Architect Drawings : A Selection of Sketches by World Famous Architects Through History

ornament or detail, but rather the requirements of the program and the arrangement and proportions
of spaces and elements (Harbeson, 1927).
The group of eight was ranked and allowed to continue to the next stage of the competition. After
submitting their esquisse, the students traced (or in some way recorded) the essentials of their project.
They then returned to their respective atelier to elaborate and render the scheme over a period of
approximately three months. The formal renderings were submitted in conventional style, using only
plan, section, and elevation (Egbert, 1980). The drawings were mechanically constructed abstractions
of the building so that they could be easily comprehended by the jurors. The competition system was
a way for the students to quickly formulate a solution to a specific program, one that was acceptable
and proper according to the theories taught at the school. They were not buildable projects, in that
they stressed character, proportion, and composition, with less emphasis on building materials and
contemporary technology (Middleton, 1982). Character, originating with the classical tradition in art,
was of three kinds: general character, not necessarily connected to the building program, meaning
association with historic expression; type character, referring to the building’s type; and specific character,
ideas arising from each building’s distinctive qualities (Egbert, 1980).
The length of attendance at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts was indeterminate. It often took several
attempts before a student won the Grande Prix, and the competition was open only to French citizens.
Invariably, the winners returned from Rome to careers in royal service. Those who never won
the Prix de Rome, as well as the foreigners in attendance, left the school when they felt they had
acquired sufficient architectural knowledge to begin practice or to continue their education with an
apprenticeship. All of these young architects carried into practice the Ecole’s method of both a ‘preesquisse’
to find an appropriate parti, and the esquisse, which expressed the essence of the organization.
Along with skills in design theory and rendering, these factors affected architects’ process for
many years to come.
VISIONARY/REVOLUTIONARY/RADICAL ARCHITECTURE
Emil Kaufmann called the architects Etienne-Louis Boullée, Claude-Nicholas Ledoux, and Jean-
Jaques Lequeu revolutionary architects (1952). He was referring not to their political stance but rather
to how they expressed the ideals of the great thinkers of their century. Their objectives ‘were the
expression of character, the creation of atmosphere, and the division of the composition into independent
units’ (Kaufmann, 1952, p. 434). They chose to express themselves through the monumentality
of form. Like Laugier, they advocated the paring down of form to basic necessity, a purism that
avoided all ornament. It was believed that this simplicity and naturalness resulted in beauty. The work
of these architects was distinctly reminiscent of Gian Battista Piranesi’s carceri: visions of prisons, ruins,
cenotaphs, exaggerated monuments, and public works projects. Ledoux was able to build a few of his
designs, such as the Saltworks at Arc-et Senans, but a large portion were disseminated primarily as
illustrations for theory books. As paper architecture, these drawings were easily reproduced and distributed;
as theoretical endeavors, they carried less functional responsibility.
The visionary/revolutionary architect’s theoretical proposals captured dramatic perspective views,
intensifying the grandeur of the architecture. Drawing techniques such as eliminating background conveyed
a specific message, free of unnecessary details. Ledoux’s fantasy architecture consisted of simple
geometry and primarily displayed function. He utilized perfect cubes and spheres to describe large and
smooth architectural form. Boullée employed atmospheric techniques to provide a context of emotion,
but his images lacked environmental context. The massive masonry façades were often represented
from a corner with high perspective points. Strong beams of light flooding the interior spaces enhanced
the dramatic effect. In contrast, Lequeu imagined decorative follies with an eclectic mix of orders and
in various states of ruin. These visionary/revolutionary sketches and drawings as theoretical arguments
raise particularly important issues for the study of architects’ media.
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