Two of the questions below will be asked at the test. You will choose one to answer by writing a detailed essay of 2-3 handwritten pages. Please make sure to address all the sub-questions, which should serve as a guideline for your answer. Use examples of buildings discussed in class as illustrations of your main points.
1. Please define the following terms as they pertain to architectural history: modernity, modernization, modernism. Explain each term using the examples discussed in class since the beginning of the semester. What challenges to architecture were posed by modernity? What processes of modernization occurred in urban space? What modernist movements have we studied so far? How do these three terms relate to each other?
2. What is historicism and how is it relevant for architecture? How did it manifest itself? When did it emerge and what inspired it? What kinds of purposes did it serve? How was the concept of style relevant for it? Please contrast and compare three different manifestations of historicism discussed in class. 3. What challenges did architecture face from the industrial revolution and the rise of iron as construction material? How did architects respond to these challenges? Please discuss both the major technological transformations and the various theoretical and practical positions articulated by different 19th century architects.
