Erik Gunnar Asplund

Il perché del luogo

Tra giardino e luogo della riconciliazione

Il n'y a que deux couleurs: noir et blanc Noir la vie, blanc la mort-ce qu'on a oublié depuis longtemps 1. Andreas Walser La separazione richiede uno spazio che si prenda cura della morte. Spesso collocato al di fuori dalle mura a distanza dalla vita urbana, a volte completamente inserito nel quotidiano andare, il cimitero si offre come luogo di risposta per il defunto. Hans Belting asserisce che "perdendo il proprio corpo il defunto perde anche il proprio luogo" 2 : la ricerca del defunto coinciderebbe con la ricerca del suo luogo. Egli continua identificando nell'aldilà il luogo verso cui il defunto si dirige, ma rimarrebbe irrisolta la questione del corpo terreno il quale necessita di un luogo dove 'riposare'. Nel Neolitico i morti erano seppelliti sotto la propria casa al fine di tenerli accanto a sé ma in seguito si svilupparono le Necropoli e da qui il cimitero che appartiene da un punto di vista sia giuridico che culturale al territorio della comunità, che ha fondato presso di sé un secondo insediamento, quello 'dei suoi morti'3.
La tomba è solamente l'immagine di un 'luogo stabile'4. La configurazione della tomba e del cimitero stesso altro non sarebbe che una strategia per compensare la mancata realtà di questo luogo incerto5.
Il cimitero è quindi un luogo fittizio: lo si può figurare solo come luogo del ricordo. Anche le immagini sulla tomba appaiono come immagini private rese pubbliche, in cui il defunto sopravvive nel ricordo come egli era in vita.
Usuali sono poi le iscrizioni che mettono in guardia dal
danneggiare la tomba; il defunto non può difendere il luogo e questa protezione deve essere garantita dai viventi.
Nella ricerca svedese sulla questione sono state evidenziati due casi che promettono di trattare il luogo con due avvicinamenti apparentemente diversi: l'uno è il caso del Cimitero nel Bosco di Erik Gunnar Asplund e Sigurd Lewerentz e l'altro è il Kirkogarden
con Katarina Kirka entrambi sviluppati a Stoccolma. Se il primo è un evidente esempio di isolamento dal contesto cittadino, il secondo ne è pienamente circondato.

1 "Es gibt nur zwei Farber; schwarz und weiss schwarz: das Leben, weiss: der Tod-schon längst vergessen", Andreas Walser, Andreas Walser-Und jetzt-gehe ich.
3 Ibid., pp. 187-188
4,Ibid.

This is only a preview: Since Gunnar Asplund completed the extension of the Gothenburg City Hall 77 years ago, it has been subject to criticism. To this day an endless controversy has been smoldering. But meanwhile the dispute revolves around the restoration that was completed recently.

Comparing to other forms of human creation, architecture is often slow and passive. It takes years, if not decades to complete a public building. From the initial competition entry by Asplund to the actual building, the Gothenburg Law Courts took 24 years to complete. During this time, the shift of aesthetic culture in Sweden from Neoclassicism to National Romanticism and finally to Functionalism has influenced the building’s architectural style. Besides stylistic influences, the paradigm of existing political and social structure in Sweden is undergoing tremendous change. With the Swedish Social Democratic Party (SAP) winning the general election and the majority of parliament in 1932, the country’s policy has become more liberal. A great number of bold economic stimulus schemes were launched to develop better infrastructure for the country. The Gothenburg Law Courts was finally conceived under this stimulus scheme led by the Swedish Social Democratic Party. This essay took interest in the most significant and controversial work of Gunnar Asplund, the Gothenburg Law Courts (1937). The following analysis will focus on different parties’ reactions and interpretation of a Gothenburg Law Courts in an attempt to understand the influence of the building socially and politically.

This is a preview only: The Stockholm Exhibition 1930 of Arts and Crafts and Home Industries (›Stockholmsutställningen 1930 av konstindustri, konsthantverk och hemslöjd‹) and the manifesto Acceptera, published the following year by the exhibition organizers, mark the breakthrough of Modern Architecture in Sweden as well as in other Nordic countries. The exhibition is organised by Svenska Slöjdföreningen (›Swedish Arts and Crafts Society‹), managed by its director, Gregor Paulsson, and designed to a large extent by Gunnar Asplund — aimed at achieving »beauty and festivity«.
The Stockholm Exhibition is a phenomenal success and attracts more than four million visitors, including 25000 foreign guests.
Despite its enormous success the architecture of the Stockholm Exhibition has been studied surprisingly little in detail and its buildings are astonishingly poorly documented.
In order to reconstruct its architecture, rediscover its qualities and bring it to life, in 2014 and 2015 master students of Chalmers Department of Architecture undertook to reconstruct the pavilions in the form of models.
The reconstruction led to a series of discoveries testifying to an architectural quality that cannot be discerned from pictures or drawings, but is documented in this volume. Through the construction of the models of the pavilions of the Stockholm Exhibition, the quality of an architecture, which for over 80 years nobody had seen, could be reconstructed and re-experienced — an architecture which proved to be so important for the culture of modernism in the Nordic countries.

