Jonathan Mosley

ARCHITECTURE AND
TRANSGRESSION
AN INTERVIEW WITH
BERNARD TSCHUMI

Bernard Tschumi first wrote about transgression in an essay

entitled ‘Architecture and Transgression’ in 1976. Published
in Oppositions, an architectural journal largely concerned with
architectural theory, the essay was an attempt to provoke
architects and theorists to explore more than just the rules
of architecture, and instead to confront where those rules are
transgressed. The essay explores the relationship of concept
(a dematerialised product of the mind) to experience (a
sensual understanding produced through the body) within
Copyright © 2014. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

architecture. Tschumi argues that the coalescence of these

elements within built architectural projects implies a paradox,
due to the ‘impossibility of simultaneously questioning the
nature of space and, at the same time, making or experiencing
a real space’.1 He also proposes, however, that these paradoxical
elements nonetheless do coexist within architectural projects;
the paradoxical oppositions are denied, therefore architecture
is inherently transgressive.
Nearly 40 years on, for this issue of 3, we had the
opportunity to interview Tschumi, to ask him both how
his original thinking about architecture and transgression
may have evolved and how his thinking may relate to an
architectural world that has in itself significantly developed
within the period. The following sections are structured
around his thinking on the role of the architect; the process
of architectural production; the impact of inhabitation and
appropriation; and the temporal nature of what constitutes
Bernard Tschumi, The Manhattan Transcripts (Part 1 – The Park), 1976–81 transgressive architecture. Each section draws on both his
A series of collages, the Manhattan Transcripts subvert the rules of architectural original 1976 essay and the interview undertaken via email
representation in both delineating a constructed environment and suggesting within it a
narrative; a confrontation of space and event. correspondence in March 2013.
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 Rachel Sara

Almost four decades ago, the influential architect

and educator Bernard Tschumi wrote the seminal
manifesto ‘Architecture and Transgression’. Here,
Guest-Editors Jonathan Mosley and Rachel Sara
revisit with Tschumi his original thesis, investigating
how his thinking has evolved around transgression
and its aptness for the world today.
Copyright © 2014. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Bernard Tschumi, The Manhattan Transcripts (Part 4 – The Block), 1976–81

Some compositions within the series seem to express an architecture imbued with the
complex and shifting relations between characters and settings; the forms and spaces
presented become the event.
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 Bernard Tschumi, Advertisement for Architecture
(Ropes and Rules), 1976–7
When considering the advertisement in relation to
transgression, it seems to contain many conceptual
oppositions and generate many questions. There is
enjoyment within the mobility of its interpretation.

Most architects today see

themselves solely as form-givers
in an existing society, rarely
as critics, and hardly ever as
revolutionaries.

The Prevalence of Image and the Architect as experience negates the paradox that Tschumi sets out as
Conservative intrinsic to the transgressive potentiality of architecture.
‘Transgression … very simply means overcoming unacceptable Furthermore, the emphasis of architecture as the production
prevalences.’2 This, the closing line of Tschumi’s ‘Architecture of ‘image’ suggests that the architect is limited to the roles
and Transgression’ essay, forms a starting point. Today, Tschumi of conservative or critic, since the role of revolutionary
speaks of the considerable changes in the world since the 1970s, is concomitant with direct action allied to radical intent.
particularly with reference to the domination of the image in ‘Most architects today see themselves solely as form-givers
relation to the philosophical triad of concept, percept and affect in an existing society, rarely as critics, and hardly ever as
(idea, image and emotional experience). ‘We now live in a world revolutionaries.’
Copyright © 2014. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

of images. On your iPhone or iPad or laptop you see mostly

images. My position is to question this prevalence of the visual.’ Ropes, Rules and Action
Interpreted as a critical stance, Tschumi’s role as an architect ‘While the crowded street of the turn of the century
here may be set within the former of his categories of architect was criticised by CIAM’s [the Congrès internationaux
as critic, revolutionary or conservative.3 He talks of an ‘iconism’ d’architecture moderne] theories of urban fragmentation, today
within architecture, stating that ‘many people have recently the ruling status of the social and conceptual mechanisms
begun to think about architecture as mostly about constructing eroding urban life is already the next to be transgressed.’4
visual images, as pure perception or icon. When doing so, Tschumi’s statement responds to a temporal context of direct
architecture loses its transgressive quality. Images are almost action in the years post-1968. Seeking to examine how his
never transgressive. The problem with images is they’re just thinking may be applied or have responded to recent instances
images, largely interchangeable with one another. It doesn’t of direct action, we question him about the Occupy movement.
matter whether your building looks like a daffodil or a butterfly – Conceived in its American guise in his current home city of
it’s just an image.’ New York, Occupy could be understood as a new model of
In contemporary architectural practice and education, the organisation, or even a new architecture, that questions the
predominance of the image is paramount, particularly when the ruling status of land ownership and use in relation to economic
considered ‘audience’ of buildings and projects is increasingly and legal systems. Today he reflects on this ‘exemplary action’,
remote, reached through the digital visualisation or photograph; citing his Advertisement for Architecture titled Ropes and Rules
we explore more works of architecture through scanning (1976–7) that celebrates architecture as the enjoyment of
pixels than we do through the multi-sensory experience of negotiating (and sometimes violating) ever more complex
the architecture as built and occupied. This lack of physical constraints. ‘Architecture always deals with constraints,
Sara, R. (2014). The architecture of transgression : Architecture of transgression ad. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated.
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 Bernard Tschumi, Advertisement for Architecture Bernard Tschumi, Advertisement for Architecture (Murder),
(Transgression), 1976–7 1976–7
One of a series of postcard-sized image/text works that act as Instead of a product, the advertisement puts forward architectural
manifestos, accompanying Tschumi’s early theoretical essays. production, constituted from physical space, meaning and the
immediacy of sensory experience.

