Overview

Fire is at the center of human civilization. The first primitive hut was built around fire, deeply imprinting it on the collective memory of architecture. As we reassess architectural conservation, we would therefore do well to explore the intimate relationship between architecture and fire. Founded in inventive interdisciplinary research that ranges across architecture and conservation, archival theory, classical mythology, evolutionary theory, philosophy, and psychoanalysis, Architecture and Fire draws on the insights of psychoanalysis to offer such a reassessment. Among the topics discussed are the ambivalent nature of fire, seen through the conflicting philosophies of Gaston Bachelard and Henri Bergson; the ways in which architecture evolves by absorbing and accommodating fire; and the destruction of buildings by fire as a critical moment of architectural evolution, with a focus on the tragic disaster at London’s Grenfell Tower in 2017. Stamatis Zografos concludes with thoughts on Freud’s drive theory. He argues that the practice of architectural conservation is an expression of the life drive and a simultaneous repression of the death drive, which suggests controlled destruction should be an integral part of the conservation agenda.  

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9781787353725

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Reviews

This book offers a significant contribution to the field of architecture by exploring it through the lens of another discipline--psychoanalysis. Architectural conservation analysis is delivered through the readings of Freud, and Zografos writes with great enthusiasm for the philosophies of Bergson and Bachelard, which he juxtaposes to illustrate the importance of the archival practice in both architecture and psychoanalysis. --Nela Milic, University of the Arts

This book offers a significant contribution to the field of architecture by exploring it through the lens of another discipline-psychoanalysis. Architectural conservation analysis is delivered through the readings of Freud, and Zografos writes with great enthusiasm for the philosophies of Bergson and Bachelard, which he juxtaposes to illustrate the importance of the archival practice in both architecture and psychoanalysis. -- Nela Milic, University of the Arts

Author Information

Stamatis Zografos is an architect and Associate Professor in Architecture at The Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL. He is co-founder of Incandescent Square and a founding member of the Institute of Psychoanalytic Studies in Architecture (iPSA). His research lies at the intersection of architecture, critical heritage studies and psychoanalysis.

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