Prosthetic Theory: The Disciplining of Architecture

Author(s): Mark Wigley

Reviewed work(s):
Source: Assemblage, No. 15 (Aug., 1991), pp. 6-29
Published by: The MIT Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3171122 .
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 Mark Wigley
Prosthetic Theory:
The Disciplining of
Architecture

MarkWigley is AssistantProfessorof What is it to talk of prosthesishere in architecturaldis-

Architecture, Princeton University. course? Or, rather,what is it to talk of it again, for was not
modern architecturesimply the thought of architectureas
prosthesis?Displaced from artifice into the artificial, archi-
tecture became a technological extension of the body that
is neither natural nor cultural. Modern architectureis the
space of the artificial. As Le Corbusierargues,
We all need means of supplementingour natural capabilities,
since nature is indifferent, inhuman (extra-human),and incle-
ment; we are born naked and with insufficient armor. . . . The
barrelof Diogenes, alreadya notable improvementon our natural
protectiveorgans (our skin and scalp), gave us the primordialcell
of the house; filing cabinets and copy-lettersmake good the inad-
equacies of our memory; wardrobesand sideboardsare the con-
tainers in which we put away the auxiliarylimbs that guarantee
us against cold or heat, hunger or thirst. . . . Our concern is
with the mechanical system that surroundsus, which is no more
than an extension of our limbs; its elements, in fact, artificial
limbs.

This concern with buildings as "human-limb objects"worn

like clothing would even become as literal as Gideon's
identification of the nineteenth-centuryinterest in "the
problem of mechanically operatedartificiallimbs"with the
development of mechanized furnitureas an extension of
the mobile body, which, in turn, he identifies with mod-
ern architecture.2In modern discourse, architectureis no
1. Artificial intelligence? From longer simply the supplement of the body of the building.
Orthopadische Behandlung The classical relationshipbetween structureand ornament,
Kriegsuerwundeter,1915. always understoodas that between a body and its clothes,

7
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 assemblage 15

has been displaced onto that between body and building.

Traditionalornamentationappearsto be removed from the
building at the very moment when the building itself
becomes a kind of ornament worn by its occupant. But
this mechanized ornament is structural.Indeed, it restruc-
tures the body that wears it.

Prostheticarchitecturebecomes a surrogatebody "intended

to second the person as such";3in this it recalls Freud's
claim, in Civilization and its Discontents, that, like the
other technologies of communication and perception-
the aircraft,the telescope, the photographiccamera, the 2. Artificiallimb, 1850s. From
Sigfried Gideon, Mechanization
telephone, and writing- the dwelling is a prosthetic TakesCommand, 1948.
extension, an "auxiliaryorgan,"but one worn as a substi-
tute for the woman's body, "the first lodging."4That is, the
building is the prostheticsubstitutefor a body already
occupied, in fantasy,as a building. The categoriesof body,
prosthesis,and architectureslip into one another. Freud
wrote this during the time he was himself wearinga pros-
thetic jaw, which his friends called "the monster"and with
which he was waging, as he put it, a "small-scalewar."5
A year after it was installed, in a letter to Lou Andreas-
Salome, Freud asked what she thought the difference
was between a person'srelationshipto such a prosthesis,
"which tries to be and yet cannot be the self," and to his
body.6 Seeing the prosthesisas the exemplar, ratherthan a
deviation, of the condition of the body, she replied, "For
that is after all the most quintessentiallyhuman thing in
man, that he both is and is not his own body - that his
body despite everythingis a piece of external realitylike
any other, which can be identified by him with the help of
his sense organs from outside himself."7The body itself is
a prosthesisof consciousness. But then Freud had argued
much earlier that even consciousness is itself a prosthetic
attachment, worn as a kind of"garment"like any other
tool.8

Such a blurringof identity is producedby all prostheses.

They do more than simply extend the body. Rather,they
are introducedbecause the body is in some way "deficient"
or "defective,"in Freud'sterms, or "insufficient,"in Le
3. "The iris diaphragm of the
Corbusier'sterms. In a strangeway, the body depends camera and that of the eye."
upon the foreign elements that transformit. It is reconsti- FromWalter Gropius,Scope of
tuted and proppedup on the "supportinglimbs"that TotalArchitecture, 1943.

8
 Wigley

extend it. Indeed, it becomes a side effect of its extensions. is itself establishedwith a certain concept of architecture.
The prosthesisreconstructsthe body, transformingits lim- Some of these complications can be unpackedhere by
its, at once extending and convoluting its borders.The tracing the role of architecturein the "home"of philoso-
body itself becomes artifice. phy - the university.
Of course, the mechanical eyes, ears, and skin providedby
Nowhere is the constitutional nature of the architectural
modern systems of construction/representationhave given
"metaphor"more evident than in the university.The uni-
way to technologies that relocate architecturewithin an
electronic space (firstmapped by Marshall McLuhan's versityis literally the space of the thesis. Since its origin at
the beginning of the thirteenth century, its central activity
UnderstandingMedia, which is, significantly,subtitled has been the "disputation"in which "theses"would be
Extensions of Man)9 within which the human body, no
defended. The test for all degrees was the ability to defend
longer natural, is but an appliance attached to digital a thesis by identifying what makes it stand up. This was
memories. So to raise the question of prosthesisin archi-
done by correctlyapplying the accepted structural/logical
tecture again would be to update the discourse of modern-
rules taken mainly from Aristotle'sTopics, a "theoryof
ity by examining this strangespace of the artificialtoday.
But before reviving the question of the prosthesisin archi- places"that specified all the differentways a thesis could
be either "constructed"or "demolished."The key function
tectural discourse, we should hesitate at least twice. First,
of these dialectical ceremonies was to define the place of
because the concept of prosthesisis always alreadyarchi-
tectural and, again, because architecturaldiscourse is itself things by establishingtheir structuralrelationshipto certain
a prosthesis. accepted grounds. This idea everywhereorganizesthe uni-
versity. As Heidegger argues, the concept of the university
The meaning of prosthesisdepends on that of the root the- is based on the search for grounds and foundationsthat is
sis from the Greek for "placing,"a "position,"a "proposi- I
philosophy. In this sense, the universityis everywhere
tion," "laid down," to be "maintainedagainst attack,"to philosophical. Hence the long debate as to whether philos-
"makea stand."This figure of standing in a place orga- ophy should have a designatedplace within the university
nizes the Western philosophical traditionin which theory just like the other faculties or have a higher place or
is understoodas the construction of argumentsthat can occupy each faculty in an organizationalrole. What each
be defended, theses that stand up. Theory has always of the differentaccounts of the universityshare is the
describeditself as a kind of building. The philosopher is a claim that it is, first and foremost, a space of construction.
kind of architect who pays attention firstto the ground, All of the conceptual oppositions that define the limits of
establishingsecure foundations, and then applies structural the universityturn on this architecturalfigure. The inside
principles in order to construct a sound thesis, a solid of the university is the space of the well-constructedthesis
structurestanding in a place, or, more precisely, a struc- whereas the outside requiresstructuring,control.
ture that places, a standing that defines place.10A "pros-
The universityhas an architecturebefore it has buildings.
thesis," then, is always architectural.It is always the Universitieswere legally establishedas such with a "deed
supplement of a structure- but one that cannot simply of foundation"(originallysolicited from the Pope) that set
be removed. Graftedon to repairsome kind of structural
up the faculty as a "corporation"(universitas)with certain
flaw, it is a foreign element that reconstructsthat which
cannot stand up on its own, at once proppingup and rights. Indeed, the faculty were themselves "founded"and
"erected"in a place. Eventually, such an erection would
extending its host. The prosthesisis always structural, define the place of a discipline, as in a professorshipthat
establishingthe place it appearsto be added to. would be establishedwith its own deed of foundation. The
So in thinking about the status of architecturaldiscourse, university,then, is a system of such places, a topology,
something as apparentlysimple as a "theoryof architec- governed by a theory of place. But while its primaryrole
ture"becomes complicated because the concept of theory was to define the place of things by developing theses, it

9
 assemblage 15

was itself essentially placeless. The universitiesemerged

., I, .,-... · ,,*-an -g^out of studium generale, schools that attractedboth stu-
V"r~~'" h mand teachers from outside a local region, but not to a
" ndents

in the old cities that would frequentlybe changed.12 Uni-

versitieswould often move from space to space within
cities, between cities, and even between countries. The
·u Reuniversity is, by definition, a "corporation,"a body of fac-
Ph,.i~-, :ulty independent of any particularphysical location. This
constitutional placelessnesswas writteninto the original
papal bulls of foundation that establishedthe key right of
'~2c~_5_ s r! the corporationas ius ubique docendi- the right of any
master to teach at any other similarly recognized school.
Thus the spatial context of the universityis not a group of
buildings or a city or even a nation, but other universities,
a space defined solely by a set of institutionalpractices.
These practices are seen to "shape" the mind, to "build" it
up through the endless repetitionof architectonic
principles.

