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The Rise of Modern Technology and Symbolic-Functionalism: The Expression of “Englishness” in the Functionalist Theory of
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The Rise of Modern Technology and Symbolic-Functionalism: The Expression of “Englishness” in the Functionalist Theory of A. W. N. Pugin
Ariyuki KONDO
European-American Culture Department, Faculty of Humanities, Seigakuin University 1-1 Tosaki, Ageo-City, Saitama 362-8585 JAPAN [email protected]
Abstract:
The rise of modern technology, expansion of industrial urban spaces, and rapidly improved
transportation facilities ——all of these events following the Industrial Revolution had a tremendous impact upon the domain of fine arts as well as on design and architecture in the first half of the nineteenth century. In architecture, the dynamic transition that took place in the nineteenth-century Industrial Revolution was discernible in the increase in the variety of building types. Nikolaus Pevsner, for one, once pointed out in the 1960s that it was in the course of the nineteenth century that the dramatic increase in the variety of what the architect is concerned with came into full fruition. The most notable building type generated in nineteenth-century England in direct response to the rise of modern technology in those days was railway architecture. While John Ruskin had “a very lopsided view” of railway architecture, Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, the leading architect-designer of the functionalist Gothic Revival movement, more positively reacted to the emergence of this new building type. In the eyes of Pugin, edifices generated in the rise of modern technology were meant to be the perfect examples of architecture with a clear intended function. He contended that such buildings should be designed in a most substantial manner reflective of their intended and required functions. Moreover, although they were expressive of function, such edifices could be equally expressive, though symbolically, of the existing circumstances, or the then current “Englishness” of mid-nineteenth century English society. Key words: Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin
John Ruskin
Railway Architecture
The Industrial Revolution
1. Introduction At the onset of nineteenth-century England, the effects of the Industrial Revolution became impressed upon every English artist. The rise of modern technology, the expansion of industrial urban spaces, and rapidly improved transportation systems and facilities had a tremendous impact upon the domain of fine arts, as well as on design and architecture of the time. While the painter John Constable turned his eyes away from industrialised cities and concentrated on English pastoral scenery and life, John Ruskin’s favourite, William Turner, depicted the dynamism of the technological power of the steam engine. Considering the close interrelation between functionalist theory and modern, mechanical technology, it appears not entirely a coincidence that the famed slogan of Functionalism ——“form follows function”——
came to light in England in the early half of the nineteenth century. The present essay is intended as an investigation of the ways in which the advances of the Industrial Revolution merged into the functionalist theory of the Victorian age. The focus is on Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin’s view of the designing of those building types that were “inseparable” from the rise of modern technology in early Victorian society.
2. The increased variety of building types in the nineteenth century On his acceptance of the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture award in 1967, Nikolaus Pevsner delivered an address to the Royal Institute of British Architects, referring to his own interesting insight regarding the multiplicity of building types to which the architectural profession had been exposed to in the past. In his address, he noted that “until the 18th century what did an architect build? Churches, palaces, country houses, houses, not much else. When you think of the 57 varieties of buildings that are now built by architects you see what a profound change has taken place”[1]. Such an increase during the past three centuries was most certainly noteworthy in the context of considering what humankind had achieved over a long period of time. However, although he referred to “57 varieties”, Pevsner did not provide a concrete breakdown of these various building types. What has to be noticed is that it is known that different types of buildings did occupy his interest. More significantly, it was in 1976 that this leading twentieth-century figure in the history of architecture, art, and design wrote his masterpiece, A History of Building Types. A number of published evidences have indicated that Pevsner was consistent in his interest in the variety of building types and derived the numerical statement through his famed discreet academic approach. In point of fact, Pevsner first took an interest in the variety of building types when he was still in Germany, and he lectured on the subject at Göttingen in 1930; Pevsner then retained his interest in the array of building types throughout his career. Numerous periods can be recalled when dynamic social transformations resulted in an increase in architectural variety. However, it is commonly agreed that the most dramatically “perceived” historic change in architecture emerged in the first half of the nineteenth century, when the rise of modern technology was commonly praised in daily life. Pevsner opens his masterpiece as follows, by stressing in its introduction the significance of the nineteenth century: If ONE [sic] looks