
the air that must be wanted, being provided for, we have
the skeleton of our building. Nay, we have all excepting
the dress. The connection and order of parts, juxtaposed
for convenience, cannot fail to speak of their relation and
uses. »

Horatio Greenhough, « American Architecture » [1843],

in Form and Function : Remarks on Art, Design, and
Architecture, ed. Harold A. Small, Berkeley, University of
California Press, 1947, pp. 61-62

Louis Sullivan, « The Tall Office Building artistically Considered », 1896

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« […] over all the coursing sun, form ever follows function and this is the law.
Where function does not change form does not change […]
It is the pervading law of all things organic, and inorganic, of all things physical and
metaphysical, of all things human and all things superhuman, of all true
manifestations of the head, of the heart, of the soul, that the life is recognizable in
its expression, that form ever follows function. This is the law.
Shall we, then, daily violate this law in our art? […]
Is it really then, a very marvelous thing, or is it rather so commonplace, so
everyday, so near a thing to us, that we cannot perceive that the shape, form,
outward expression, design or whatever we may choose, of the tall office building
should in the very nature of things follow the functions of the building, and that
where the function does not change, the form is not to change?
Does this not readily, clearly, and conclusively show that the lower one or two
stories will take on a special character suited to the special needs, that the tiers of
typical offices, having the same unchanging function, shall continue in the same
unchanging form, and that as to the attic, specific and conclusive as it is in its very
nature, its function shall equally be so in force, in significance, in continuity, in
conclusiveness of outward expression? From this results, naturally, spontaneously,
unwittingly, a three-part division, not from any theory, symbol, or fancied logic. And
thus the design of the tall office building takes its place with all other architectural
types made when architecture, as has happened once in many years, was a living
art. »

Louis Sullivan, « The Tall Office Building artistically Considered », Lippincott’s,

mars 1896

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LITTÉRATURE DU FONCTIONNALISME
1896-1926

« Le début de toute création architecturale est la

composition […] il est certain qu'une idée de base
heureuse et bien mûrie a aujourd'hui un grand poids et
elle contribue à l'évaluation d'une œuvre plus que
n'importe quelle fleur luxuriante cultivée par la force
spontanée et inconsciente de l'artiste. Il est également
important de tenir compte de l'esprit pratique qui
envahit aujourd'hui l'humanité. Tout artiste devra suivre
ce principe: « Rien qui ne soit fonctionnel ne pourra
jamais être beau ».

« L'économie artistique fait aussi partie de la

composition. Il s'agit là d'une notion moderne qui
indique une prudence extrême dans l'emploi et la
composition des formes qu'on nous a transmises […] Si
l'œuvre qu'on entend réaliser veut être un miroir fidèle
de notre époque, elle doit exprimer le plus parfaitement
et le plus complètement possible la simplicité, le
caractère fonctionnel et je dirais même le sens militaire
de la vie moderne. »

Otto Wagner, « Architecture moderne » [Moderne

Architektur, 1896, 1898, 1902, 1914], in Architecture
moderne et autres écrits [1980], trad. Sylvie Pizzuti,
Bruxelles, Pierre Mardaga, 1984, pp. 48, 50

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« Here, reforms are taking place – we recognize them

most fully in the contemporary English house – that
strive to increase the amount of light and air, to design
strictly functional rooms, to avoid all useless
appendages in the decoration, to eliminate heavy,
unmovable household furnishings, and to strive for an
overall sense of brightness and impression of
cleanliness. »

« The gravitational axis that lies within the swings of the

pendulum of emotional values is prescribed for the
tectonic arts in the necessary and constant demands of
material, function, and construction. The more perfectly
these demands are fulfilled, the more lasting will be the
values achieved. »

Hermann Muthesius, in Style-Architecture and Building-

Art [Stilarchitektur und Baukunst, 1902], trad. Stanford
Anderson, Santa Monica, The Getty Center, 1994, pp.
80, 94-95

« Beauty in the artistic sense exists only in the visible

expression of the purely aesthetic functionality of the
components, so that they can contribute to the whole
and give a sensory representation of the tension
between load and support. Since the actual aesthetics
of architecture are the result of the antagonism
between the inorganic forces of nature and are
absolutely unrelated to such notions as regularity,
proportion, and symmetry in geometric and
stereometric forms, the beauty of a building stems from
the straightforward expression of its purpose and from
an effective and natural way of achieving it. »