The firstuniversitywas establishedin Paris in response to

the growingdemands for such an institution to control
teaching practices, of which the final and most influential
came from Stephen of Tournai, who distinguishedbetween
the space of the mind and that of the body. The "stable"
mind is constructedby restrictingits mobility:

IIIC
-OST
;~*P~
NTKfU~e- ThIjJ I;I[ JLOSOPHitE The freedomof wandering[libertasvagandi]is dividedinto two:
the movementof the bodythroughdifferentplacesandthe
movementof the mindthroughdifferentimages.The curious
4. Templeof Knowledge:in wanderwiththeireyesgoingfromplaceto place,kingdomto
the buildingof liberalarts
grammaroccupiesthe ground kingdom,cityto city, provinceto province.... . Thosefickleand
floor andtheologyand unstablein mindalso wander.... . This freedomof wanderingin
metaphysicsthe top. From the mindthroughdifferentimagestiresand impedesscholarsin
GregoriusReisch,Margarita their studies and the cloistered in their prayers.13
Philosophica, 1583.
The institutional architecturebuilt into the practicesof the
universityresiststhe "wanderingmind" before actual build-
ings are constructedto resist the "wanderingbody."Archi-
tecture was only used to "stabilize"an alreadyoperating
universitywhen cities would offer buildings permanently
dedicated to teaching in order to persuadethe highly
mobile faculty and students to remain in one place. 14 Only
then was a deed of foundation grantedover the land and

10
 Wigley

5
buildings. For the first time, the institutionalmetaphor of books, and treatisesbegan to identify architectureas a priv-
building was applied to actual buildings. In fact, it was this ileged "public"art urgently in need of institutional
very metaphor that the buildings were called in to protect. control.19The traditionof architectureas an "extraof edu-
Architecturewas used to protect the architecturalconcepts cation" was opposed in favor of controlling both the educa-
that structuredthe institution. The first buildings estab- tion of the architect and publications on architecture.20It
lished solely for the universitywere special churches used was argued that were architecturegrounded in every level
for the disputation of theses;16 the first thing to be given a of the educational system, from high school up to the uni-
physical place, then, was the thesis, the concept of place- versity, "publisherswould soon fill the chasm."21Architec-
ment itself. ture thus became a public art precisely by occupying the
These buildings, prostheticsupplements to the corporation, space of publication.22One of the central functions of the
remain foreign to the concepts they protect. There is no universityhas always been the control of publication, regu-
lating both the production and distributionof books. The
place for the study of architecturewithin this institution. architecturalprofession, in the form of the American Insti-
As a "mechanical"art, it has no place in the home of the
tute of Architects, which was set up in 1856, immediately
"liberal"arts. But this distinction between mechanical and
liberal depends on the architecturalmetaphor. It follows promoted the founding of both an architecturalperiodical
and a school of architecture.
from Aristotle'sdescription of the theorist as an architect
(arkhitekton)placed above the manual laborer.17It is pre-
cisely the figure of architecturethat is used to exclude Such a school became possible because of a transformation
architecture. Ironically, architecturecannot simply enter in the status of the university. Until then, American uni-
the space of the thesis because this space is alreadyorga- versitiesfaithfully maintained the original institutional
nized by a certain theory of architecture,or rather,an structureturning around the disputationof theses. Like the
architecturaltheory, architectureitself remaining very first universitystudents, the American student had to
untheorized. be "readyto defend his theses or positions."23Indeed,
many of the theses being defended originatedin the thir-
Nevertheless, in the nineteenth century, architecturewas teenth century. This traditionalstructurewas itself
incorporatedwithin the university.This recent develop- defended by employing the accounts of the universityas
ment, begun in the United States, rehearsesfamiliar
providinga "liberaleducation"that had been developed to
exchanges from the long history of architecture'snegotia- counter the early nineteenth-centurycritics of the English
tion for a place as a discipline. But it uniquely focuses the
terms of this negotiation because it involves architecture university.24These accounts reaffirmedthe core of the uni-
versityas architectonic in order to resist its "extension"
claiming a place within the same institution that houses with new disciplines such as the emerging sciences. They
philosophy ratherthan within those institutions (like the
opposed not only the attachment of prostheticdisciplines
academies) whose own place was determined by the appli- to the body of the universitybut also the idea that the
cation of the philosophical distinctions the universities
were set up to protect. universitywas alreadya kind of prosthesis,an "instrument"
for "extendingthe boundariesof our knowledge."25At the
The call for architectureto enter the universityto establish same time, they offered architecturaleducation as an
its grounds came at a time when it was seen as groundless. example of what should be excluded from the university.26
Repeatedly,American architecturein the mid-nineteenth Architectureremained at once the model for reason and
century is describedas existing in an "abyss."18This abyss foreign to it. And yet it needed to be governedby reason,
was a scene of theoretical and stylistic "chaos"and "confu- along with the other fine arts, which "areapt to forget
sion," produced by the growing realm of architecturalpub- their place, and, unless restrainedwith a firm hand,
lications that disseminated multiple, partial, and false ideas instead of being servants, will aim at becoming principal
about the art. A series of letters to editors, articles, hand- . . .laying down the law in cases where they should be

11
 assemblage 15

subservient."27Again, the architecturalmetaphorwas used

to exclude, subordinate,and control architecture.
But the universitywas eventually expandedthrough the
addition of both the sciences and the fine arts. They were
admitted by extending the domain of the architectonic
principle ratherthan abandoning it. Both sets of disciplines
were redefinedas an extension of the traditionalscholarly
search for grounds and added as the "superstructure" to the
old "foundation"of the university.This displacementof
the universitywas acceleratedwith the Morril Land Use
Act of 1862, which establisheda number of Land Grant
Colleges throughout the country "in order to promote the
liberal and practicaleducation of the industrialclasses in
the several pursuitsand professionsof life." Gradually,the
differencesbetween these new universitiesand the old ones
were blurred. The more technical universitiesaccommo-
dated a liberal programwhile the liberal colleges accom-
modated the sciences. By the end of the nineteenth
century, the modern American universityhad been estab-
lished in a stable form combining liberal arts, fine arts,
sciences, and professionalschools. The institution had
extended itself into the traditionalgap between liberal and
practicalbut redefined this territoryto preserveits basic
(architectural)principles. This disruptionof the traditional
limits of the universitycreated a double opening for archi-
tecture:first, to join the sciences, which were added from
1847, and, second, to join the fine arts, added from 1870.
The first school of architecturein a universitywas estab-
5. Listof theses publicly lished in the first Land Grant College to be founded, the
defended at HarvardUniversity MassachusettsInstituteof Technology.28It opened as a
in 1646 departmentwithin the School of IndustrialScience in
1866. The year before, its founder, William Ware,
describedthe strategyby which it would occupy the uni-
versity:just as architectureexceeds the building it supple-
ments, the new discipline would graftitself onto the
sciences, rationalizingbuilding with the existing technol-
ogy courses, but then importingthe disciplinary"appara-
tus" of the libraryto rationalizethat which exceeds
building to become fine art. It was this "essentialequip-
ment" that would establish a place for architecture.
The photograph,in the form of prints, postcards,and
stereoscopicviews for study and lantern slides for lec-

