Fabio Gianfrancesco

Architettura del paesaggio - Landscape Architecture
 
M-FIL/04 – Landscape Aesthetics, Fall Term 2024-2025 - 6 ECTS (CFU)
 
M 16:30 - 19:00 / Tr 11:30 - 14:00, room G43
 
Office hours: Tr 09:30 - 11:00 and by appointment
 
***ANNOUNCEMENT***
 
Exams session of Tuesday, November 11th, will be held from 15:00, at Valle Giulia Building, Traum Laboratory Office
 
 
Summary
 
Short Description: This course will investigate some of the central questions of Modern and Contemporary Aesthetics, with special reference to Architecture’s cultural environment and to the behavioral, anthropological, and political issues arising at the intersection between Aesthetics and Urban Design. Particularly considering the Phenomenological perspective in philosophy, the crucial role of a perception of the landscapes - especially of the ones deeply modified if not compromised by human intervention - will be deepened at first considering the psychological impact, as described and analyzed by Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Kurt Lewin and finally broadening how different perspectives, both in contemporary Philosophy and Architecture’s theories, take in account the social implications for the current shaping of urban forms-of-life.
 
Outcome Statement: Students will be able to demonstrate an understanding of the main philosophical questions in the area of contemporary Phenomenological Aesthetics. Particularly, a comprehension of the historical and conceptual development of the topics will permit to understand the turning of the meaning of Landscape itself through a brief exposure of the History of the theories of perception and to articulate some of the main problems and responses central to this area of philosophy, as well as a motivating perspective on the role of Aesthetics in Architecture and Design nowadays.
 
Required Readings:
 

• Introductive handout to Aesthetics provided by the Instructor (also containing excerpts from Plato’s Theaetetus, Aristotle’s Metaphysics and I. Kant’s Critique of the Power of Judgment et alia)
   
• P. Montani, Technological Destinies of Immagination [Trans. by Barbara Fisher], Milano-Udine: Mimesis International, 2022, (Prologue: "Image, Sound, Word, Gesture", Chapter 1 " Imagination, Technique, Language", excerpt of Chapter 2 " The Critical Meaning of Technoaesthetics" (pp.65-78).
   
• D. Scarso, Steven Holl: Architecture and Phenomenology in “Chiasmi International” vol.9, “Architecture and other Institutions of Life”, Paris/Milano/University Park: Vrin/Mimesis/Penn State University Press, 2007, pp. 19-20.
   
• S. Holl, The Crisscrossing in “Chiasmi International” vol.9, “Architecture and other Institutions of Life”, Paris/Milano/University Park: Vrin/Mimesis/Penn State University Press, 2009, pp. 21-24  
   
• M. Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception [trans. by Colin Smith], London/New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978 (Introduction: Chapters 1 "The ‘Sensation’ as a Unit of Experience", 2 "‘Association’ and the ‘Projection of Memories’", 3 "‘Attention’ and ‘Judgement’"; Part I: "Experience and Objective Thought. The Problem of the Body", Excerpt of Chapter 3 "The Spatiality of One’s own Body and Motility" (pp. 150-154); Part II, Chapter 2 “The Space”).
   
• M. Merleau-Ponty, “Cezanne’s doubt”, in Sense and Non-Sense [trans. by Hubert Dreyfus and Patricia Allen Dreyfus], Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1964.  

In addition to the previous readings, students shall choose one among the two proposed paths:
 
1. Critique of the Urban Landscapes:
 

• H. Lefebvre, Right to the City, in Writing on Cities [trans. and ed. by Eleonore Kofman and Elizabeth Lebas] Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2000
   
• R. Koolhaas, Delirious New York. A Retroactive Manifesto for Manhattan, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978. 
   
• K. Lynch, The Image of the City, Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1960 (optional or mandatory for non-attending students)
   

2. Phenomenology of Landscapes of War:
 

• K. Lewin, The Landscape of War, [trans. by Jonathan Blower], in “Art in Translation” , no. 2: 199–209.
   
• E. Weizman, Hollow Land. Israel's Architecture of Occupation, London/New York: Verso, 2007.
   
• J. Butler, Frames of War. When Life is Grievable?, London/New York: Verso, 2009. (optional or mandatory for non-attending students).

 
Course Procedures: The whole course will be held, where possible, through live lectures, and will be taught in English, as well as for the evaluation methods required. Referring to this latter, students will be required to sustain written tests and will be finally examined by the instructor in an oral exam at the end of the Course. Attendance will be considered mandatory and also in case of motivated exceptions it will be strongly encouraged. Under no circumstances a positive outcome will be reached without an attentive reading of the required texts.