at any book on the history of Western architecture from the beginnings to the middle of the eighteenth century，one will find that it is almost entirely made up of churches and castles and palaces. … All this changed in the course of the nineteenth century so that today what the architect is concerned with is a multitude of building types. [2] In the very same introduction, it becomes evident in the following quotation from Henry von Brunt, a nineteenthcentury American architect, that the above-mentioned notion of the nineteenth-century state of architecture was not merely Pevsner’s personal view, from the perspective of the mid-twentieth century. The architect, in the course of his career, is called upon to erect buildings for every conceivable purpose, most of them adapted to requirements which have never before arisen in history … Railway buildings of all sorts; churches with parlors, kitchens and
society rooms; hotels on a scale never before dreamt of; public libraries the service of which is fundamentally different from any of their predecessors; office and mercantile structures, such as no pre-existing conditions of professional and commercial life has ever required; school houses and college buildings, whose necessary equipment removes them far from the venerable examples of Oxford and Cambridge; skatingrinks, theatres, exhibition buildings of vast extent, casinos, jails, prisons, municipal buildings, music halls, apartment houses, and all the other structures which must be accommodated to the complicated conditions of modern society … [3]
3. Railway architecture, a generated edifice in the rise of modern technology Contemporary to the age of innovation and the rise of modern technology, Pugin was aware of what had been attempted and actually achieved in the course of the Industrial Revolution. Among his responses to the dramatic technical progress of those days, his own writing in 1843 states that “never, in the annals of architecture, have so many glorious opportunities offered, in a short space of time, for the accomplishment of noble buildings”, namely, such changes were reflected in “three royal palaces, half the metropolis, churches without number, vast restorations, entire colleges in both [Oxford and Cambridge] universities, galleries, civic buildings, bridges, hospitals, houses, public monuments, in every possible variety …”[4]. All of these building types that Pugin listed are limited to edifices built in the pre-early nineteenth century, as can be gleaned from the book’s 1843 publication date. Had that observation of nineteenth-century architecture been written a decade later, there would undoubtedly have been one more type of building to be included to this list ——the railway station—— the building type that was arguably most deeply connected to the then current rise of modern technology. In 1825, the first public railway was operated between Stockton and Darlington, and by the time Pugin died in 1852, almost every city and town had at least one station; in fact, “there were only a few market towns and costal resorts without a railway station”[5]. A rapid increase in the number of this new building type had considerable socio-economic effects. Due to the strong social impact of the emergence of railways and railway stations, Pugin and Ruskin, the two leading champions of the Gothic movement in nineteenth-century Britain, could not ignore the advent of this new building type. However, the expression of their respective modes of appreciation clearly differed. According to Matthew Digby Wyatt, a contemporary of John Ruskin and a Cambridge counterpart of Ruskin’s Oxford Slade Chair in Fine Art, Ruskin seems “to have altogether a very lopsided view of railways and railway architecture”[6]. The reaction of Pugin, on the other hand, sharply contrasted with that of Ruskin. Referring to the same subject, Pugin states in An Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture: “The Railways, had they been naturally treated, afforded a fine scope for grand massive architecture”[7]. Such clearly contrasting views regarding railway architecture seem to be connected with differences between Ruskin and Pugin as regards whether mechanical improvements (i.e., in contrast to Ruskin’s favourite “handwork”) were desirable and undeniable existing circumstances in the age of industrial innovation. Emphasising the superiority of “hand-work” over mechanical creations, Ruskin wrote in his famous The Seven Lamps of Architecture:
… it was possible for men to turn themselves into machines, and to reduce their labour to the machine level; but so long as men work as men, putting their heart into what they do, and doing their best, it matters not how bad workmen they may be, there will be that in the handling which is above all price: it will be plainly seen that some places have been delighted in more than others ——that there have been a pause, and a care about them; and then there will come careless bits, and fast bits; and here the chisel will have struck hard, and there lightly, and anon timidly; and if the man’s mind as well as his heart went with his work, all this will be in the right places, and each part will set off the other; and the effect of the whole, as compared with the same design cut by a machine or a lifeless hand, will be like that of poetry well read and deeply felt to that of the same verses jangled by rote. [8] Pugin, on the other hand, vouched for the use of mechanical improvements and positively saw these as means of accelerating tasks and ensuring labour for more artistic aspects of a job. He states: In matters purely mechanical, the Christian architect should gladly avail himself of those improvements and increased facilities that are suggested from time