Chandigarh 1956 /anglais/allemand: Le Corbusier and the Promotion of Architectural Modernity - Hardcover

Le Corbusier's masterplan and buildings for Chandigarh, capital of the Indian federal state of Punjab, is a landmark of 20th century architecture and urban planning. The Swiss photographer Ernst Scheidegger, founder member of the Magnum agency and famous for his pictures of the artist Alberto Giacometti, travelled to India and to Chandigarh several times in the 1950s, where he took a large number of photographs of the growing new city, its government buildings and also of the local people and their living conditions. From this material he made a mock-up for a book, "Chandigarh 1956", illustrated also with sketches and drawings by Le Corbusier. These equally striking and illuminative photographs are published here for the first time.This book also includes a facsimile of Scheidegger's original mock-up for "Chandigarh 1956". The Swiss art historian Stanislaus von Moos investigates in a comprehensive essay the importance of Chandigarh and of Ernst Scheidegger's photography, and explaining how Le Corbusier's office also took control of publicity for the Chandigarh-project and analyses how the reception of urbanism and urban planning by the media has changed.

Ernst Scheidegger was educated as a photograper at the Zurich College for Applied Arts. He was a founder member of the Magnum agency in Paris, and later a teacher for visual design at the renowned College for Design in Ulm (Germany). From 1960-80 he was a supplements editor of the Swiss newspaper Neue Zurcher Zeitung, for which he also produced more than 200 own photo reportages. At the same time he ran an art gallery and a publishing house, now Scheidgger & Spiess Publishers. He has made film portraits of artists such as Max Bill and Alberto Giacometti. Stanislaus von Moos graduated in history of art from the University of Zurich. He has been a professor for the history of modern art at the University of Zurich from 1983-2005 and is currently teaching at the Accademia di architettura in Mendrisio, Switzerland. He was Jean Labatut Visiting Professor at Princeton University in 1997. He has published widely on the history of art and architecture and is an expert on Le Corbusier's life and work.