The Manhattan Transcripts Project, New York, New York, Episode 4: The Block
Bernard Tschumi
French and Swiss, born Switzerland 1944
1980-81
An architectural collage in ink with cut-and-pasted gelatin-silver photograph fragments on tracing paper in which Bernard Tschumi stages schematic building elements and brief actions to argue that urban meaning comes from events, not just form.
The sheet reads like a sparse constellation—precise, diagrammatic outlines and tiny plus-signs float across pale tracing paper, punctuated by jagged photographic triangles showing bold, cropped figures that create a staccato, cinematic rhythm.
Part of the influential Manhattan Transcripts, this work helped reframe architecture as a medium of events and narratives, influencing later theoretical and deconstructivist practices by privileging action and montage over static composition.
Medium
Ink and cut-and-pasted gelatin silver photographs on tracing paper
Dimensions
19 x 31" (48.3 x 78.7 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Purchase and partial gift of the architect in honor of Lily Auchincloss
Accession
9.1995.14
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