Presentación acerca de la formación lenta y progresiva de una tradición funcional en los países nórdicos como alternativa a la fórmula rupturista del Movimiento Moderno.
Se toma la obra del arquitecto danés ARNE JACOBSEN por ser una figura "puente" entre la tradición clasicista de la Academia de Bellas Artes de Copenhague (presente directa o indirectamente en su etapa de formación en los años 20: C.F.Hansen, M.Bindesboll, C.Petersen, K.Klint), la adopción esquiva del Funcionalismo centroeuropeo en Dinamarca bajo la fórmula de la "Tradición Funcional" (E.G.Asplund, Kay Fisker, A.Aalto), y la superación del Movimiento Moderno bajo el influjo de la arquitectura norteamericana (Mies van der Rohe, Eero Saarinen, S.O.M.) tras la Segunda Guerra Mundial, situándose en la vanguardia de los años 50 y 60 (hasta su muerte en 1971).

El análisis en retrospectiva de la evolución de la ciudad moderna nos permite entenderla desde la dialéctica que establecieron dos modelos urbanos aparentemente antagónicos: mientras en el mundo nórdico se abogaba por un profundo respeto por la continuidad histórica, en los países centroeuropeos se presentía el inevitable destino de la historia al entender la ciudad como “escenario arrasado”, verdadera tabula rasa donde desplegar los postulados racionalistas. La aparente divergencia de sendas posturas urbanísticas (‘continuidad’ versus ‘ruptura’) a principios de los años 20 del s.XX, encontrará líneas de convergencia, erigiéndose, sin saberlo, en un modelo híbrido e integrador de lo mejor del pasado histórico y del deslumbrante porvenir. Estas coincidencias serán compartidas por sus líderes respectivos, E.G.Asplund y Le Corbusier, quienes mostrarán una década más tarde posturas más reconciliadoras, tanto en sus trazados urbanísticos como incluso en sus proyectos arquitectónicos.

PDF disponibile al link. http://www.skuola.net/universita/esercitazioni/il-cimitero-enskede-a-stoccolma-di-erik-gunnar-asplund-e-sigurd-lewerentz
Il cimitero Enskede si presenta come un importante esempio dell'elaborazione moderna del rapporto tra
architettura e paesaggio, qui coniugato nell'ambito di una struttura che deve rispondere
ad esigenze funzionali e simboliche molto precise.
L'odierna disposizione degli edifici e del paesaggio è il frutto di un percorso progettuale protrattosi
per circa venticinque anni e compiuto dagli architetti svedesi Erik Gunnar Asplund (1885-1940) e
Sigurd Lewerentz (1885-1975), in collaborazione, in alcune fasi, individualmente, per altre.

"Akzeptiere: Das Buch und seine Geschichte" is the latest in-depth contribution by Atli Magnus Seelow, one of several by him on the 1930 Stockholm exhibition and the book accepetera, the 200-page text often referred to as ‘the manifesto of Swedish functionalism’ which was co-authored by the group – Erik Gunnar Asplund, Wolter Gahn, Sven Markelius, Gregor Paulsson Eskil Sundahl and Uno Åhrén – responsible for what is still an important event in Nordic countries. In Nordic circles accepetera has had ‘a major impact over time in relation to the short-lived Stockholm exhibition, ‘ (Seelow 2018) but the Swedish manifesto lacks all textual or historical analysis until recently, unlike many manifestos of the time which were thoroughly explored and also translated. As stressed in the title, Seelow examines both the ‘book‘ (Das Buch) in all its facets, and the ‘ history‘ (seine Geschichte) or historical background from which the manifesto sprang. Eighty-seven years after accepetera, Seelow’s 2018 contribution provides the first thorough contextualisation of the text within the Swedish architectural, theoretical and political panorama, though he also eschews any uniquely Swedish-oriented perspective. The author says quite plainly that the main reason for his contribution was to get the text translated in its entirety, made at last available to a German readership. His intention of disseminating the manifesto outside Swedish borders is not a lone voice among recent studies - Lucy Creagh was a forerunner in curating the full English reprint translation in 2008. Nevertheless, Seelow’s is a pivotal contribution in that German culture was a primary reference point for Sweden. The choice of language for the book and the translation is hardly coincidental.

The »Stockholm Exhibition 1930 of Arts and Crafts and Home Industries« (›Stockholmsutstallningen 1930 av konstindustri, konsthantverk och hemslojd‹) and the Acceptera-manifesto, published the following year by the exhibition organizers – Gunnar Asplund, Wolter Gahn, Sven Markelius, Gregor Paulsson, Eskil Sundahl und Uno Ahren – mark the breakthrough of Modern Architecture in Sweden as well as in the other Nordic countries. In Acceptera(›Accept‹) the authors promote, under the term »Functionalism«, or »Funkis«, a modernisation of architecture, urban planning and the arts and crafts, which is the product of inevitable progress and which has to be »accepted« — thus the title of the book. In subsequent years this functionalism develops into an equally aesthetic and political programme for the restructuring of Sweden to a »folkhem« (literally ›a people’s home‹), the term symbolising Sweden’s welfare state. This book makes the text of the Acceptera-Manifesto accessible to the interested r...

