Printed Architecture: Petr Vorlík

The 30th session of the lecture series Printed Architecture at the Jablonec bookstore Serius will present the architectural historian Docent Petr Vorlík on Friday, November 27, 2015, at 6:30 PM, who will discuss the latest book Czech Skyscraper.



Doc. Ing.arch. Petr Vorlík, Ph.D. (*1973) graduated from the Faculty of Architecture at the Czech Technical University. For ten years until 2005, he worked as a designer. Since 2002, he has been involved in the research center for industrial heritage at CTU in Prague and at the Faculty of Architecture. He specializes in the history of 20th-century architecture, the history of industrial architecture, and issues of new usage and contemporary architectural creation.
The lecture will focus on the latest book Czech Skyscraper, which traces the story of the modest Czech skyscraper through over a hundred prominent and less-known buildings or utopian projects, such as the buildings of significant interwar manufacturing corporations, public administration headquarters, and the infrastructure of a progressive republic, the post-war realization of avant-garde dreams, uncritical optimism, as well as the arrogance of socialist realism, the victory of technology over landscape and historic cities, prominent showcases of socialism, attempts to humanize monotonous panel housing estates, and post-revolutionary rises of consumerism and the principle of "seeing and being seen." Each era had its ambitions, which often materialized in the construction of high-rise buildings. Through examples of individual high-rise buildings, one can point out the often subtle relationships between power and architecture.

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