Architecture Theory since 1968: A theory “made with tweezers”

Abstract

While the anthology tends to stabilize the present, the collection tends to destabilize it, to bring it into a critical state. The anthology builds an intellectual lineage for the present in which to support a specific architectural practice. The collection traces the map of its fractures, draws up the cartography of its lost opportunities. If in the anthology it is the whole that determines the fragment, in the collection it is the fragment that determines the whole. To interpret Architecture Theory since 1968 as a collection, as a display, as an atlas, as an archive, as a toolbox, as a mnemonic device, as a theory without an author... All this means taking advantage of one of its main virtues. Because unlike other theoretical supports, Architecture Theory since 1968 shows how it was built: it is a theory “made with tweezers”. To paraphrase Alejandro de la Sota, one could say that Architecture Theory since 1968 is a physical theory as opposed to a chemical theory, in which no element mixes with another to produce a third, but, with the tweezers, you can always find the personality of each element.