H. P. Berlage, « Architecture’s Place in Modern

Aesthetics » [« De plaats die de bouwkunst in de
moderne aesthetica bekleedt », 1886], in Thoughts on
Style, 1886-1909, trad. Iain Boyd Whyte et Wim de Wit,
Santa Monica, The Getty Center, 1996, p. 96

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« Should they be unprepared, we will see the architect's

work taken over by the engineer, whose job it already is
to make the actual functional buildings [Nutzbauten].
This word sounds harsh to today's architects but will no
longer do so in the future, for then we shall be able to
call all architecture by that name. »

H. P. Berlage, « Architecture and Impressionism »

[« Bouwkunst en impressionisme », 1894], in Thoughts
on Style, 1886-1909, trad. Iain Boyd Whyte et Wim de
Wit, Santa Monica, The Getty Center, 1996, p. 119

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SCIENTIFIC MANAGEMENT
1913-1936

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Christine Frederick, The New Housekeeping : Efficiency Studies in

Home Management, New York, 1913

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Bruno Taut, Die Neue Wohnung, 1924

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Alexander Klein
« Functional Housing for Frictionless Living »
1928

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Margerete Schütte-Lihotzky
FRANKFURTER KÜCHE
1926

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Walter Gropius
SIEDLUNG DESSAU-TÖRTEN
1926-1928

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Ernst Neufert
BAUENTWURFSLEHRE
1936

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FONCTION ET « SACHLICHKEIT »
1925-1928

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HANNES MEYER
Petersschule, Bâle
1926

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« Toute chose en ce monde est le produit de la formule: fonction x économie.

Ces choses ne sont pas des œuvres d'art : tout art est composition et par
conséquent antifonctionnel.
Toute vie est fonction et par conséquent non artistique […]

Construire est un processus biologique.

Construire n'est pas un processus esthétique.
La maison nouvelle n'est pas qu'une machine à habiter. Assemblage d'éléments,
elle devient un dispositif biologique répondant aux besoins spirituels et corporels
[…]

Penser l'architecture en termes fonctionnels et biologiques, y voir une façon

d'agencer le processus vital, conduit logiquement à la construction pure : ces
formes construites n'ont pas de patrie, elles sont l'expression d'un courant
international de la pensée constructive. Une des qualités de notre époque est son
internationalisme. La construction pure est la base et la caractéristique du
nouveau monde des formes. »

Hannes Meyer, « Bauen », Bauhaus, vol. II, n° 4, 1928, pp. 12-13 (trad. Claude
Schnaidt)

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FONCTIONNALISME « SYNTHETIQUE »
1935-1945

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BEAUDOUIN, LODS, PROUVE

Maison du Peuple, Clichy
1935-1939

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« Such a consideration implicitly presupposes the possibility of distinguishing

between room (festival hall and market) and function (celebration and trade). This
distinction plays a key role not only in theoretical debate, but also in the practical
methodology of functionalistic planning: it interpolates distance between the object
and its function […]

We encounter here, for example, a "de-automization" of the space-function-time

continuum which checkmates the symbolic expressiveness, and even the
functionalistic iconography of architecture. Here, too, there is implicit refutation of
the assumption that for each function there must be a corresponding object, a
space which is symbolically and functionally adapted to it. The self-expression of
the architectural objects is "reduced" to a manifestation of its encasing properties,
of its function as a container […]

That phase of functionalism which could be defined as "analytical“ is over and

gone. "Formal" interest is no longer concerned with functions acknowledged as
specific to a particular program, nor is it concerned with particular independent
aspects of spatial division, construction, technology, or expression, but rather with
their synergetic combination, synergy meaning: "the co-operation of several
functions to produce the effect of a whole. This small (or great) change in thinking
with regard to the architectural object could be covered by the term "synthetic
functionalism“. »

Bruno Reichlin, « Maison du Peuple at Clichy : A Masterpiece of 'Synthetic'

Functionalism », Daidalos, n°18, 15 décembre 1985, pp. 94, 96

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BUCKMINSTER FULLER

Dymaxion House, 1927-1929

Dymaxion Bathroom, 1937
Dymaxion Deployment Unit, 1940
Wichita House, 1941-1946

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