Professor John Macarthur has released a new book that examines a provocative, complex question posed by its title: Is Architecture Art?
Described as “a full-blown enquiry, of a kind not previously seen,” “nuanced, knowledgeable and incisive” and “undeniably an obligatory reference,” the volume not only interrogates the question but also the relevance of philosophical aesthetics to the practice of making buildings, and why this relationship matters to the discipline of architecture.
Published by Bloomsbury and now available for pre-order, Is Architecture Art? An Introduction to the Aesthetics of Architecture engages the work of thinkers ranging from Hume and Kant to Adorno, Tafuri and Rancière. It draws on accessible and thought-provoking accounts of historical and contemporary architectural and art theory, and encourages a new understanding of the purpose of architectural practice in the contemporary era as the concepts of “art,” “the arts” and of the creative economy continue to shift and blur.
by John Macarthur.
“This book offers much more than an introduction: it brilliantly and inspiringly surveys and synthesises the question of the status of architecture, and is undeniably an obligatory reference from now on,” reads an endorsement on the book’s back cover by Bart Verschaffel, Ghent University.
Professor Macarthur says his interest in the subject extends back to his PhD and first major book, Picturesque: Architecture, Disgust and other Irregularities (2007). The idea for Is Architecture Art? later came about while teaching aesthetics in a seminar that connected readings from philosophy and art history with architectural concerns and examples. Reflecting on the variety of answers to the question of “is architecture art?,” the confusion of ideas surrounding the topic and the debate that it inspired, he realised the question was worthy of deeper investigation.
Professor Macarthur applied for a research grant with co-researchers Dr Susan Holden and Dr Ashley Paine from The University of Queensland and Associate Professor Wouter Davidts from Ghent University.
“I decided to try to put some money and opportunity around the idea … I set it up as part of a broader project that could provide research training and opportunity to early career researchers and higher degree by research candidates,” he says.
Mies van der Rohe’s unfinished design for a Golf Clubhouse,
by architects Robbrecht en Daem, photographer Thomas Hicks.
By permission of Robbrecht en Daem, Architecten.
In 2015, with funding from an Australian Research Council Discovery Projects grant, the group formed what became a six-year research project called “Is architecture art? A history of categories, concepts and recent practices.”
The research was conducted through the Architecture Theory Culture and History Research Centre (ATCH) in the School of Architecture, Design and Planning at UQ, with Ghent University. Post-doctoral Fellows Elke Couchez and Macarena de la Vega de Leon, and doctoral students Rosemary Willink and Annalise Varghese also joined the research team.
Initially, the book was intended to be the first in a series and to set an agenda for the research project. “The collaboration was exciting, and we ended up doing a lot of joint publications and this book got pushed to the back,” Professor Macarthur says.
“But this has given me the benefit of hindsight and allowed me to draw on the research of my friends and our individual and collective findings … I am grateful for the stimulating exchange of ideas brought about by the research project.”
The analysis, arguments and opinions presented in Is Architecture Art? are Professor Macarthur’s own take on the project, his earlier research, and the much wider body of scholarly literature.
The volume is aimed as a resource for students, practitioners and scholars of architecture, art and history, and is carefully organised into six main sections:
Is Architecture (an) Art?
Sensing Space
Discipline, Medium
The Work of Architecture
Values
Freedom and Utility
So – is the questioned answered by the book?
Professor Macarthur lies on the affirmative side of the debate, but in a conditional form: Yes, sometimes and in some ways, architecture is art, depending on what you take “art” and “the arts” to mean.
“It is the entanglements of concepts, values and history that interest me, rather than the answer,” he says.
A pre-launch presentation of Is Architecture Art? will be included in the upcoming SAHANZ Conference, to be held in Brisbane 2–4 December 2024.
1. Excerpts from endorsements featured on the back cover of the book.
2. Other books that resulted from the Is Architecture Art research project: John Macarthur, Susan Holden, Ashley Paine, and Wouter Davidts, Pavilion Propositions: Nine Points on an Architectural Phenomenon (Amsterdam: Valiz, 2018); Wouter Davidts, Susan Holden, and Ashley Paine, eds, Trading between Architecture and Art (Amsterdam: Valiz, 2019); and Ashley Paine, Susan Holden, and John Macarthur, eds, Valuing Architecture: Heritage and the Economics of Culture (Amsterdam: Valiz, 2020).