12
 Wigley

tures,29was to play the same role with regardto the uni-

versitythat the drawinghad played in helping architecture
to gain a place in the first academies in the Renaissance.
The photographicimage enabled the materialityof build-
ings to enter the immaterial space of the university.All the
differentsizes and types of buildings in the world could be
brought into the same frame of the camera, assembled,
and compared. The photographliterallyprovidedthe
frame of reference for a new discipline. Ware proposed
that the architectureschool would be organizedaround a
libraryof photographs,supportedby models, casts, prints,
drawings,specimens of decorativematerials, tiles, stained
glass, lecture diagrams, and books. In the teaching of both
building and architecture,the central concept was that of
the "collection."
The troubleis technological;
thereis a wantof systemand
method,and of meansforgeneralcollection,anda general
6. Beseler Oxy-Hydrogen diffusion of their results .... Modern science ... has happily
Stereopticon lantern slide broughtit withinour powerto formcollectionsof any natureand
"used by all the Normal to anyextent,illustrating
the historyof artin all its forms...
Schools in the State of New Photography offersto bringthe wholeworldto ourdoor;anda
York."From The Magic Lantern systematiccollectionof architectural
photographs, bothof the
and Its Applications, 1886. ensembleand of the detailof buildings,so arranged as to be of
easyreference,wouldbe an invaluableand indeedindispensable
auxiliary.30
In emphasizing the collection, Ware had picked up some
of the argumentsWilliam Rogershad used in his original
proposalfor the universitycirculated in 1861 to raise
financial and intellectual supportfor the venture. Rogers
argued for the creation of a central "Museum of Industrial
Art"in which objects would be classified in a way that
would in itself be an importantsource of "instruction."
Nor, in regardto any partof the Museum,shouldthe greatpur-
poseof instructionbe lost sightof in the multitudinous gathering
of materials.A meremiscellaneouscollectionof objects,however
vast,has littlepowerto instruct,or even to inciteto inquiry.The
practicalteachingand the realsuggestiveness of a Museumis
almostwhollydependenton the clearand rationalarrangement
of its parts,and the leadingideaswhichrulein their
classification.31

7. Lanternslides used at the

Ware appropriatedand developed this theme in his letter
MassachusettsInstitute of of 27 April 1865 to the original members of the institute,
Technology respondingto Rogers'sproposalof the previousyear that

13
 assemblage 15

MIT would, from the start, include an architecture When Ware developed this lengthy letter into his proposed
school.32This letter, which ends with Ware offeringhis course of instruction after being given the professorship,he
services and which undoubtedlyled to his appointmentas elaboratedits suggestion that the student, too, might be
the firstprofessorof architecture,begins with the optimistic understoodas a collector, not merely surveyinga field that
suggestion that a school of architecturewould only involve has been newly "classifiedand arrangedin an accessible
a "comparativelyslight extension of your programme."33 and available shape"but even participatingin the process
Ware identifies "design"as this "extension."But "between" of classification.38Students would rehearsethe teacher's
this prostheticsupplement and the main body of the uni- analysis of the archive ratherthan simply receiving its
versityis an "extensiveregion"that is "necessaryto be gone results.39Over the years, Ware graduallydesigned a series
over by the student, but which is at presentalmost unex- of exercises, known as "tours,"by which studentswould
plored and in which a great deal of labor must be spent work their way through every object within the collection.
before a road can be establishedthrough it and made
practicablefor your classes."34The explorationof this The opening of the school had to be delayed for a year
unchartedterritorybetween the scholarly space of the the- while Ware toured Europe, collecting, in addition to books
sis and the architecturalprosthesis,which includes areas of and papers, "2,000 photographs,500 prints, 400 plaster
both the study of architectureas a fine art and the study of casts, 200 crayon drawings,40 water-colors,mostly of
building as a technological science,35requirespractices architecturalsubjects, and 30 manuscriptarchitectural
of systematiccollection. These practicesare meant to map drawings, large and small, besides 100 sheets of working
this territoryand thereby rationalizethe connection of drawings, mostly tracings, and some specimens of tiles,
design to scholarship. The lines of the map, the networkof potteryand stained glass."40This collection establishedthe
"roads"establishedthrough the region, would stitch design, libraryaround which the school was organized;it grew so
and thereforearchitecture,onto the university. rapidlythat by 1894 it included fifty thousand slides.41In
the Rogers Building, where all the departmentsof MIT
Ware presentsthe teacher as, firstand foremost, a collec- were originally housed, a space was designatedfor Ware's
collection: the "architecturalmuseum and library."Located
tor, assembling all the available fragmentsof architectural
theories and designs in order to extractauthorized lines of above the institute'smain lecture hall, scene of the grand
argument that can be passed on to studentsand thereby public demonstrationsof the advances of research, it
"fix"architecturalpractice. markedthe beginning of the territoryin the building spe-
cific to the school of architecture.It lay between the gen-
Any intelligentpersonby collectingand collatingwhathasbeen eral spaces of the universityand the most idiosyncraticof
saidon this subject,discerningthe pointsof agreementand con- architecturalspaces, the design studios that occupied what
tradictionamonghis authors,wouldbe ableat the end of his
was, in effect, the attic. The superstructuralquality of this
studiesto forma moreintelligentopinionof the generalquestion
roof space was symbolically opposed to the scientific labo-
thanis probablyin existence,andto conveyto yourclassesa
ratoriesthat filled the first floor and the foundationalspace
greateramountof usefulinformationuponit thaneverwas
of the basement (proppingup, as it were, the lecture
imparted... The Institutecouldnot do a greaterservicethan
to collectopinionsand authorities,and by organizingdiscussion halls), the sites of researchthat would, indeed, become the
do somethingto fix professionalusage.36 spaces upon which the universitywould build its reputa-
tion. Architecturewas graftedon top of the structurepro-
This "labor"of collection was requiredbecause there were vided by the sciences, its key rooms occupying the vestigial
no definitive scholarly publicationson architecturaltheory
space of the building, the leftover space, or, more pre-
and practice that could be employed in the university.
cisely, the supplementaryspace.
Indeed, it was as the preliminarywork towardpreparing
the set of such textbooksthat Ware himself would go on to This space was, in fact, the subject of a protractedconflict
publish throughout his career.37 between Rogers and the architects, JonathanPreston (a

14
 Wigley

8. Rogers Building,
MassachusettsInstitute of
Technology, 1864-65

founding member of the institute) and his son William.

Having argued, following a tour of European schools, that
their design for the institute could follow no known prece-
dent, the construction of the building began in April 1864,
but in February 1865 Rogers wanted to change the roof
form to a mansardroof to provide more teaching space.
The architects resisted, proposingto add a clearstoryspace
behind the building's classical pediment. The argument
became so heated and deadlockedthat another architect
was called in to design the roof before the Prestons'spro-
posed addition was, for structuralreasons, reluctantly
approvedin May 1865, by which time Ware had entered
the picture and was negotiating for the unique require-
ments of architecturalteaching.42Symptomatically,archi-
tectural design occupied this prostheticsupplement to the
building. A space had been made for architecturein the
universitythat was not completely inside the university.
The world of the collection, and the lectures based on its
classification, inserted itself into the traditionalinteriorof
the building, but the world of design remained outside this
interior, above the original ceiling line and yet underneath 9. Plan of Rogers Building,
the roof. Architecturewas inside the university,but inside fourth floor, showing design
as an outsider. studios

15
10,11. Rogers Building,
architecturaldrawing rooms,
1876

12. Rogers Building,

architecturallecture and
drawing room, 1876

16
13. Rogers Building, design
studio, 1876

14. Rogers Building,

architecturallecture and
drawing room, 1876

17
 assemblage 15

15, 16. Walker Building,

MassachusettsInstitute of
Technology, design studio
and studios leading into the
library,1880s
 Wigley

17. Pierce Building,

MassachusettsInstitute of
Technology, architectural
lecture room, controlled by
Stereopticon lantern slide, 1904

