A collection of unpublished essays and writings of the founder of European Rationalism to rediscover some of the most interesting reflections of the Austrian architect.
A clear-headed criticism on planning, on his time, on style and ornament, on society, on the city, on his brief activity as a publisher: these are only a few among the many subjects with which Adolf Loos dealt, and which this book presents through the architect’s writings.
Adolf Loos (1870-1930) lived in between two centuries. He gave his contribution to architecture in a moment in which architecture itself was inevitably changing. Loos’ writings provide a snapshot of his time, in particular of the Vienna Secession and its most renowned representatives, with whom Loos broke to give space to new ideas and cultivate the roots of modern Rationalism.
The planner of Villa Karma on Lake Geneva (1904) and Steiner House in Vienna (1910), with his fierce and resolute spirit, offers a clear, varied and ironic chronicle of his time and of the relationship between art and architecture, a subject that is still topical today.