Preparing CIAM X 1954-1955

  1. Introduction
  2. Team 10 members present
  3. Bibliography

Introduction

The dissatisfaction with CIAM IX, CIAM as an institution and the ‘functional city’ as a tool for planning the modern city that they had inherited from their CIAM forefathers, prompted national CIAM groups and international meetings of the ‘like-minded’ to meet between the congresses with the purpose of defining a new direction for CIAM. At the forefront of these initiatives were the younger Dutch and British CIAM members, Georges Candilis, with the participation of Italian CIAM members Ignazio Gardella and Franco Albini, and Swiss member Rolf Gutmann who all made important contributions in formulating a new working method for CIAM planning. The members of the older generation were equally disappointed with CIAM IX. Giedion had hoped that the congress would produce a Charter of Habitat since CIAM had published only a summary of CIAM VIII entitled The Heart of the City (1952), but had published nothing dealing with principles since 1944 with Can Our Cities Survive?

The first interim meeting was a ‘study weekend’ organized by the young Dutch architect Sandy van Ginkel under the direction of Jaap Bakema and held at Doorn, The Netherlands, 29-31 January 1954. Independently of CIAM, they met to decide on the subject and method of work for the next congress. Taking up a suggestion made by Ernesto Rogers at the Sigtuna meeting, they proposed that the central topic of discussion be a new working method for the implementation of ‘habitat’.
These loosely associated, third generation modern architects who met at Doorn were also bound by their desire to produce towns in which ‘vital human associations’ were expressed and to develop methods that would enable them to implement these associations. In spite of the differences of opinion as to how this was to be achieved, they arrived at enough of a consensus to produce a summary of their discussions in a document entitled ‘Statement on Habitat’, which they conceived of as a necessary preliminary step toward the creation of a Charter of Habitat. Their ‘Statement on Habitat’ began by historically locating The Athens Charter as embodying a method that functioned adequately for counteracting the chaos in the nineteenth-century city, but was found wanting as a method for the twentieth century. In its place they proposed new criteria for planning in which the totality of a community and its particular character and environment should be taken into account. They represented this concept with the ‘Scale of Association’ diagram that was directly borrowed from the sociologically-based notions of Scottish town planner Patrick Geddes, and his ‘Valley Section’ diagram. The ‘Scale of Association’ diagram was to replace the CIAM grid as a tool to study and compare settlements located in different regions and countries. Although the ‘Statement on Habitat’ was written seven months before these members would be recognized as Team 10, and aided by the more polemical title of ‘Doorn Manifesto’ subsequently given by Alison Smithson, it may be considered to be the foundational document of the group.

The younger members continued to meet between 1954 and 1956 to outline the new direction and working method for CIAM X. These collaborations were formalized by the executive body of CIAM, the CIAM Council, at a meeting in Paris, in June 1954, with the formation of a new group of ‘youngers’ the CIAM X Committee, where its members, Jaap Bakema, Georges Candilis, Peter Smithson and Rolf Gutmann, were given the task of preparing the intellectual and spiritual pro-gramme for CIAM X. The CIAM X Committee was subsequently expanded at a meeting in London with CIAM Council member Jacqueline Tyrwhitt to include some of the other younger members who had attended the meeting at Doorn.

