Science Moderne: Sigfried Giedion's Space, Time and Architecture and Mechanization Takes Command

Abstract

Sigfried Giedion (1888-1968) was a Swiss art historian who pioneered the history of technology while helping bring forth modernity, born of the convergence of revolutionary transformations in science, technology, and the arts, and identified with such names as Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenberg, Pablo Picasso, Marcel Duchamp, Sigmund Freud, Henry Ford, and the Wrights (both Frank Lloyd and the brothers Wilbur and Orville). Together, Space, Time and Architecture and Mechanization Takes Command, originally published in English in 1941 and 1948 respectively, shed light on this convergence—showing, for example, how such abstruse concepts as the special theory of relativity drifted from physics and entered the popular idiom in painting, architecture, and literature. Giedion believed passionately in bridging disciplinary and cultural boundaries. It was through his artist friends that Giedion discovered a new world of science. He then coupled art and science to create a fresh vision of technology, his best hope for restoring the "equilibrium" he desired between man and machine.