The »Stockholm Exhibition 1930 of Arts and Crafts and Home Industries« (›Stockholmsutställningen 1930 av konstindustri, konsthantverk och hemslöjd‹) and the Acceptera-manifesto, published the following year by the exhibition organizers – Gunnar Asplund, Wolter Gahn, Sven Markelius, Gregor Paulsson, Eskil Sundahl und Uno Åhrén – mark the breakthrough of Modern Architecture in Sweden as well as in the other Nordic countries. In Acceptera (›Accept‹) the authors promote, under the term »Functionalism«, or »Funkis«, a modernisation of architecture, urban planning and the arts and crafts, which is the product of inevitable progress and which has to be »accepted« — thus the title of the book. In subsequent years this functionalism develops into an equally aesthetic and political programme for the restructuring of Sweden to a »folkhem« (literally ›a people’s home‹), the term symbolising Sweden’s welfare state.

This book makes the text of the Acceptera-Manifesto accessible to the interested reader in German for the first time. In addition, the history of the book is investigated: the various movements and developments that contribute to the Stockholm exhibition and the publication of Acceptera are examined; the reception and impact of the book are also taken into account. Finally, this edition is extensively annotated and its design follows the Swedish original from 1931 as it constitutes an integral part of the book.

Full text available:
http://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-fau/frontdoor/index/index/docId/10383

Throughout the twenties, Gunnar Asplund, being unaware of any fashion or trend, had been one of the leading figures of Nordic Classicism in Sweden. However in 1930, his style would radicalize, influenced by the tenets of international style and functionalism. The Stockholm Exhibition 1930, whose design he assumed, needed to show the new situation caused by the changes in the industry and the arts within daily life and especially in the field of housing. His ambitious architectural proposal made the exhibition one of the most important in the history of architecture in Stockholm, establishing functionalism as the predominant style in Sweden

ENGLISH SUMMARY.
Around 1922, two big masters from the Modernist Movement, the Swedish E.G. Asplund and the Franco-Swiss Le Corbusier had already defined their ideas of city. Besides the various theoretical proposals and some built fragments, Asplund made his urban proposal for new ministerial buildings of the Real Chancellery of Stockholm. And, simultaneously, Le Corbusier had finished its “Ville Contemporaine”, an integral urban model that would follow its practical application shown at his Voisin Plan (1925) for the historic centre of Paris.

The retrospective analysis of the modern city evolution allows us to understand it since the dialectic has established the relating urban models: whereas the Nordic countries defended a deep respect for the historical continuity, in central European countries there was some kind of a sensation about the inevitable destine of history when understanding city as “overthrown scenario”, real flat tabula where to implement the rationalist postulates.

Despite the apparent divergence of the two urbanistic oppositions initially placed (“continuity” versus “rupture”), several real common places may be found, making up without knowing the integrating, hybrid model from the historical past and also from the upcoming dazzling. Just like this it is possible to understand the nuances that the messianic Le Corbusier introduced to the realist proposal of Plan Voisin, realising certain reknown pieces from the historical Paris and place them in his ambitious space. And symmetricall, it may be probed that the urban drawing that Asplund made for the residential block at Norr Mälarstrand in Stockholm (1931-1932), following the lines of direction of a typical Zeilenbau, just before the urban design by the Swiss masters for the Norrmaalm island (1933) as a valid application of his famous urban model (the “Ville Radieuse”, 1930) at the Swedish capital.

Moreover, in the architectonic level we observe a similar convergence, coming from the opposite direction, whose common origin surprisingly is related to the traditional Japanese house.

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RESUMEN (ESPAÑOL).
El análisis en retrospectiva de la evolución de la ciudad moderna nos permite entenderla desde la dialéctica que establecieron dos modelos urbanos aparentemente antagónicos: mientras en el mundo nórdico se abogaba por un profundo respeto por la continuidad histórica, en los países centroeuropeos se presentía el inevitable destino de la historia al entender la ciudad como “escenario arrasado”, verdadera tabula rasa donde desplegar los postulados racionalistas. La aparente divergencia de sendas posturas urbanísticas („continuidad‟ versus „ruptura‟) a principios de los años 20 del s.XX, encontrará líneas de convergencia, erigiéndose, sin saberlo, en un modelo híbrido e integrador de lo mejor del pasado histórico y del deslumbrante porvenir. Estas coincidencias serán compartidas por sus líderes respectivos, E.G.Asplund y Le Corbusier, quienes mostrarán una década más tarde posturas más reconciliadoras, tanto en sus trazados urbanísticos como incluso en sus proyectos arquitectónicos.