Architecture and the Historical Imagination

The importance of Eugene-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc (1814-1879) within modern architecture cannot be overstated. Key theoretician of modernism, renowned restoration architect, medieval archaeologist and champion of Gothic revivalism, he also published some of the most influential texts in the history of modern architecture. Martin Bressani expertly traces Viollet-le-Duc's complex intellectual development, showing how restoration, in all its layered meaning, shaped his outlook. Through his life journey, we follow the route by which the technological subject was born out of nineteenth-century historicism.

Résumé
Hailed as one of the key theoreticians of modernism, Eugne-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc was also the most renowned restoration architect of his age, a celebrated medieval archaeologist and a fervent champion of Gothic revivalism. He published some of the most influential texts in the history of modern architecture such as the Dictionnaire raisonn de larchitecture franaise du XIe au XVIe sicle and Entretiens sur larchitecture, but also studies on warfare, geology and racial history. Martin Bressani expertly traces Viollet-le-Ducs complex intellectual development, mapping the attitudes he adopted toward the past, showing how restoration, in all its layered meaning, shaped his outlook. Through his life journey, we follow the route by which the technological subject was born out of nineteenth-century historicism.