Le Corbusier: An Archipelago of Ideas

Le Corbusier: An Archipelago of Ideas is understood as a collection of islands (an archipelago). Implying some kind of distance (geographic, temporal, ideological) through which to travel, islands occupy a space that is at once both isolated and connected. They are often sites where modernity’s impact is mediated through isolation and a struggle for independence. Often sites of colonization, islands are pregnant with conflict, politics, culture, and identity. It is through this lens that we read this curated selection of models representing various of Le Corbusier’s projects. In turn we read these islands and the projects themselves sitting precariously within modernity’s advance, embracing and challenging its influence. The closing of distance is required in order to access the islands. How this is achieved is left to the reader. The islands can be visited at random, read as independent moments. Or they can be understood as an archipelago, interconnected by some found narrative thread moving between projects and locales chronologically, geographically, or otherwise. How the intermittent fragments are assembled and visited amidst the surrounding sea is left to the visitor.  

The archipelago begins with his early houses in Switzerland and follows through to his late work in India. In between Le Corbusier produced projects in Paris, various other countries in Europe, the USSR, North Africa, the Americas, Iraq, and Japan. The models on display are organized geographically as a group of “islands” that establish a kind of global archipelago of projects that allows the viewer to understand the evolution of Le Corbusier’s work, along with the geographical range of his designs. 

Le Corbusier’s career begins in the watch-making city of La-Chaux-de-Fonds in Switzerland where he executed several accomplished early houses in styles ranging from the Arts and Crafts to the Classical. As a land-locked country in the centre of Europe, Switzerland was vital to Le Corbusier’s formation as an architect, he returned to the country to construct other projects later in his career. His education was largely self-directed and involved working for several important European architects (Including Auguste Perret and Peter Behrens) and undertaking significant trips, including the famous “Journey to the East” of 1911. 

The Purist phase of his professional life occurred after 1917 when he moved to Paris and encountered the painter Amédée Ozenfant (1886-1966), who had a dramatic impact on Le Corbusier’s career. Together they created Purism as a late form of Cubism. It is mainly in the Paris region, the Île-de-France, that Le Corbusier produced influential projects such as the Maison La Roche-Jeanneret (1922-1924), the Villa Stein-de Monzie (1926-1928), and the Villa Savoye (1928-1931) based on his “Five Points of Architecture.” Following his winning entry to the League of Nations competition for Geneva in 1927 (he was not awarded first prize on a technicality), Le Corbusier embarked on larger projects due to his growing reputation; these include his Cité de Refuge scheme for the Salvation Army (1929-1933) and the Swiss Pavilion (1930-1935) in Paris. 

In 1929 Le Corbusier made an important voyage to Latin America, where he gave several lectures and viewed the landscape from the air. In the 1930s, his architecture took a new direction as he embraced a more “vernacular” and expressive approach to design, in contrast to the mechanical precision of the Purist period. He also pursued commissions from potential clients in communist Russia and capitalist America. In the Soviet Union Le Corbusier built the Centrosoyuz Headquarters in Moscow (1928-1936) and contributed an important scheme to the Palace of the Soviets competition in 1931. Later, he was advisor to a team of young Brazilian architects, including Oscar Niemeyer, who designed the Ministry of Education and Health building in Rio de Janeiro (1936-1942). In the 1930s he also devoted much effort to producing designs for Algiers, the capital of the French colony of Algeria in North Africa; his efforts were unsuccessful and his designs unbuilt. During the Second World War he was forced to close his office and attempted to secure work from the Nazi-supported Vichy regime in occupied France. 

After the Second World War Le Corbusier re-established his practice in Paris and embarked on numerous projects. Of particular importance was his design for the Unité d’habitation in Marseilles (1946-1952) and his participation in the design for the United Nations Headquarters in New York (1946-1947); the UN project signaled the fact that modern architecture had been embraced internationally. The post-War era encompassed the “brutalist” phase in Le Corbusier’s work, characterized by an expressive use of concrete and a bold approach to form. A series of significant projects throughout France would inspire architects around the world, including the Chapel Notre-Dame du Haut at Ronchamp (1950-1955) and the Monastery of Sainte-Marie de la Tourette at Eveux-sur-l’Arbresle (1953-1960). He also produced late works in Argentina, the United States, Italy, Iraq, and Japan. 

In the 1950s, Le Corbusier undertook important projects in India. In Ahmedabad he designed the Millowners’ Association Building (1951-1954) and two key houses. The most significant commission of his career was the design for the new capital city of Chandigarh for the Punjab region in northern India. Building upon a plan by another design group, he and his team developed a plan based on a loose grid. His principal collaborators (Pierre Jeanneret, Maxwell Fry, and Jane Drew) designed the residential sectors, while Le Corbusier concentrated on the legislative complex comprising the Assembly (1951-1964), the High Court (1951-1955), and the Secretariat (1951-1958). 

Modern architecture, as a project initiated in Europe and America, was effectively imposed on many nations, especially those operating under colonial regimes. As countries around the world became independent of colonialism, they typically attempted to balance modernity with an emerging sense of their own histories, traditions, and identities. Le Corbusier was effectively the leader of the international movement to establish modern architecture, even as his own architecture had largely abandoned the idea of a universal modernism in the 1930s. The legacy of his projects around the world continues to be studied and interpreted. His ideas have permeated modern and contemporary architecture globally.