19
 assemblage 15

But the architecturalcollection, far from stayingwithin its the studio: other places, other times, other architects, other
designatedspace, spilled out into all the architectural schools, and other disciplines. These tokens bring all of
spaces, covering every surface. The space of architecturein these issues "into"design. The designer is seen as detached
the universityliterally became the space of the collection. from the physical space of the studio and set adriftamong
The school immersed itself in its collection. While the the conceptual space of these representations.Inasmuch as
walls of the lecture rooms were covered with drawingsand these tokens are held to be representationsof something
projectedlantern slide images, those of the drawingand "other,"something "outside"the studio, they act to define
design rooms were lined with photographs,prints, draw- the interior, the space of design, the paradigmaticspace of
ings, casts, tiles, stained glass - every type of representa- architecture.The whole series of symbolic forms of ritu-
tion that had been collected. These objects packedtogether alistic interactionwith these objects, by studentsand by
systematicallyso obscured the walls that the collection teachers, sustains architecture'sconvoluted relationship
became the walls, defining, subdividingand rearranging with the institutional structureof the university.They at
the space. Students producedand displayedtheir drawings once define and defend the space of architecturerelativeto
under the critical eye of the assembledexemplars. This both the traditionalinterior of the universityand its exte-
fetishistic layering of worshippedobjects acted as a kind of rior. They construct and maintain a space for architecture
defence, protectingarchitecturefrom the claim that might that is neither inside nor outside the university.
come from below that design is not scholarly, that the
The defensivenessneeded to maintain this vulnerable
prostheticextension, in the end, does not really belong in
the university. space was written into the argumentsby which architecture
was firstable to occupy the university. Even though in his
This close relationshipbetween the collection and design proposedcourse of study Ware had argued that building
was preservedwhen the school of architecturemoved into could be classified with technological science and architec-
the Walker Building in 1883, where it occupied the space ture with the technologies of the emerging science of art
above that given to chemistry and physics, and again when history, "design"as a fine art still threatenedto escape clas-
it moved into the Pierce Building in 1892, before return- sification and hence the university.But Ware contended
ing to the Rogers Building in 1916 when the rest of the that this, too, was to be rationalizedby "sound reason"in
universityhad moved to a new campus. Architectureoccu- order to restrainarchitecturaleducation to the "middle
pied the original center of the universityonly when it had ground"between utility and pure art. In describingeach
been effectively turned into an extension. In 1938 architec- stage of architecturaleducation, he employed the tradi-
ture left the Rogers Building to rejoin the rest of the uni- tional architecturalrhetoricthat organizedthe university.
versityin its own building, but one that was, yet again, an Indeed, the curriculum culminated in traditionalfashion
extension of the main universitybuilding. With each with a "thesis"project meant as the equivalent of the writ-
move, the ideology of the collection was sustained. But as ten theses with which students in all the other schools in
the place of architecturein the universitybecame succes- the universitycompleted their degrees.
sively more secure, the objects of the collection began to
be separatedoff into a discrete but accessible space.43The Rogershad specified the need for such a dissertationin the
need for the defensive walls of representationsbegan to original course of instruction he had proposedfor the uni-
fade away. versityin 1864.44Ware'sfirst announcement that an "origi-
nal design"would fulfill this requirementin architecture
The design studios alone remained lined with representa- came in 1868 in a supplement to the university'sannual
tions, as they are in most architectureschools today. The descriptionof its courses. But the word "thesis"was not
space of design continues to be defined by layersof photo- used officially to describe such a design until after the first
graphs, models, xeroxes, posters, designs, sketches, maga- one had been successfully completed by Henry A. Phillips
zines, mottos, books, advertisements,fabrics, and so on, in 1873.45Entitled, in full, "Design for the Buildings of
which act as fetishistic substitutesfor what exists outside the Water Worksof a City, embracing the treatmentof a

20
 Wigley

system of Beams, of an Iron Arched Rib with bracings, of

the Stabilityof the Chimney and of the Tower, and of the
pieces of a Roof Truss covering a small building," its topic
was specified by the school and aimed to exhibit archi-
tecture's role as both a science and an art. Its defence
involved the submission of a set of drawingsand forty-two
pages of "explanation"that identified the issues addressed
by the thesis and gave a detailed account of the design's
programmatic,aesthetic, and technical properties,along
with extensive structuralcalculations. Such scholarshipwas
seen to finally place architecturewithin the traditional
space of the university.

The graduatingarchitect assembles argumentsanalogous to

those constructedby the traditionalscholar;only what is 18. HenryA. Phillips,design
being constructedand defended is literally a construction, for a "WaterWorks,"first
what is being placed is literally a place. This strange architecturalthesis completed
at the MassachusettsInstitute
encounter between architectureand its metaphorwas even of Technology, 1873
written into Ware'sclaim that not only could architecture
assume the role of a liberal art, but that it was playing the
essentially public role of the liberal arts before the constitu-
tion of the university.46Consequently, in entering the uni-
versity, architecturereclaimed its own space.
Ware'sconvoluted application to architectureof an archi-
tectural metaphor, and the resulting course structureorga-
nized around the dematerializingand classifyingeffect of
the photographicimage, providedthe basic strategyfor all
the new schools of architecture, including those that soon
developed within the new discipline of the fine arts. Archi-
tecture was seen to be central within the fine arts. In fact,
departmentsof fine arts often emerged out of architecture.
This peculiar disciplinarygenealogy can clearly be seen in
the school of architecturethat Ware founded in 1881 at
Columbia University after he left MIT. Ware reelaborated
his original strategyfor occupying the universityby adding
the "apparatus"of the collection to the preexistinginstitu-
tional structure;he argued that as architectureis a fine art
it "must always be, so far as relatesto design, not quite
one" with the scientific body of the universityonto which
it is grafted.47Founded in the sciences, the school soon
detached itself from them, being for some years suspended
without a properplace, then becoming the basis of the
new departmentof fine arts, and, ultimately, detaching

21
 assemblage 15

itself from that to form an independent school.48This cannot be separatedfrom the technical. Indeed, for Hei-
mobility resulted from the demands for independence that degger, the modern domination of technology is precisely
grew as soon as the form of the modern universityhad the dominance of the architectonic principle that organizes
stabilized.49Architectureschools began to detach them- the production of theory.52
selves from their hosts in both the sciences and the fine
arts to occupy the gap between them - the "middle Architectureitself could only be admitted into the space of
ground"identified by Ware. This independence, however, the universitywhen the distinction between architectonic
was not achieved until well into the twentieth century. and technical broke down. Indeed, it could act as a privi-
leged figure for this breakdowninasmuch as Ware had
But, in fact, a certain discomfortremains. Architectureis
still a "misfit,"a "blacksheep."50The discipline is itself alwaysargued that it was the unique characterof architec-
ture to straddleall such distinctions. Significantly,Ware
always a prosthesis.The crucial excess, the supplement by was fired from Columbia for pushing the limits of the uni-
which building is extended into architecture,however
much subject to control, always remains externalto the versityeven further. He had establishedthe form of the
modern architecturalschool by identifyingeducation with
architectonic order prescribedby the university.Even
Ware'scanonic strategyfor occupation concedes that some publication, producing many of the standardarchitectural
books that were used extensivelyboth inside and outside all
part of design exceeds the (university)reason that attempts the universities. But he was dismissed in 1903 when he
to control it.51That is to say, architectureremains foreign
to the architecturalconcepts it applies to itself. Because reportedto the trusteesof Columbia that he had published
his lecture notes as textbooksfor a correspondenceschool,
these concepts organize the university,architectureis at
a programintended to be a university"extension"course,
once more of an insider than any other discipline in the
through which students who could never enter the physi-
universityand more of a foreign agent. This ambivalence cal, let alone class-specific, space of the universitycould,
is nowhere more evident than in the final "thesis"project.
nevertheless, eventually earn one of its regulardegrees.53
On the one hand, the project, as creative art, could not be
Ware was held to be subvertingthe distinctions between
more foreign to the university.But, on the other hand, its
privateand public, and between intellectual and commer-
public oral defence by the student is the most faithful cial, with which the universityhad traditionallydefined
maintenance of the oldest and most central institution of
itself. In such a scheme, the elite space of the well-con-
the university.
structedargument could no longer be isolated even from
domestic space. But, of course, such a transformationof
Architectureremains a prostheticintrusion into the
the privatehouse into a prostheticattachmentto the uni-
domain of the thesis. But as such, it cannot simply be
removed. Like all prostheses, it occupies the host because versitywas as inevitable as the original occupation of the
there is a gap in the main body; it supplementsa defi- universityby the technologies of communication that
would make this attachment possible, and Columbia soon
ciency in the thesis, a crack in the solid foundationsof the launched its own correspondencecourse as the "Home
university. Suspended between art and science, academic
and professional, pure and applied, theoreticaland practi- Study"program.54
cal, it fills all the gaps that once defined the outer limits of But in thinking of how architectureparticipatedin these
the universitybut now inhabit and divide its core. Archi- transformationsof the institution, it must be remembered
tecture incorporateditself into the institution by exploiting that Heidegger identifies the ends of modern technology,
this convolution of the bordersof the universitythat went and thereforethe university,as fundamentallymilitary. In
unacknowledgeduntil the nineteenth century. The old these terms, it should be noted that prosthetictechnology
myth of the autonomy of the university,as a clearly is military technology. The pioneering work on prosthetics
defined place separatefrom the materialworld it theorizes, of the sixteenth-centurysurgeon Ambroise Pare, for exam-
breaksdown. In the modern university,the theoretical ple, was a development of the precise mechanisms with

