Hartmut Mayer

TEXT IN GERMAN. Tectonics is back on the agenda for contemporary architectural discussion. Up to now tectonics tended to be associated with the language of neo-Classical architecture, which seemed to have faded out because of the triumph of Modernism, but now the dogmas of Modernism are being questioned, interest is reviving in architecture using tectonic design principles. So DIE TEKTONIK DER HELLENEN, Bötticher's main work published in 1844-52, does not just provide a theory of tectonic form that is still estimable today, it also contains a theory about the central problem of the 19th century, that of taking over the stylistic forms of past epochs.