PA4. THE TIME OF ARCHITECTURE – IAR

The Origins

It all started with the appearence of the first humanoids (the AUSTRALOPITECUS) in 1.600.000 – 200.000 B. C. and since they lived in equatorial zones they didn’t need shelters and neither know the fire. Then evolved into the HOMO HABILIS. They mainly used oval plants around 5 meters wide at the beginning.

Then the HOMO HABILIS evolved into the the HOMO NEANDERTHALENSIS, 100.000 – 40.000 B. C. that started to live in caves or caverns in the mountains so they could keep the fire alive and also protect themselves from the other animals.

In 40.000 B. C. the HOMO SAPIENS made shelters with the bones and skulls of the mammals they used to hunt and with the fur they made the covers.

From the 8.000 – 4000 B.C. they started a sedentary lifestyle and started building permanent houses near to the rivers and the seas.

The use of defensive walls as protection of the city and building rectangular houses was very common. These houses had a ground floor and a first floor, were built with adobe bricks and the roofs were made by wood and covered by mud.

Protohistory

In this period of time, 4.000 – 3.000 B. C. the houses were still made with adobe and bricks, and the domestic pottery was also developed. This civilization created religious monuments like the Ziggurats, as well as artistic munuments and they had cities and capitals.

The Egyptians

The egyptians are known by their temples and pyramids.

The temples had a reception room, privete chambers and the sanctuary (residence of the god), and the pyramids were made by limestone masonry instead of adobe bricks and tree trunks like in the mastaba thay were built before.

The Greeks

The Greeks expressed with their architecture the equilibrium of the verticality (columns) and the horitzontality (beams), all the elements were treated with carefulness and the materials used always were the best possible.

They wanted to achive the excellence with the form, the details and the execution.

The Romans

The Roman architecture is closed in the interior while the exterior is made in a grandiose scale. Thanks to the discovery of concrete, the romans could experiment with interior space, lights and shadows, but it wasn’t the concrete thet we know nowadays, it was limeand thanks to its durability we still conserve some Roman buildings till nowadays.

The Romans covered large public spaces with arches, vaults or domes (except for temples), did huge engineering works (roads, highways, bridges…) and followed the ideas of stability, functionality and magnificence.

The Middle Ages

The classical language of architecture developed from Greek and Roman architectures disappeared during the middle ages but then was used later again, (Renaissance – Modern Age).

Byzantine

Roman architecture developed new techniques such as arches and vaults, surpassing the basic Greek concept.

Islamic

It is influenced by the energy of a new religion. It is a warlike, masculine architecture that demands submission; the most important mosques reflect a militaristic zeal.

Caliphates and Cathedrals: build the most representative buildings of andalusian power.

Romanesque

Characterized by the grandeur of its cathedrals, monasteries and castles.

Gothic

Marked by the verticality, both in the towers and in the very high naves, allowed by the pointed arches and the ribbed vaults, whose weight was displaced by the buttresses to external buttresses, lightening the walls, which host an increasing multiplicity of side chapels.

Late Gothic: Gothic architecture lost its basic role as a unifying force for the arts and became less of a protagonist.

Renaissance

Incorporation of perspective as an instrument of the architectural project and the notion of design as a form of knowledge.

High Renaissance: denotes the height of the visual arts in the Italian Renaissance.

Baroque

Aims to give its structures compositional dynamism, instead of the restful Renaissance character.

El Rococo: reaction against the grandeur, symmetry and strict regulations of the Baroque.

Neoclassic

Reproduces the forms generated by the Greeks and the Romans, suppresses any reference to body measurements, preferring the new metric system adopted by the French and favoring monumentality.

19th Century

Reference to the classical academic architectural style.

20th Century

ART NOVEAU INTERNATIONAL: International style of artfocused on the decorative arts.

Expresionism: Early modernist adoption of novel materials, formal innovation and a very unusual concentration, sometimes inspired by natural biomorphic forms.