whether they be gravity or regulations. Much of the architect’s fears, versus the architect as revolutionary, whose role we might
skill is to take advantage of or bypass these constraints.’ conceive of as exemplifying society’s ideals.
In applying this thinking to the Occupy Wall Street
‘event’ that began on 17 September 2011, Tschumi exposes Villa Savoye, the Tower of David and the Pleasure
two conflicting factions of ‘architects’ whose roles might be of Excess
understood in his terms as conservatives and revolutionaries: An experience of the then derelict, decayed Villa Savoye in
those representing the establishment who have negotiated Poissy, France, influenced Tschumi’s original thinking in
zoning codes to develop land and deliver a space that is perceived exploring transgression within architecture, first raising the
to be public (such as a public square or plaza) as a part of a
Copyright © 2014. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

possibility that architecture is produced as much by what

wider private development; and those acting as activists taking happens to it after ‘completion’, for example through inhabitation
advantage of this anomaly of perceived ‘public’ land to claim and decay, as it is produced by the architect as author. Within
temporary occupation of that territory. ‘In the case of Occupy, ‘Architecture and Transgression’, he describes his visit in 1965
the movement brilliantly took advantage of certain contradictions to Le Corbusier’s seminal building, defining that experience as
in New York City zoning codes, and the ambiguities of the status ‘a moment of architecture’. He contends that ‘The moment of
of the public, but also the privately owned square they occupied. architecture is that moment when architecture is life and death
Was the square a public or a private space? Occupy cleverly at the same time, when the experience of space becomes its
redefined territorial presence and made a major statement about own concept. In the paradox of architecture, the contradiction
the situational use and abuse of assumed categories.’ between architectural concept and sensual experience of space
In considering these factions of ‘architects’ (understanding resolves itself at one point of tangency: the rotten point, the
the sudden occupation and change of use of city space as an act very point that taboos and culture have always rejected. This
of performed architecture), we witness a sociopolitical, and even metaphorical rot is where architecture lies. Rot bridges sensory
economic, battle against competing architectures, demonstrating pleasure and reason.’6
a contrast between the slow procedure of legislation, planning This convergence of pleasure and reason, Tschumi allies to
processes, regeneration and gentrification, compared to the eroticism. In the essay he describes architecture as ‘the ultimate
rapid, legislation- and permission-free attack and counter-attack erotic object’, arguing that: ‘Just as eroticism means a double
exemplified in the Occupy movement. If, as Tschumi originally pleasure that involves both mental constructs and sensuality,
stated, ‘each society expects architecture to reflect its ideals and the resolution of the architectural paradox calls for architectural
domesticate its deepest fears’,5 the battle is between the architect concepts and, at the same instant, the immediate experience
as conservative, whose role is to domesticate society’s deepest of space.’7 How can architectural practice strive towards this
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 Enrique Gómez, Centro Financiero
Confinanzas (Tower of David), Caracas,
Venezuela, 1994–
The Tower of David is exceptional in
its transgression of spatial hierarchies,
with respect to both height and central
positioning within the cityscape. The image
could also be understood as expressing
shifting power relations and scales between
the formal and informal city.

eroticism, towards the pleasure of excess? ‘Architecture is architectural establishment as subject of various research
simultaneously very abstract, but also very visual, and it can projects and with a dedicated book and Venice Biennale
affect your emotions powerfully. This is why it is such an exhibition display produced by Urban-Think Tank, the
extraordinary field of endeavour. The pleasure of excess is as curator Justin McGuirk and photographer Iwan Baan.9 The
much in the mind as in the senses. So is architecture.’ Tower is becoming a test case for vertical informal living. In
If the derelict Villa Savoye, with ground-floor service both the sensory experience of its everyday, and concurrently
rooms smeared with excrement, broke certain architectural in its extraordinary reasoning, society is shifting its
taboos for Tschumi in 1965, then we contend that the expectations of architectural form. There is a question whether
Centro Financiero Confinanzas, known as the Torre David any piece of architecture can continue to survive as erotic, to
Copyright © 2014. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

