18 Ewa Węcławowicz-Gyurkovich
to him and based on Derrida’s philosophy, they laid the
theoretical foundations of deconstruction in architecture.
In the Polish literature, Cezary Wąs [4], Tomasz Ko-
złowski [5] and Anna Krajewska have commented on this
issue: We can therefore say that Deconstruction (whatever it
is – a method, an attitude, a worldview) refers to the notion
of movement. The beauty of Deconstruction certainly does
not lie in stability and normality, but in changeability, mo-
mentariness, unsteadiness of connections [6, pp. 20, 21].
Very often, the nal forms challenged commonly known
principles. In completed architecture, the solids lose their
stability, sometimes giving the impression as if they were
detaching from the ground and ying into space. An im-
portant common element is fragmentation and the intro-
duction of movement, represented by kinetic art, but also
the introduction of the element of time, which occurs in
Futurism – it proclaimed the “beauty of speed”. Curvature,
dislocation, collapse, fracture or squashing, breaking into
parts, explosions, collisions, separations, cutting through
matter and areas evoke shock and amazement. The separa-
tion of function and form became important. This is what
Eisenman wrote in Representations of The Limit; Writing
a “non-architecture”
1
, about the theoretical works and vi-
sual installations of the late 1970s by Daniel Libeskind:
This was the beginning of an attempt to free elements
from their function in both their tectonic and formal sense
– from the causal relationship of function and form (after:
[7, pp. 66, 67]). The provocative confusion and interpene-
tration of forms, which are very often rotated, transformed,
juxtaposed with each other as part of a pre-planned jumble,
do not repeat the familiar compositions of the past. They
are fresh, dramatic, surprising, never seen before. The indi-
vidual buildings are dierent, as they result from each art-
ist’s dierent vision and perception of the world around us.
American architect Mark Wigley’s doctoral thesis
Jacques Derrida and Architecture: the Deconstructive
Possi bilities of Architectural Discourse [8], which was
presented at the University of Auckland in 1986, became
a challenge to organise an exhibition of designs and com-
pleted buildings by seven representatives of this trend at
the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1988. This
exhibition was organised by Philip Johnson and Mark
Wigley. It showcased the designs and buildings of Zaha
Hadid [9, pp. 101–119], Frank Gehry, Bernard Tschumi,
Rem Koolhaas, the Coop Himmelb(l)au team, Peter Eise-
man, Daniel Libeskind. The event reverberated through-
out the world and was followed by numerous magazine
articles. Meanwhile, the book summarising the exhibi-
tion portrayed architecture as a philosophical concept
[10]. Wąs, analysing Wigley’s philosophy, points out that
Deconstruction in architecture is mainly about breaking
down and destroying the structure of forms from within:
This results in the breaking down of the composition, a se-
ries of dislocations, deviations or disruptions […] there
is a discovery of the imperfection consuming the work
1
Eisenman P., Representations of The Limit; Writing a “non-archi-
tecture”, [in:] D. Libeskind, Chamber Works. Architectural Meditations
on themes from Heraclitus, Architectural Association, London 1983.
and bringing the composition to the limits of stability, but
without nally crossing them [4, p. 23].
Published in 1984, Eisenman’s essay The End of the
Classical: The End of the Beginning, the End of the End
criticises the paradigms of value and time in the percep-
tion of architecture. This author writes: […] Architecture
in the present is seen as a process of inventing an articial
past and a present without a future. It remembers a future
that no longer exists (after: [11]). Deconstruction has also
become a language emphasising symbolism and prepar-
ing the viewer to read meanings, even more strongly than
postmodernism. It seems to be more important to inu-
ence the viewer with shape and extravagant massing than
to t into an existing context. The deliberate introduction
of provocation, the creation and search for dierence and,
above all, the freedom to shape forms, emotions and cour-
age against the hitherto existing boredom and schematism
– these are the basic features of the trend.
Deconstruction in Poland
In our country, the architecture of Deconstructivism
emerged with a long delay. This was related to the politi-
cal and economic isolation of Central European countries
in the 1970s and 1980s. Economic considerations also
played a major role in delaying the completion of archi-
tecture of this trend here. The inuence of the public level
of preparation for the perception of avant-garde art should
also be emphasised, including the degree of aesthetic ed-
ucation of Polish society, for which the aesthetics of the
late 19
th
century was a model in many cases. Thus, De-
constructivist architecture initially appeared in Poland at
the turn of the 1980s in the form of small-scale structures.
It was not until the second decade of the 21
st
century that
important buildings for culture were created in this style.
Poland in the 1980s was experiencing a social, econom-
ic and political crisis. It seems that during these dicult
years, the inhabitants of our country were preoccupied
with satisfying their subsistence needs rather than intro-
ducing avant-garde aesthetics. This delay was mainly due
to the economic situation of the country and the investors,
as well as the lack of access to the latest technologies and
building materials that the Deconstructivist realisations re-
quired. It is a very elitist movement, with very few build-
ings completed in Europe and around the world. In Poland,
experimental examples of this trend began to appear in the
late 1980s and early 1990s in interiors, mainly of public
buildings. At that time, it did not require large nancial
outlays. Today, many of these interiors no longer exist. In
2001, a multi-family, four-storey residential building was
completed in Krakow at 32 Wybickiego Street [12, p. 179].
In this case only a twisting of the front wall on the side of
Józefa Wybickiego Street was applied. In the architect’s
opinion, this building cannot be qualied in its entirety as
a realisation in the Deconstructivist trend
2
. Such delicate
2
The building was designed by Elżbieta Kierska-Łukaszewska,
and in researching Krakow’s late 20
th
and early 21
st
-century architecture,
Maciej Motak classied the building as deconstruction [12, p. 179].
