REYNER BANHAM SLIDE COLLECTION

Author(s): Dennis Sharp

Source: AA Files , Summer 1994, No. 27 (Summer 1994), pp. 93-96
Published by: Architectural Association School of Architecture

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.com/stable/29543903

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Reyner Banham Slide Collection
AA EXHIBITION GALLERY, MEMBERS' ROOM & BAR 13 JANUARY -10 FEBRUARY 1994

Reyner Banham always had an arm's-length material from the Reyner Banham Slide Collec? significance for so many generations. This point
relationship with the AA, yet many people who tion, which has been donated to the AA by Ban? was reiterated in Cedric Price and Ron Herron's
came to London to study architecture in the late ham's widow, Mary, in memory of her husband. useful and perceptive remarks published in the
1960s and early 1970s seemed to think that he This gift is now housed in the AA Slide Library leaflet which accompanied the exhibition.
was a member of the teaching staff. Those of us and consists of thousands of images taken over The colour slides did not exude the individual
who ran the arts and history department at the about twenty years before he died in 1988. The power, or communicate any of the coherent
AA found it got so bad that we had to come to an collection includes personal and family images as points, of the well-produced films. It has to be ad?
arrangement whereby the most keen of these well as all those things that display the inexhaust? mitted that they made little sense without adequate
misinformed students could get into the lectures ible nature of Banham's inquiring mind: gas captioning, or the resonant tones of the lecturer
Banham was giving just down the road at the stations, landscapes, furniture and, of course, behind them. There was no indication of what
Bartiett School, where he had been given a chair bulbous American car-tits. they were or why they had been taken, or why
of architectural history. In 1976 UCL lost Ban? Only a very small number of the slides could be they were being shown. In one sense this is under?
ham to the USA. displayed in this modest exhibition which, for all standable. After all, most of them were intended
By that time Banham had become the most im? its thinness, did manage to convey a real sense of as primary source-material for Banham's own lec?
portant critical commentator on architecture in occasion, largely through the voice-overs of the tures, films, magazine articles and books. They
Britain. As Pevsner's protege he soon established continuously running videos which amplified that make or underline a pertinent point or illustrate a
his position as a practical theorist with his monu? unmistakable combination of authoritative particular subject area. Clearly some were simply
mental and indispensable Theory and Design in American drawl colliding with a genuine 'have memory-joggers. As Cedric Price observed, there
the First Machine Age (1960). There followed yer got a lite mate' Norfolk accent. is another side to these Banham pictures: 'He was
further important publications on modern archi? The television videos featured in the exhibition always relating things back to people. . . . His
tecture. These marked out new milestones in the included Reyner Banham Loves Los Angeles slides involved people doing things, people in
exegesis of modern movement texts. Couple this (1972), Roads to Eldorado (1979) and Fathers of action. I think one of the reasons he used photo?
to his brilliant career as a journalist with the Pop (1980). Additionally, in a separate, rather graphs was to freeze an experience in history for
Architectural Review and later New Society and it spare setting a selection of 35-mm. colour slides his own delight.'
is understandable why he became ? at a time of varying quality were projected onto a large I hope that those who take advantage of this
when such definitions were important to students screen. The videos brought back refreshing mem? marvellous new AA asset will be able to weld
and stylists alike ? a guru of pop, non-pop and ories of the friendly, smiling, acerbic and well these images into contexts as illuminating as Peter
well-tempered environments. Thankfully, most informed Banham. It was compelling stuff and his Banham did.
of his books retain much of their relevance today, reassuring and charismatic presence still held. Dennis Sharp
despite the efforts of untalented copyists and Banham deserves to be introduced to new gener?
plagiarists to cash in on their reputations and ations of students ? some to whom I spoke at the This exhibition and the subsequent tour were sponsored
themes. These publications ought to be repack? time of the exhibition seemed sadly ignorant of his by the Architecture Unit of the Arts Council.
aged in new editions, perhaps, and a wider selec?
tion of his criticism and illustrative material
published in anthology form.
For someone of my generation Banham
achieved a reputation within architectural criti?
cism and history writing that was as large as the
one the big bad Wolfe had assumed in contem?
porary criticism and pop literature. Banham's
illustrated talks on aspects of historical, theor?
etical and contemporary architecture always
retained their pertinence and freshness. His oc?
casional evening lectures at the AA and at Art Net
were packed. Unlike Joseph Rykwert's lectures
during the same period, which were ? to the
exasperation of many of his audience ? usually
accompanied by out-of-focus and amateurish il?
lustrations, Banham's presentations were impec?
cable ? and in later years, when he drew more
upon his American interests and obsessions, free
of copyright and deeply personal. He usually took
his own photographs, at the time a rare enough
phenomenon for such a high-profile sage. For
many of us it was also a tremendous relief, as we
had to sit through many talks each week from
internal and visiting lecturers who drew relent?
lessly on the AA's own members' slide collection.
It was a joy to have Banham mixing in his own
stuff with the glass-covered AA Slide Library
classics.
The exhibition of slides and videos held in Janu?
ary and February of this year in the AA Exhib?
itions Gallery was made up of a selection of Peter Reyner Banham photographed by Tim Street-Porter

AA FILES 27 93

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THE AMERICAN SOUTHWEST
In his Scenes in America Deserta (1982) Banham
described the desert as 'a territory which is now
among the chief of my earthly pleasures \ Many of
the slides in the collection were taken on his travels
throughout the Southwest during 1980-6 when he
was Professor of Art History at UC Santa Cruz.

94 AA FILES 27

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CALIFORNIA BUNGALOWS
Another large section of the collection is devoted
to California architecture. Below is a series of
bungalows photographed in Santa Cruz 1981-3.

95
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 AIRSTREAM CAMPERS ^?^^^^BB^^Si?^ - '
'A self-propelled residential gizmo seems to be a ^^^^^^S?^S^^^^^M^ '
kind of ultimate in the present state of US culture \ toSBhBBm
wrote Banham in Design by Choice (7957). For ^p^^M^^mP^^^^^'' '
him the camper represented the ultimate in ^^^^^SSBiBI^" ^ ^ii^
freedom and what he called 'gizmology\ ^^^^H^^^^^Hku v

^^^^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^^^^

96

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