22
 Wigley

which the surrogatebody that forms a suit of armor is con-

structed.55Prosthetictechnology alternatedbetween pro-
ducing substitutesfor the body partsthat militaryweapons
had destroyedand producing these very weapons. All
weapons are prosthetic. Like all prostheses,they are always
mechanisms of both defence and attack. As extensions of
the body, they are called "arms."One body gains control
of another by being extended further.Theory became the
agent of this control by redefiningthe possibilityof exten-
sion. As the firstAmerican universityto efface the distinc-
tion between the architectonic condition of theory and its
technological application, MIT, whose original course of
study included military training in the basic program,56
would, of course, go on to become a major developer of
military technology, and effectively a producerof weapons,
through its increasinglyclose ties to a growing networkof
new intermediateinstitutions, known as the "military-
industrialcomplex," that has disruptedevery one of the
traditionallimits of the university.
In entering the universityby graftingitself onto the sci-
ences, architecture, the art that was responsiblefor military
technology before the rise of the sciences as independent
disciplines (all the classical treatiseson architecturehaving
a section on both defensive structuresand weapons of 19. "Theform of a hand made
attack), is implicated in the operationsof this complex. artificiallyof iron." From
The effacement of the limits of the university,and its com- Ambroise Pare, A Supplement
plicity with the military, does not occur in the applied sci- of the Defects in Man's Body,
ences alone. Every field has its disciplinarytechnologies 1579.
that sustain specific institutionalpracticeswith material
and ideological effects that are strategicallyexempted from
critique. The traditionalspace of the thesis is more and
more the space of technical mastery.

Even though the modern displacement of the limits of the

universityfollows from certain gaps in the architectonic
theory of place itself, architecturedid not enter the univer-
sity as some kind of rethinking, or even firstthought, of
architecture. Precisely what it is to enter is to take this
theory for granted, that is to say, to take it as an unques-
tionable truth that in some way precedes the university
structure"based"on it, ratherthan as an ideological con-
struction whose structurecan, and should, be inspected.
The university'sfundamental thesis, the architecturalprin-

23
 assemblage 15

ciple of grounding, remains undefended, undisputed. The Notes ture of his retina. In the photo-
universitydoes not examine the foundation of its own I would like to thank Elizabeth Per- graphic camera he has created an
kins of the MIT Archives and Spe- instrument which retains the fleet-
foundation. Its architectureis unstable, necessarilyerected
cial Collections, Sally Beddow of ing visual impressions, just as a
over an abyss, inasmuch as its inaugural metaphor of
the MIT Museum, and Janet Parks gramophonedisc retainsthe equally
architecture is exempted from its own interrogation.57 The of the Avery Libraryat Columbia fleeting auditoryones; both are at
metaphor becomes so familiar that it is not seen, even in Universityfor their assistancein the bottom materializationsof the
the moment of being applied to actual buildings. researchfor this paper. A shorter power he possessesof recollection,
version of this paper was published his memory. With the help of the
It is this blindness that needs to be examined when in Ottagono 96 (1990): 19-26. telephone he can hear at distances
which would be respectedas unat-
addressing the development of modern architecture as a 1. Le Corbusier,The Decorative
tainable even in a fairytale.Writing
technological prosthesis. In a parallel and apparently unre- Art of Today, trans. James I. Dun-
was in its origin the voice of an
lated history, the discipline of architecture developed itself nett (Cambridge,Mass.: MIT Press,
absent person;and the dwelling-
as a prosthetic implant in the institutional mechanisms for 1987), 72. On this passageand the house was a substitutefor the
whole argument about architecture
the production of theory. Both histories turn on the evo- mother's womb, the first lodging,
as a form of clothing that organizes
lution of new technologies of communication. As these for which in all likelihood man still
it, see Mark Wigley, "Architecture
longs, and in which he was safe
technologies begin to breed, the body of the university After Philosophy:Le Corbusierand
and felt at ease. Man has, as it
becomes as dissimulated as the human body. The limits the Emperor'sNew Paint," Journal
were, become a prostheticgod.
and functions of each are no longer clear. But these dissi- of Philosophyand the Visual Arts 2 When he puts on all his auxiliary
mulations are not independent of each other. With the (1990): 84-95.
organs he is truly magnificent;but
continued erasure of the distinction between theory and 2. SigfriedGideon, Mechanization those organs have not grown on to
TakesCommand (New York:Oxford him and they still give him much
technology, the two histories have become fundamentally
UniversityPress, 1948), 390. trouble at times" (Sigmund Freud,
entangled. Civilization and its Discontents
3. "Tools are the useful extensions
For Heidegger, the final collapse of the distinction between of man's arms and legs. This defini- [1930], trans. James Strachey [New
tion can be stretchedto cover cer- York:W. W. Norton, 1961], 42).
theory and technology is the technology of theory itself,
tain productsof human ingenuity 5. Ernest Jones describes this
thinking machines, information systems.58 The networks of which are also intended to second implant, added after an operation in
communication have become the new house of theory: the person as such: the dwelling is a October 1923: "The huge pros-
"The philosophical requirement is today best represented tool, and so are the road, the work- thesis, a sort of magnified denture,
by that information technology which, though it seems to shop, and so on" (Le Corbusier, or obturator,designed to shut off
escape the control of the university and thus, in Kantian Lookingat City Planning, trans. the mouth from the nasal cavity,
Eleanor Levieux [New York:Gross- was a horror;it was labelled 'the
terms, the control of philosophy, is nonetheless its true and man Publishers, 1971], 31). monster'" (Ernest Jones, The Life
most faithful representative."59 The contemporary architec- and Workof Sigmund Freud [New
ture of digital prosthetics is what remains of the once-solid 4. "With every tool man is perfect- York:Basic Books, 1957], 3:96).
body of the university. The critical gap between architec- ing his own organs, whether motor
ture and its metaphor has been erased. The uncanny home or sensory, or is removing the limits 6. "I am writing to you from the
of both theorist and theory is electronic. The status of both to their functioning. Motor power deep contentment of a boundless
places gigantic forces at his disposal, inactivity, interspersedwith the
the architectural object and architectural discourse has
which, like his muscles, he can unpleasantsensations of a small-
been displaced, such that the distinction between them can employ in any direction;thanks to scale war waged with a refractory
no longer be made. The way these technologies parasiti- ships and aircraftneither water nor piece of equipment. Reflecting on
cally inhabit, infect, and become the body of architecture air can hinder his movements; by the fine but yet not entirely accept-
redefines the discourse. But this displacement cannot sim- means of spectacles he corrects able sentences in which you discuss
defects in the lens of his own eye; the relationshipof man to his body,
ply be theorized here, or anywhere, as theory is itself by means of the telescope he sees I ask myself what you would say to
dependent on the very architecture being displaced by its into the far distance;and by means the analogous relationshipto a sub-
own technological offspring. In the end, prosthetic archi- of the microscope he overcomes the stitute such as this which tries to be
tecture cannot be disciplined. limits of visibility set by the struc- and yet cannot be the self. This is a