to time. The steam engine is a most valuable power for sawing, raising, and cleansing stone, timber, and other materials. [9] “Why should ten minutes be expended in raising a body which could be equally well done in two?”, asks Pugin[10]. This question represents very well Pugin’s attitude, which, in keeping with the times, appreciated the state of constantly evolving modern technologies. He then elaborated on his position as follows: The readier and cheaper the mechanical part of building can be rendered, the greater will be the effect for the funds; and if I were engaged in the erection of a vast church, I should certainly set up an engine that would saw blocks, turn detached shafts, and raise the various materials to the required heights. By saving and expedition in these matters, there would be more funds and a greater amount of manual labour to expend on enrichments and variety of detail. [11] Living in an age of great technological improvements, which led to the realization of the Crystal Palace —— the sanctuary of industrialization—— Ruskin was obstinate in not recognising the inevitable events of the age. Supposing that, as Ruskin firmly believed, the meteoric rise of modern technology in the mid-nineteenth century was meant for denigration, the fact that it constituted the essential part of the then current state of society and “the tendencies of the age” nevertheless remains unchanged. Pevsner, in his lecture delivered in the year of 1949 in Cambridge on his appointment as the Slade Professor of Fine Art, praised Wyatt for setting forth that “our course in this nineteenth century may be hateful if you please; denounce it, but as it is our course, wise men should recognise the fact, and try, by all the light that God gives them, to direct it rightly”[12]. It was this very “course” that Ruskin did not recognize and consequently was unable to “direct … rightly”. In contrast, Pugin was consistent in his acceptance of the inevitable “tendencies of the age”, and he engaged himself with the search for concrete means to utilise these tendencies and bring about results. As regards his
profession, Pugin regarded the expression of “existing opinions and circumstances”, ——the manifestation of “Englishness” at the time—— as an essential function inseparably bound with that of architecture. Pugin accepted the rise of modern technology in the mid-nineteenth century and the consequent changes in one’s lifestyle as the manifestation of the then current “Englishness”. Thus, he responded to the opening and development of railways and to the building of stations, undoubtedly one of the most symbolic events among the technological innovations of his time. How perceptively Pugin responded to the announcement of this latest building type is evident in the fact that he made an aesthetic and stylistic issue of its design.
For instance,
Pugin closely observed the design and, from an English perspective, commented upon the condition of some exemplary stations of the Great Western Railways. Pugin might not have had a high opinion of the actual state of station design, considering iron as “a constitutive material”[13]; however, neither did he join Ruskin in saying, for instance, that “the iron roofs and pillars of our railway stations … are not architecture at all”[14].
4. Railway architecture and the plain presentation of minimum construction In the design of railway architecture, Pugin maintained that it is best to use plain and unelaborated elements showing the intended function of the different components of the basic construction. Indeed, no other edifice can challenge the railway station in representing those structures that are in themselves aesthetically pleasing by expressing functions immediately connected with industrial innovations and the rise of modern technology. Pugin states: “Little more was required than buttresses, weathering, and segmental arches, resistance to lateral and perpendicular pressure. I do not hesitate to say, that, by merely following out the work that was required to its natural conclusion, building exactly what was wanted in the simplest and most substantial manners, ——mere construction, as the old men weathered the flanking walls of their defences,—— tens of thousands of pounds could have been saved on every line, and grand and durable masses of building been produced; but from inconsistency, whenever any thing sublime has been attempted at the stations, the result is perfectly ridiculous”[15]. The essence of this contention had been previously indicated in 1841 by Pugin, in his own “manifesto of Functionalism” in which a structure’s ornaments were considered with reference to “construction and convenience”, and to “architectural propriety”[16]. In the opening of the famed The True Principles of Pointed or Christian Architecture, published in 1841, Pugin alleges: The two great rules for design are these: 1st, that there should be no features about a building which are not necessary for convenience, construction, or propriety; 2nd, that all ornament should consist of enrichment of the essential construction of the building. The neglect of these two rules is the cause of all the bad architecture of the present time. [17] According to Pugin, it was his ideal predecessors, “the architects of the middle ages”, who respected “the two great rules for design” in the course of building a variety of edifices, and “the first who turned the natural properties of the various materials to their full account, and made their mechanism a vehicle for their art”[18]. Indeed, “the whole history of Pointed Architecture” was, in Pugin’s view, “merely a series of innovations”[19], and it was in “pointed architecture alone that these great principles have been carried out”[20].
