Will to war, will to art : cultural internationalism and the modernist aesthetics of monuments, 1932-1964

This dissertation examines a period around World War II when the prospect of widespread destruction provoked a profound re-evaluation of Europe's landmarks, their material value, and their ethical significance. Between 1932 and 1964, works once known as artistic and historic monuments-from buildings to bridges, paintings to shrines, ruins to colossi-acquired a "cultural" value as belonging to the "universal heritage of mankind." Promoted as didactic objects of international understanding, they became subjects of a new brand of international law. I trace the origins of this international valuation to a political movement, identified as Cultural Internationalism, whose main tenet was that the transnational circulation of knowledge constitutes an antidote to war. This ideal fueled the birth of organizations that brandished the autonomy of intellectual work as a weapon against nationalisms: most visibly, the League of Nations' Institut International de Coop&ation Intellectuelle (IICI, 1924-1941), its successor the United Nations Educational, Cultural, and Scientific Organization (UNESCO, 1946-), and the American Commission for the Protection and Salvage of Artistic Monuments in War Area (Roberts Commission, 1943-46). Despite the continued role of this institutional lineage in cultural production worldwide, there has not been a study of its contribution to 20th-Century aesthetics.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Architecture.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2008

Author dc:creator

• Allais, Lucia

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Mark Jarzombek.

• Architecture.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/45941

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/45941