24
 Wigley

problem which arises even in the unpredictedpossibilitiesof exten- City, Its Schools, and the Origins of
case of spectacles, false teeth and sion," and "the photographic the Universityof Paris,"23-25, on
wigs, but not so insistently as in the camera can either completeor sup- the essential "placelessness"of the
case of a prosthesis"(Letterof 11 plement our optical instrument, the institution.
August 1924, in Ernest Pfeiffer, eye" (Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Paint- 15. For examples of the close rela-
ed., Sigmund Freud and Lou ing, Photography,Film [1925;
tionship between legal documents
Andreas-SalomeLetters [London: Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, for buildings and professorships,see
Hogarth Press, 1972], 137). 1987], 15, 28). the documents assembled in John
7. Letter of 3 September 1924, in 10. For a development of Heideg- Willis Clark, ed., Endowmentsof
ibid., 138. ger's account of the architectural the Universityof Cambridge(Cam-
metaphorthat organizes theory, see bridge:CambridgeUniversity Press,
8. "We are not accustomed to
Mark Wigley, "The Translationof 1904).
expend much thought on the fact Architecture:The Production of
that every night human beings lay 16. The firstsuch dedicated build-
Babel," Assemblage8 (1989): 7-22.
aside the garmentsthey pull over ing constructedfor the first uni-
their skin, and even also other 11. Martin Heidegger, Der Satz versity(the university"in"but,
objects which they use to supple- vom Grund (Neske: Pfullingen, significantly, not yet "of" Paris),
ment their bodily organs (so far as 1957). Cf. Jacques Derrida, "The that is to say, arguablythe first uni-
they have succeeded in making Principle of Reason:The University versitybuilding proper, was built in
good their deficiencies by substi- in the Eyes of Its Pupils," Graduate 1322 to lure back the mastersthat
tutes) - for instance, their specta- Faculty PhilosophyJournal 10, no. had migratedto Siena the year
cles, false hair or teeth, and so on. 1 (1984): 12. before. See Ferruolo, "Parisius-
In addition to this, when they go to 12. "Each of the faculties that con- Paradisus,"23.
sleep they performa perfectlyanal- stitute the universityhad some 17. Aristotle, Metaphysics, 981b.
ogous dismantling of their minds church or convent which was usu- Cf. Derrida, "The Principalof Rea-
they lay aside most of their mental ally borrowedfor its meetings; but son," 23.
acquisitions;thus both physically the place of the meeting was not
and mentally approachingremarka- invariable, and neither the univer- 18. Despite their radicallydifferent
bly close to the situation in which sity nor its constitutional bodies operativeagendas (beaux arts, mod-
they began life" (Sigmund Freud, assembled in a building of its own. ern, postmodern, etc.), all the dif-
"MetapsychologicalSupplement to . . .Wherever there were rooms to ferent historical constructionsof the
the Theory of Dreams" [1916], in be hired for schools, and churches architectureof mid-nineteenth-cen-
General PsychologicalTheory[New and convents to be borrowedfor
York:Macmillan, 1963], 151). tury America share the figure of the
congregations, a universitycould "abyss"(sometimes referringto it as
make itself at home" (H. Rashall, a "chasm"or "schism").
9. "During the mechanical ages we
The Universityof Europe in the
had extended our bodies in space. 19. See, for example, Minard La-
Middle Ages [New York:Oxford
Today, after more than a century of fever, The ArchitecturalInstructor
electric technology, we have UniversityPress, 1936], 1:406.
(1856).
20. Prosthetic arm and extended our central nervous system 13. Cited in Stephen C. Ferruolo,
The Origins of the University:The 20. "Architecture,A School
package. From Orthopadische itself in a global embrace, abolish-
Schools of Paris and their Critics, Study,"The ArchitecturalReview
Behandlung ing space and time" (Marshall and AmericanBuilder'sJournal
McLuhan, UnderstandingMedia: 1100-1215 (Stanford:StanfordUni-
Kriegsuerwundeter, 1915. (December 1869): 308.
Extensions of Man [London: Rout- versityPress, 1985), 275.
ledge and Kegan Paul, 1964], 3). 21. Ibid. 309. "Educationmust be
This identification of the technol- 14. For an analysis of the "fragility" liberal and comprehensive as well
ogy of the media with extension is of the relationshipbetween the as universal and cheap, or the result
written into modernist theory. For early universitiesand the cities they will remain incomplete. To secure
example, "Painterlymethods of rep- occupied, see Thomas Bender, ed., anything permanentlysatisfactoryin
resentationsuggestive merely of past The Universityand the City (New the matter of architecture, profes-
ideologies shall disappearand their York:Oxford University Press, sors of ability, workmen of ability,
place be taken by mechanical means 1988), in particular,Stephen C. and an appreciativepublic are nec-
of representationand their as yet Ferruolo, "Parisius-Paradisus: The essary. . . . With reference to the

25
 assemblage 15

appreciativeand able public, the ground good as he goes." The "sta- 29. The lantern slide was begin- ment, however large the general
press is the improvingpower that is ble" core of the universityis always ning to play a crucial role in the mass of its collection" (ibid.).
mainly to be looked to" (Calvert describedas building: "He is accus- emerging institution of the modern
Vaux, Villas and Cottages [New tomed to a chain of deduction in universitylecture. In 1875 MIT 32. Rogers proposeda department
York:Harperand Brothers, 1857]). which each link hangs from the offereda course of eighteen public of "Buildingand Architecture"that
preceding, yet without any insecur- lectures, called "LanternProjec- would begin with engineering and
22. On the constitutional relation-
ity in the whole; to an ascent begin- tions," on "the use of lantern slides only in the fourth year would offer
ship between architectureand pub- "lectureson Architectureas a Fine
ning from solid ground, in which as a means of illustrationin teach-
lication, see Beatriz Colomina, ed.,
each step, as soon as it is made, is a ing" (President'sReportfor the Year Art"(William Rogers, Scope and
Architectureproduction (New York:
foundation for a furtherascent, no Ending September30, 1875 [Bos- Plan of the School of Industrial Sci-
Princeton ArchitecturalPress,
less solid than the first self-evident ton: A. A. Kingsman, 1876], 97). ence of MassachusettsInstitute of
1988). "Until the advent of photog- And in 1876 a regularcourse on
truths"(William Whewell, Of a Technology[Boston:John Wilson
raphy, and earlier of lithography, lantern projectionsbegan within the
Liberal Education in General [Lon- and Son, 1864]).
the audience of architecturewas the
don: John W. Parker,1845]). Physics Department(President's 33. "There is not now in the coun-
user. With photography,the illus-
Reportfor the YearEnding Septem-
tratedmagazine, and tourism, 26. See Newman, The Idea of the try any adequate instruction in
ber 30, 1876 [Boston:A. A. Kings-
architecture'sreception began to University,61. Construction and in Design none
occur also through an additional man, 1877]). For a brief account of whatsoever,while the demand for
27. Ibid. 62. The expressions the passageof the lantern slide from
social form: consumption. With the skilled draughtsmenand competent
"place,""firmness,"and "laying entertainmentto education, see architectsis rapidlyincreasing in
enormous amplification of the audi- down" come from the very architec- Elizabeth Shepard, "The Magic
ence, the relation to the object tural domain they are used to every part of the country. To meet
Lantern Slide in Entertainmentand this want would requirea compara-
changed radically.The audience exclude. The architecturalmeta- Education, 1860-1920," Journalof
(the tourist in front of a building, tively slight extension of your pro-
phor is always employed politically the History of Photography11, no.
the readerof a journal, the viewer as a conservativeagent. For ex- gramme"(William Ware, letter to
2 (April-June 1987): 91-108.
of an exhibition or a newspaper John Runkle [secretaryof the Insti-
ample, the inaugural addressby
advertisement,and even the client Charles Eliot on becoming presi- tute], 27 April 1865, p. 1, Massa-
30. William Ware, An Outline of chusetts Institute of Technology
who often is also all of the above) dent of HarvardUniversityin 1869: a Course in ArchitecturalInstruc- Archives and Special Collections).
increasinglybecame the user, the "A universityis not built in the air, tion (Boston, 1865), 9.
one who gave meaning to the work. but on social and literaryfounda- 34. Ibid.
In turn the work itself changed" tions. If the whole structureneeds 31. William Rogers, Objects and 35. Ware identifies "the history of
(BeatrizColomina, "Introduction:
rebuilding, it must be rebuilt from Scope of an Institute of Technology; architecture,the theory of architec-
On Architecture, Production and the foundation. Hence, sudden Including a Society of Arts, a tural ornamentation, the laws of
Reproduction,"in ibid., 9). reconstructionis impossible in our Museum of Arts, and a School of proportion,of harmony and of geo-
23. S. E. Morison, The Founding high places of education"(S. E. Industrial Science (Boston:John metrical and naturalisticdecora-
of HarvardCollege (Cambridge, Morison, ed., The Developmentof Wilson and Son, 1861), 13. "In tion," on the fine art side, and
Mass.: HarvardUniversityPress, Harvard University 1869-1929 organizing and conducting the "mechanic arts employed in build-
1935), 337. [Cambridge,Mass.: HarvardUni- Museum of the Institute, reference ing, supervising, specifications,
24. Peter Slee, "The Oxford Idea of versityPress, 1930], lxi). should be had ratherto the extent contracts, lighting, ventilation,
a Liberal Education, 1800-1860: of practicalinstructionto be derived heating, etc.," on the scientific side
28. Before then, there had only from it ratherthan to the multitude
The Invention of Tradition and the (ibid., 2).
been supplementarycourses on of objects which it might embrace.
Manufactureof Practice,"Histories 36. Ibid., 6.
architecturein the university,start- Its severaldepartmentstherefore,
of the Universities7 (1988): 61-68.
ing in 1852 at New York Univer- should aim, in the first phase, at 37. In his firstannual reportto the
25. John Henry Newman, The Idea sity, Yale, Michigan, and Harvard. forming a collection of objects of presidentin 1872, Ware argues that
of a University(1852), xxxix. Rea- Likewise, in England, supplemen- prominent importance. . . . As "it has been necessaryto give a
son is "exercised,unfolded and tary courses were startedin 1840 at specimens of materials, workman- good deal of information, viva
confirmed"but not extended. King'sCollege in the Universityof ship, and machinery accumulate, voce, that might better have been
Instead, the universityseeks to London and a year later at Univer- care should be taken to preservethis obtained from text-books, if proper
establish "principleslaid down sity College. But it was not until method of arrangement,wherever text-bookswere to be had. Indeed a
within them as a foundation for the 1894 that the first universityschool practicable;and to accord a promi- chief part of my own labor has con-
intellect to build on" following the of architecturewas founded at the nent place to what might be called sisted in collecting and putting into
traditionalmethod of "makinghis UniversityCollege of Liverpool. the typical objects in each depart- shape the common-places of archi-