5. Expressing the rise of modern technology, a symbolic function of English, or Gothic, architecture It was not only from the functionalist point of view that Pugin concluded that “Pointed architecture” —— more specifically the Decorated Gothic of the thirteenth and fourteenth century—— was superior to other styles of architecture, and therefore was the appropriate form for the national style of England. Pugin advocated the symbolic function of Gothic architecture and emphasized its important role. In contrast, Pugin had a low opinion of nineteenth-century architectural “reality”, with “private judgement” running riot, “every architect” having a theory of one’s own, and the spread of “a disguise” in the course of erecting buildings[21]. According to Pugin, the architecture of the nineteenth century was an “extraordinary conglomeration of classic and modern styles peculiar to the day, and of which we can find no example in any antecedent period”[22]. His critical view of the then popular pagan style and ornaments in nineteenth-century English architecture was led by his notion that such style and use of ornament were not expressive of “existing opinions and circumstances” in those days. In other words, this type of ornamentation did not reflect nineteenthcentury “Englishness”, from which the style and ornaments of every English edifice should have germinated. Pugin was convinced that “revivals of ancient architecture, although erected in, are not buildings of, the nineteenth century, ——their merit must be referred back to the period from whence they were copied”[23]. He elaborated as follows on the architecture of his times: Will the architecture of our times … hand down to posterity any certain clue or guide to the system under which it was erected? Surely not; it is not the expression of existing opinions and circumstances, but a confused jumble of styles and symbols borrowed from all nations and periods. [24] Pugin was totally convinced that the proper expression of “Englishness” could be exclusively achieved through the use of an “un-pagan” style ——the revived Gothic, the only style that originated in English religion and custom. Pugin further emphasized that “… in the name of common sense, whilst we profess the creed of Christians, whilst we glory in being Englishmen, let us have an architecture, the arrangement and details of which will alike remind us of our faith and our country,—— an architecture whose beauties we may claim as our own, whose symbols have originated in our religion and our customs”[25]. Rapid development of industry and technology was surely the most remarkable “circumstance” in midnineteenth century English society; and the rise of new modern technology and the emergence of railways and railway stations were requisite elements of Victorian “Englishness” and “national character”. The style with the capacity to symbolically express this new facet of “Englishness” was, in Pugin’s rather stubborn view, surely not of pagan orientations. “The colossal Grecian portico” of 100 feet high, showed “inconsistent and useless decoration”, and such “caricatures of pointed design” as “mock castellated work, huge tracery, … ugly mouldings, no-meaning projections”, and many other shallow nineteenth-century creations ——all of these architectural displays were erected without any function, and were merely a means of “showing off” what architects could achieve, instead of “carrying out what was required” in railway architecture; in short, these constructions were considered to be totally unacceptable[26]. According to Pugin, the Gothic style was not merely suited for ecclesiastical edifices, but for any edifice originating in English religion, custom, and climate, i.e., it could be applied to anything built in England. However, contrary to his firm belief in the usefulness of this style, it was commonly thought that this style was
not suited for civil architecture; Pugin himself was vocal about this unreasonable misunderstanding on the part of the general public, who in his mind were not mature enough to alter this conventional view of the use of Gothic: Had the various buildings been allowed to tell their own tale, to appear in their natural garb, were it rich or simple, what variety and interest would our architectural monuments present! ——but no, public buildings, it was said, could not be Gothic, and therefore must be Grecian, that is, with pediments and porticos. The reasons assigned were, ——1st, That Gothic was so very expensive, which is a positive falsehood; and, 2ndly, That they would not be in character. [27] Pugin rigidly refutes such negations of the Gothic by saying “it is impossible to imagine” how an edifice in Gothic, which was “to consist of doors, windows, walls, roofs, and chimneys, when consistently treated, and these various features made parts of the design, can be less in character, than a building where they are bunglingly concealed and disguised”[28]. Pugin could not force himself to admit that “this view, so utterly false and absurd”, had taken such hold on “the minds of the million, that pointed architecture is considered … as out of the question when public offices, law courts, bridges, and similar structures, are in question”[29]. Considering the contention that Gothic was not for non-ecclesiastical use to be largely based on persistent but groundless convention, Pugin advocated Gothic as the only practical style and true form of expressive and symbolic “Englishness”. The meteoric rise of modern technology and consequent emergence of new buildings types, of which railway architecture was representative, are striking events that took place in England, a Christian country with its own customs and distinctive northern climate. This undeniable reality naturally led Pugin to conclude that the use of the un-pagan, revived Gothic was a justified “act”, not only in the context of practical, physical Functionalism, but also from the viewpoint of “Symbolic Functionalism”.