(Tower of David), an incomplete office building in Caracas, incite a pleasure of excess as much in the mind as in the senses
designed by the architect Enrique Gómez and now squatted if we become familiar with it.
by over 2,000 people, broke certain taboos of the 1990s and
2000s. As a material manifestation of the 1994 Venezuelan Time, Transgression and Architecture
economic crash, which stopped its construction midway, and Transgression is temporally conditioned (a transgressive
the ingenuity of its occupants in ‘completing’ the building to act in a previous time may not be transgressive now). Is
become habitable as an informal settlement, the architecture transgression as a concept confined to the time when Tschumi
is at a point of convergence between the sensory and the was first writing about it? What relevance might the concept
conceptual. This is an erotic architecture: there is pleasure in of transgression have to architecture now? ‘Transgression
its excess. The building exemplifies Tschumi’s original theory is a fundamental concept, like the boundary between life
that ‘Architecture seems to survive in its erotic capacity only and death. So it has always been there and always will be.
wherever it negates itself, where it transcends its paradoxical What changes is its type or nature. For example, let’s take
nature by negating the form that society expects of it.’8 the concept of cross-programming or trans-programming,
The Tower of David evokes a fundamental transgression, ie combining programmes that are usually kept separate. For
however Tschumi’s statement anticipates the fluxive condition a long time, a building was meant to be either a church, a
of society’s expectations for architectural form. The Tower town hall, a shop, or a school, each with its own typology.
has not only accumulated increasing numbers of inhabitants To suggest that one could combine and intersect different
as families, and established small businesses and services on programmes was once very unusual and quite transgressive.
the floor plates and within its frame; it has also attracted Today trans-programming and cross-programming are our
critical discourse and recognition, being subsumed into the new norm. Now, with airports and museums becoming
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 Designed by Enrique Gómez and by its inhabitants, the
exposed floor slabs of the tower’s upper storeys and
the opposing glass and informal mixed-material facades
communicate the block’s incompleteness and create the
setting for an extraordinary narrative.

Architecture must be willing to break

free of its role in domesticating society’s
deepest fears, to on occasion sever its
bondage in order to change, challenge
as well as reflect society’s ideals.

shopping malls, conference centres and tourist attractions, with architectural conservatism, the part that transgression
cross-programming has become acceptable. But there will plays within this accumulation of critical, even occasionally
always be new modes of transgression, small or large scale, revolutionary possibilities for architecture becomes ever more
social or philosophical.’ prescient. Architecture must be willing to break free of its role
Tschumi’s thinking, developed within his explorations in domesticating society’s deepest fears, to on occasion sever
of trans-programming and cross-disciplinary processes and its bondage in order to change, challenge as well as reflect
approaches within academia and practice, recognises an society’s ideals. 1
increasing hybridisation of both architectural programme
and autonomy of discipline. His comments demonstrate
Copyright © 2014. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

Notes
the ‘fundamental concept’ of transgression as instigating 1 Bernard Tschumi, ‘Architecture and
or being linked to change in what architecture can or may Transgression’ [1976], in Bernard Tschumi,
Architecture and Disjunction, MIT Press
be. Is transgression inherently necessary for progression in (Cambridge, MA), 1996, p 67.
architecture? ‘Is it progression or simple evolution? I’ll give 2. Ibid, p 78.
3. Ibid, p. 9
you an example. In the 1970s and 1980s, many architects 4. Ibid, p 78.
and scholars considered it problematic to combine film and 5. Ibid, p 72.
6. Ibid, pp 75–6.
architecture, art and literature, photography and dance. They 7. Ibid, p 71.
saw architecture as architecture, theatre as theatre, literature as 8. Ibid, p 78.
9. For further information see Alfredo
literature alone and rejected crossovers and multimedia. What Brillembourg and Hubert Klumpner, Urban-
was once considered a transgression is now quite acceptable Think Tank and Chair of Architecture and
Urban Design, ETH Zürich (eds), Torre David:
practice. Similarly, some of the work in this issue directly Informal Vertical Communities, Lars Müller
transgresses the dictionary of received ideas about what (Zurich), 2012, and http://torredavid.com/.

architecture is. Nevertheless, it could have a major influence in

the future.’
From the period of his seminal essay in 1976 to the
present day, Tschumi has been a major contributor and editor
of that ‘dictionary of received ideas about what architecture
is’, setting out among other concepts a fundamental
Text © 2013 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
understanding of transgression applied to architecture. Images: pp 32-5 © Bernard Tschumi; pp
In these times of accelerated societal change concurrent 36-7 © Iwan Baan
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