26
 Wigley

21. Man with seven legs. From

Orthopadische Behandlung
Kriegsuerwundeter,1915.

tectural information, things which existing schools, and time spent in

every architect knows, but which learning what can be had and in
are not as yet accessible to students" making judicious selections, would
(President'sReportfor the YearEnd- be well spent. ... I should also
ing September30, 1872 [Boston: propose to prepareaccurate lists of
A. A. Kingsway, 1873], 41). the collections and apparatus
38. Ware, An Outline of a Course needed for my classes"(William
in ArchitecturalInstruction, 15. On Ware, letter to William Rogers, 24
the library,and photographyin par- April 1866, MIT Archives and Spe-
cial Collections).
ticular, as a surveillance device, the
disciplinaryapparatusresponsible 41. See Caroline Shillaber, Massa-
for the emergence of art history as a chusetts Institute of Technology
science, see Donald Preziozi, School of Architectureand Planning
RethinkingArt History:Meditations 1861-1961 (Cambridge, Mass.:
on a Coy Science (New Haven: Yale MIT Press, 1963).
University Press, 1989).
42. I am indebted to discussions
39. "Where so much is to be done
and correspondenceon the question
in the collecting of information it
of the roof design with Joan Follett
would of course be profitableto the
of the John Nicholas Brown Center
whole class and stimulating to each
for the Study of American Civiliza-
member of it to put them upon the
tion. For details of the argument
search, making them contribute the
over the roof, see Joan E. Follett,
result of their reading or of their
"The Business of Architecture:Wil-
conversationwith mechanics and
liam Gibbons Preston and Architec-
expertsto the common stick. I have
tural Professionalismin Boston
practicedthis method with my own
During the Second Half of the
pupils"(Ware, letter to Runkle,
Nineteenth Century,"Ph.D. diss.,
16).
Boston University, 1986, 65-71.
40. Ware's reporton the school of
architecture, in President'sReport 43. The beginning of this trend can
for the YearEnding September30, be seen in the official description of
1872, 36. More than just collecting its first move: "Opening directly
material that would then be classi- from the main drawing-roomis the
fied in the library,Ware prepared departmentlibrarycomprising six
detailed lists of thousands of objects hundred and fifty volumes, and
in Europe, and their prices, that some three thousand photographs
could be orderedfrom the United bound in books. The libraryand
States as the school developed. photographsare entirely free to the
When Ware wrote to William students, who are encouraged to use
Rogers, then presidentof the uni- the collections very freely. There is,
versity,asking for permission to also, quite a collection of casts and
travel to Europe, he argued that he models of architecturalfragments,
needed to preparesuch a catalogue and a very fine lot of French school
in addition to studying differentsys- drawings, including some of the
tems of architecturaleducation and envois de Rome, which were
collecting the "necessaryequip- secured by ProfessorWare, some
ment":"The collection of drawings, years since, in Paris. In addition to
models, photographs,casts and the special library,several thousand
other necessaryequipment of an photographs,prints, drawings, and
architecturalschool could be made casts have been collected to form a
at the same time with this study of nucleus for an architectural

