Architecture and Modernity : A Critique

For Heidegger the Greek temple is an appropriate vehicle for clarifying his ideas on
art precisely because mimesis in the sense of Darstellung or representation does not
play a role.
Once one departs from this narrow notion of mimesis, however—as Benjamin
and Adorno do—the thesis that architecture is nonmimetic loses its validity.
When one’s definition of mimesis no longer coincides with faithful copying, but
refers rather to more general figures of similarity and difference, to certain affinities
or correspondences, then there is no longer any reason for excluding architecture
from the realm of mimesis. In architecture, too, forms are constructed and buildings
designed on the basis of processes of correspondence, similarity, and difference.
The reference points here are extremely varied in character: the program of demands,
the physical context, a typological series, a particular formal idiom, a historical
connotation. All these elements lend themselves to being treated mimetically
and thus to being translated in the design.
When discussing mimesis in architecture, however, the reference to Adorno
and Benjamin is not the sole productive one. In French poststructuralism, there is
also considerable discussion of the extent and significance of mimesis. This concept
plays a crucial role in the work of Lacoue-Labarthe and Derrida in particular.
Mimesis in Contemporary Theory
For Lacoue-Labarthe, the reflection on mimesis is the pretext for his confrontation
with Heidegger that he sees as the main task of contemporary philosophy. 98 In
“Typographie,” his contribution to the book Mimesis. Désarticulations, 99 his argument
pivots on the curious observation that Heidegger, who devoted a thorough
discussion to virtually all the basic concepts of Greek philosophy, never reflects on
mimesis as such. By way of a deconstructivist reading of the writings in which
Heidegger comes closest to dealing with this problem, Lacoue-Labarthe argues
that Heidegger ignores mimesis because of its “constitutive undecidability.” This lacuna
in his thought means that Heidegger to a certain extent continues to follow
the path of Western metaphysics, even though it is a tradition that he aims to
break with.
Mimesis is characterized by a “constitutive undecidability,” according to
Lacoue-Labarthe. This he explains by referring to Plato’s treatment of mimesis. In
Plato’s Republic it is explicitly stated that poets, writers, actors, and artists should be
excluded from the ideal state because their work makes no contribution whatsoever
to truth and goodness. Their exclusion is first formulated in the chapter that deals
with education. According to Plato, the spiritual education of small children must not
be determined by listening to stories (as is usually the case), because stories are
largely based on fantasy and are therefore untrue. Thus, the state should keep a careful
eye on the production of texts, permitting only those that serve the truth and propagate
elevated principles. That means amongst other things that a writer can only tell
his tale in indirect speech because the use of direct speech means that he is pre-
4 Architecture as Critique of Modernity