The Structuralist Debate : Conceptual Architecture (1969–1974) between Formalism and Ideology

Canclini, A. (2025) The Structuralist Debate : Conceptual Architecture (1969–1974) between Formalism and Ideology. Footprint, 19 (2). pp. 69-76.

Abstract

In 1967 structuralism underwent a theoretical acceleration, establishing its scientific basis through linguistics and semiotics, which allowed it to question its metaphysical and anti-historical premises through its critique of anthropocentrism, and it began to enter into relations with other disciplines, including architecture. Peter Eisenman’s interest in the conceptual began with the various versions of his manifesto ‘Notes on Conceptual Architecture: Towards a Definition’, published between 1970 and 1974; in all these texts, he speaks of formal universals, deep structures, conceptual structures and sign systems capable of generating meaning. The Conceptual Architecture was immediately criticised by Diana Agrest and Mario Gandelsonas, who denounced this structuralist appropriation as an ideological consumption of theory. From 1974 onwards, Conceptual Architecture began to show signs of weakness, but it was only after the critique by Agrest and Gandelsonas, which questioned both its assumptions and its entire intellectual trajectory, that Eisenman's theoretical agenda evolved towards a new, hermetic and unknowable code: the exact opposite of what had been advocated.