Discussions about the elaborate rules of presentation of the ASCORAL grid were resolved with an outline for a new, much more succinct presentation with only four panels for each project.
There were differences of opinion among the members of the CIAM X Committee about the conceptual framework of CIAM X, which they somewhat resolved in a draft of a document that was accepted at a meeting of the CIAM X Committee with the CIAM X Advisory Group, (represented by Le Corbusier and Giedion) in Le Corbusier’s office, on 14 September 1954. The term ‘Equipe X’ and ‘Team X’ appeared for the first time in documents authored by CIAM Alger and Candilis in preparation for the Paris meeting, for their role in preparing for the CIAM X congress. An intense internal debate ensued among the Team 10 members, especially between the Dutch and English, as they attempted to consolidate their new conception of urbanism for the next congress. The Dutch felt they were overruled by the English, who stuck to their pragmatic interpretation of the Geddes ‘Valley Section’ diagram and the idea of scales of association. Van Eyck and Bakema wanted to focus on the more idealistic issues of ‘the greater reality of the doorstep’, ‘growth and change’ and ‘the aesthetics of number’. Once this debate was settled they were then faced with the task of convincing the CIAM Council of their new approach which was reluctantly approved at a meeting with the CIAM Council in Paris in July 1955.
Realizing that the younger members were taking over the responsibilities of CIAM, the founding members began the process of documenting the history of CIAM and producing documentation of the Sigtuna meeting and CIAM IX congress. The CIAM Council and Team 10 and their advisers met at La Sarraz, Switzerland on 8-10 September 1955, with the purpose of preparing this documentation to be titled ‘Le Statut du Logis’ and to finalize the working programme for CIAM X. At this meeting a confusing mix of desires was brought to the surface, with the older members seeking to summarize the last 25 years of CIAM history and Team 10 members wanting to prepare a document that would lead CIAM into the future.

The Smithsons continued their campaign to get CIAM’s four functions replaced by the categories of ‘cities’, ‘towns’, ‘villages’ and ‘isolated houses’ as proposed on the ‘Scale of Association’ diagram. And the degree to which the notion of habitat had infiltrated the thinking of the older generation was made evident by the title they agreed upon for the congress: ‘The Habitat: Problem of Inter-relationships. CIAM’s First Proposals, Statements and Resolutions’. The older members recognized the role played by the younger members who were now being referred to as Team 10, thanked them for the work they had done, and allowed them to continue with the preparations for CIAM X under the supervision of CIAM Council member José Lluís Sert.

Annie Pedret


Members present:

Doorn 1954
interim meeting
29-31 January 1954
organized by Bakema\Van Ginkel
present:
Jaap Bakema
Aldo van Eyck
Sandy van Ginkel
Hans Hovens Greve
Peter Smithson
John Voelcker

Paris 1954
CIAM Council, interim meeting
30 June 1954
organized by CIAM Council
present:
Sigfried Giedion
Walter Gropius
Le Corbusier
José Lluís Sert
Jacqueline Tyrwhitt
and
Jaap Bakema
Aldo van Eyck
Georges Candilis
Rolf Gutmann
Bill Howell
Peter Smithson
John Voelcker
CIAM X Committee (CIAX) appointed

London 1954
CIAM X Committee, interim meeting
28-29 August 1954
organized by CIAX
present:
Jaap Bakema
Georges Candilis
Sandy van Ginkel
Rolf Gutmann
Bill Howell
Gill Howell
Brian Richards
Alison Smithson
Peter Smithson
John Voelcker
Shadrach Woods

Paris 1954
CIAM X Committee, interim meeting
14 September 1954
Le Corbusier’s office, Paris, France
organized by CIAM Council
present:
Sigfried Giedion
Le Corbusier
and
Jaap Bakema
Georges Candilis
Aldo van Eyck
Sandy van Ginkel
Bill Howell
Gill Howell
Alison Smithson
Peter Smithson
first reference to Team X \ Team 10

Paris 1955
Team 10 interim meeting
14 April 1955
Candilis office, Paris, France
organized by Team 10
present:
Jaap Bakema
Georges Candilis
Aldo van Eyck
Alison Smithson
Peter Smithson
John Voelcker
Shadrach Woods

Paris 1955
CIRPAC\CIAM Council, CIRPAC meeting with CIAM Council
4 July 1955
organized by CIAM Council
present among other delegates:
Jaap Bakema
Georges Candilis
Bill Howell

La Sarraz 1955
CIRPAC ‘Le statut du logis’ ,CIAM Council meeting
8-10 September 1955
organized by CIAM Council
present among other delegates:
Jaap Bakema*
Max Bill
Giancarlo De Carlo
Cornelis van Eesteren
Paul Emery
Aldo van Eyck
Sigfried Giedion
Rolf Gutmann*
Bill Howell
Ernesto Rogers
Alfred Roth
Alison Smithson
Peter Smithson*
John Voelcker
André Wogenscky
Shadrach Woods
* appointed to CIAM Committee of reorganisation
first informal discussion of work


Bibliography