27
 assemblage 15

museum. Models and illustrations refersto it as a successful "graduat- its three branches are certainly in this Country have been estab-
of architecturaldetail and materials ing thesis"(Tenth Annual Cata- more germane to scientific pursuits lished in connection with schools of
are arrangedin the rooms of the logue of the Officersand Students than to painting and sculpture, and Engineering. This connection
department,but the chief part of with a Statement of the Coursesof it is easier and cheaper to add the though a great advantagein starting
the collection of casts of architec- Instruction 1874/75 [Boston:A. A. apparatus needed for the study of is soon felt to be a hindrance, but
tural sculptureand detail belonging Kingsman, 1874], 51). The require- elementarydesign to a school of our school is the firstthat has
to the departmenthas been, for ment for "thesiswork"was first science than to bring the work- undertakento put this work on an
want of space in the Institute Build- added to the list of courses in the rooms and laboratoriesof a school independent and purely professional
ings, deposited in the Museum of catalogue of 1876, at the same time of science into a school of art. Still, basis"(William Ware, letter to Pres-
Fine Arts. . . . The students of the as it was added to the list of courses it needs to be distinctly recognized ident Low of Columbia University,
departmenthave free access to them in all the other schools. But not that the atmosphereof exact science 12 September 1892, MIT Archives
at all times; and as the Museum until the catalogue of 1880 did the is unfavorableto the growth of the and Special Collections). On the
building is close at hand, no incon- universityspell out what a thesis artisticsentiment; and that in tem- period in which the school of archi-
venience results from the change" entailed. For the student to be enti- per and methods a school of archi- tecture had no designatedplace, see
("ArchitecturalEducation in the tled to a degree, "he must, more- tecture must always be, so far as Stephen M. Bedfordand Susan M.
United States,"pt. 1, "The Massa- over, preparea dissertationon some relatesto design, at least, not quite Strauss, "HistoryII: 1881-1912," in
chusetts Instituteof Technology," subject included in his course of one with the purely practical RichardOliver, ed., The Making of
The AmericanArchitectand Build- study;or an account of some schools with which it is associated. an Architect, 1881-1981 (New
ing News 24, no. 658 [4 August researchmade by himself; or an It must accordinglyrequire special York:Rizzoli, 1981), 23-48.
1888]: 48). original reportupon some machine, pains to create for it an atmosphere
work of engineering, industrial of its own, favorableto the harmo- 49. In 1902 Ware describedthis
44. Rogers first specified that to
works, mine, or mineral survey;or nious development of its own process in a letter:"Abroad,Schools
obtain a degree the student must of Architectureare associatedwith
an original architecturaldesign students"(William Ware, "Memo-
"preparea dissertation"in Scope randum as to the ProposedCourse Schools of Painting and Sculpture,
and Plan of the School of Industrial accompanied by an explanatory
memoir. This thesis or design must of Architecturein the School of or of Decorative Art, and it was
Science of MassachusettsInstitute of
be approvedby the Faculty"(Fif- Mines," School of Mines Quarterly only in the lack of a more conge-
Technology,18. teenth Annual Catalogue of the 3 [November 1881]: 4, emphasis nial field that some of those in this
45. The first descriptionof the the- Officersand Students with a State- mine). In a letter to PresidentBar- country were planted in Scientific
sis project in architectureappeared ment of the Coursesof Instruction nard, Ware discussed extensively Schools. . . . Architecturalschools
in an 1868 supplement to the third 1879/1880 [Boston:A. A. Kings- the foundation and use of the col- were needed, and the simplest way
annual catalogue of the university: man, 1880], 51). lection: "In establishinga School of to startthem was to take advantage
"The Diploma of the Institute, Architectureit was obvious that the of the courses in Physics, Chemis-
46. Ware, An Outline of a Course
declaring its possessorcompetent to firstthing to do was to form a suffi- try, Geology, Mathematics, and
in ArchitecturalInstruction,3. On Civil Engineering alreadyestab-
practice his professionas an Archi- cient collection of books and photo-
Ware's repeatedinsistence that lished. A single instructorin Archi-
tect, is given only to those students graphs, printsand drawings, so that
architecturaleducation should be, tecture was all that was requiredto
who, having passed a satisfactory ample illustrationsof the subject
firstand foremost, founded in a set the new branch of study on its
examination in the studies pre- matter might be at hand. But it was
scribedfor the Regular Students, general liberal education, see John not so obvious how such collections feet. But all these schools have
Andrew Chewning, "William Rob-
presentsOriginal Designs, upon a could best be utilized in the daily found, what we were ourselves
ert Ware and the Beginnings of
prescribedsubject, satisfactoryto routine of instruction."He quick to discover, that the condi-
ArchitecturalEducation in the tions were unfavorableto its growth
the judges appointed to examine describedhis "revisionof the mate-
United States, 1861-1881," Ph.D. and development. Schools of Archi-
them" (A Supplement to the Third rial collected so as to make sure
Annual Catalogue of the Massachu- diss., MassachusettsInstitute of tecture are first of all Schools of
that it was in presentableform"and
setts Institute of Technology:The Technology, 1986. the way the students systematically Art, and in the somewhat sandy soil
Programmeof the Course of Instruc- 47. "The question is raised went through the content of the suitable to Schools of Applied Sci-
tion in the Department of Architec- whether, architecturebeing counted libraryin a succession of studies ence, they were in danger, like the
ture [Boston:Alfred Mudge and among the fine arts, it does not called a "tour"(William Ware, let- seed sown among the rocks, of
Sons, 1868], 6). But the first men- belong in a school of science. But if ter to PresidentBarnard, 1887, springingup quickly indeed, but of
tion of the word "thesis"in the a thorough and comprehensive MIT Archives and Special presentlywithering away because
school of architecturecame only course of study is to be established, Collections). they had no richness of earth. All
after the completion of the first the- a school of science seems the most these schools accordingly, have
sis in the catalogue of 1874, which convenient place for it. Two out of 48. "All the ArchitecturalSchools from their inception endeavoredto

28
 Wigley

differentiatetheir work from that of years he was interestedin education tactics;and, for this purpose, will
the scientific departments. ... In by means of the correspondence be organized into companies, to
this endeavor some of these schools system, diffusing in the widest pos- meet on stated days for military
have indeed met but indifferent sible way some knowledge of the instructionand exercise"(The First
success"(William Ware, letter to principles of architecture. I assisted Annual Catalogue of the Officers
Mr. Mitchell, 11 January1902, him in getting up a text-bookon and Students and Programmeof the
MIT Archives and Special the architecturalorders. . . . This Course of Instructionof the School
Collections). year ProfessorWare reported[to the of the MassachusettsInstitute of
board of trusteesof Columbia Uni- Technology,1865/66 [Boston:John
50. "The truth is that owing to this
condition of misfit, schools of versity]the success he had with the Wilson and Sons, 1865], 25).
text-book he had preparedfor the 57. See Derrida, "The Principle of
architecture, while located at the
International[Correspondence
university,can seldom be said to be Reason," 10.
School of Scranton, Pennsylvania]
in and of the university"(Henry N. 58. Heidegger, "The Principle of
and outlined a scheme of credits to
Cobb, Architectureand the Univer- Ground," 216.
beginners for entrance to the
sity [HarvardUniversity, 1986]).
School of Architecturefor students 59. Jacques Derrida, "Mochlos,ou
"From the administrativepoint of
view architectureis often thought of taking the correspondencecourse. le conflit des faculties,"Philosophie
as a 'black sheep' of university They listened without comment, 2 (1984): 21-53.
and said they they would adjourn
courses"(F. H. Bosworthand Roy
for luncheon. Mr. Ware ate his
Childs Jones, A Study of Architec- Figure Credits
lunch and upon going to his office
ture Schools [New York, 1932],
before rejoining the Trustees, found 1, 20, 21. OrthopadischeBehandlung
129). The specific needs of archi-
there a letter delivered by hand, Kriegsuerwundeter(Berlin, 1915).
tecture schools "and the academic
stating that he was therewith retired 2. Sigfried Gideon, Mechanization
points of view of the American
from head of the Architectural TakesCommand (New York:Oxford
Universitywere points of view that
School" (William Thomas Par- University Press, 1948).
could not be completely harmo-
nized in the American University" tridge, A Few Reminiscencesof Prof.
W. R. Ware, ms., Papersof Wil- 3. Walter Gropius, Scope of Total
(ArthurClason Weatherhead, The Architecture(New York:Collier,
liam Thomas Partridge,William
History of Collegiate Education in 1943).
Ware Collection, Avery Library,
Architecturein the United States
Columbia University). 4. GregoriusReisch, Margarita
[Los Angeles, 1941], 71).
Philosophica(Basel, 1583).
51. In architecture, reason is 54. "Some time afterwardI asked 5. HarvardUniversityArchives.
"influential"yet its control is not one of the trusteesthe reason for
"absolute":"but even here [architec- their action. He said 6. The Magic Lantern and Its
they were
ture as fine art] intelligence and Applications(New York, 1886).
panic strickenat the thought that
sound reason exert a controlling
he, as head of a Columbia School, 7-18. Collection of the MIT
influence, and elsewhere they rule had committed them too far with a Museum.
with absolute authority"(Ware, An
purely commercial project .... 19. Ambroise Pare, "A Supplement
Outline of a Course in Architectural Within a few
years afterward of the Defects in Man's Body," in
Instruction, 17). Columbia University embarkedon
The Collected Worksof Ambroise
52. "The perfection of technology a huge 'Home Study' program
Pare (Paris, 1579).
is only the echo of the claim to the by correspondence, of course!"
that to the (ibid.).
perfectio, is, complete-
ness of the foundation"(Martin 55. See Ambroise Pare, "A Supple-
Heidegger, "The Principle of ment of the Defects in Man's
Ground," trans. Keith Hoeller, Body," in The Collected Worksof
Man and World 7 [1974]: 213). AmbroisePare (Paris, 1579).
53. In his unpublished reminis- 56. "The regularstudents of the
cences of Ware, William Partridge School will be taught the use of
describedthe event: "For many small-arms, and the simpler partsof

29