The Manhattan Transcripts Project, New York, New York, Episode 1: The Park
Bernard Tschumi
French and Swiss, born Switzerland 1944
1976-77
A gelatin silver photograph from Bernard Tschumi’s Manhattan Transcripts that juxtaposes a literal park view with abstracted diagrams to present architecture as a sequence of events, movements, and narratives.
Three numbered panels sit across a white field—(1) a dark, reflective riverscape photograph, (2) a closely rendered, organic-plan diagram, and (3) a dashed-line outline with arrows—together reading like a cinematic storyboard that oscillates between image and instruction.
The Transcripts reframed architectural practice by insisting that space is produced by actions and events, introducing a filmic, narrative method that influenced later deconstructivist and conceptual approaches to design.
Medium
Gelatin silver photograph
Dimensions
14 x 18" (35.6 x 45.7 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Purchase and partial gift of the architect in honor of Lily Auchincloss
Accession
3.1995.2
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