6. Conclusion For Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, the leading architect-designer of the functionalist Gothic Revival movement, the rise of modern technology in the course of the nineteenth century was not merely a means of accelerating construction tasks nor of ensuring a necessary work force. If anything, the real issue for Pugin seemed to be the fact that various incarnations of early-Victorian modernization, including improvements in technology and in transportation, were unavoidable, existing circumstances, and these changes were reflective of the “existing opinions” in mid-nineteenth century English society. It was Pugin himself who demanded that architecture be an expression and a reminder of existing opinions and circumstances, along with the faith and customs, of where the architecture was to be built. The rapid increase in the variety of building types in the nineteenth century was indubitably “generated” in and “originated” from the essential circumstances in nineteenth-century England, that is to say, the flowering of the industrial revolution and social modernization. Therefore, from Pugin’s point of view, the architecture of these new building types emerging in the nineteenth century should have been erected in the national style of that nation, more specifically England, in which these events were taking place. As a matter of fact, this conclusion would also apply, in Pugin’s mind, not only to buildings functionally related to technological advances, but to any other traditional Anglo-edifices.
Pugin was convinced that only Gothic, and none of the pagan styles, would function both practically and physically in the simplest manner required for any English edifice. This type of architecture, emerging during the course of the rise of modern technology in England, was not exceptional. In the long history of architecture, according to Pugin, only Pointed, or Gothic, architecture followed “the two great rules for design”, i.e., the refusal of unnecessary features in a building for “convenience, construction, or propriety” and the negation of “all ornaments” which did not lead to the “enrichment of the essential construction of the building”. Moreover, the whole history of Pointed (or Gothic) architecture was, in Pugin’s words, “merely a series of innovations”; after all, it was only this particular style of architecture that could “function symbolically” in what was known as the progressive nature of “Englishness”, the very nature of which was in the vanguard of the nineteenth-century rise of modern technology.
Notes 1. “Nikolaus Pevsner, 1967 Gold Medallist”, The Journal of the Royal Institute of British Architects, August 1967, p. 318. 2. Nikolaus Pevsner, A History of Building Types, London: Thames and Hudson, 1976, 1997, p. 9. 3. Ibid. 4. Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, An Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture in England, London: John Weale, 1843, p. 9. 5. Christopher Hibbert, The Story of England, London: Phaidon Press, 1992, 1995, p. 160. 6. The Journal of Design and Manufactures, Vol. II: September 1849 – February 1850, p.72. 7. Pugin, Op. cit., p. 10. 8. John Ruskin, The Works of John Ruskin, Library Edition, Vol. VIII, eds. E. T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn, London: George Allen, 1903, p. 214. 9. Pugin, Op. cit., p. 39. 10. Ibid., p. 40. 11. Ibid. 12. The Journal of Design and Manufactures, Vol. II: September 1849 – February 1850, p.72. 13. Ruskin, Op. cit., p. 67. 14. Ibid. 15. Pugin, Op. cit., pp. 10–11. 16. Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, The True Principles of Pointed or Christian Architecture, London: John Weale, 1841, London: Academy Editions, 1973, p. 2. 17. Ibid., p. 1. 18. Ibid., pp. 1–2. 19. Pugin, Op. cit., 1843, p. 40 20. Pugin, Op. cit., 1841, 1973, p. 1. 21. Pugin, Op. cit., 1843, p. 1. 22. Augustus Welby Northmore Pugin, Contrasts, St. Marie’s Grange, 1836, London: Charles Dolman, 1841, Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1969, p. V.
23. Ibid. 24. Pugin, Op. cit., 1843, p. 5. 25. Ibid., p. 6. 26. Ibid., p. 11. 27. Ibid., p. 9. 28. Ibid. 29. Ibid., pp. 9–10.