Theatres of Architectural Imagination

Lisa Landrum is Associate Professor and Associate Dean Research in the Faculty of Architecture at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Canada. She holds a Bachelor of Architecture from Carleton University, and a post-professional Master’s and PhD in Architectural History and Theory from McGill University. She is a registered architect in New York State and Manitoba, and a fellow of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada. Her research on architectural agency and the theatrical origins of architectural acts is published in several books, including Reading Architecture (Routledge 2019), Confabulations: Storytelling in Architecture (Routledge 2017), Architecture’s Appeal (Routledge 2015), Architecture as a Performing Art (Routledge 2013), and Architecture and Justice (Routledge 2013). Sam Ridgway is an architect and Adjunct Associate Professor in the School of Architecture and Built Environment at the University of Adelaide, Australia. He has a Master of Architecture from the University of Adelaide and a PhD from the University of Sydney. His research and publications have focused on a theorization of factory-made buildings, construction theory, architectural representation, and the texts and buildings of the remarkable architect and academic Marco Frascari. Recent work explores architectural imagination by enquiring into the complex relationship between architecture and theatre. His publications include Architectural Projects of Marco Frascari: The Pleasure of a Demonstration (Routledge 2015), and "A Theater of Architectural Monsters," in Ceilings and Dreams: The Architecture of Levity (Routledge 2020).

1. Introduction Part 1: Bodies 2. The dramatization of architecture: bodies in the drawings of Álvaro Siza 3. Die Turnstunde: Hans Hollein’s museum performing itself 4. Theatrical metaphors in Bruno Schulz’s prose: a play of imagination for potential architecture 5. Lecoq's Mimodynamics for architects: practicing a renewal of architectural imagination 6. Projecting the eccentric theatre: representations of the synesthetic experience at the Bauhaus 7. Performing the common: political imagination of protest in place Entr’acte A Constructing table – between anamorphic disguise and dissection: a polyphonic drawing experiment Part 2: Settings 8. Roman theatre’s scaenae frons as a thematic edifice 9. A Question of décor: political theatre in Renaissance Ferrara 10. Public spaces as theatres of action: Lawrence Halprin’s phenomenological perspective on cities 11. "The play’s the thing": on theatricality and modern public space 12. Imagining a participatory theatre in Ahmedabad 13. Relations among things: Aldo Rossi and Seville’s Semana Santa Entr’acte B Manifestos on architecting social imaginaries A Good Host Black Box of Imagination: deconstructing the notion of theatres of imagination Part 3: (Inter)Actions 14. A Tale of two foyers: on space between thresholds 15. The palace and the plaza: a post-war convergence 16. A delegated performance for public space: The Mile Long Opera 17. Monsters of architecture and the magical function of theatre: a look at Balinese temples 18. An encounter with wholeness: Vis and Ramin at Persepolis Entr’Acte C Drumming in the hall of the mountain 19. Earthly theatres: moving grounds, suffusing airs, sentient surrounds 20. Janus / In Time: universal openings via live arts – theatre, dance and architecture