Contenu du sommaire : L'architecture rurale : questions d'esthétique

Architecture without architects : an unvoluntary aesthetics ? The problem of the aesthetics of rural architecture has been handled, or covered up, in various ways by specialists in their analyses, typologies and inventory procedures, as well as in the practical applications of their research. Various disciplines have treated this topic differently depending on their conceptual approaches and methods as well as their social and institutional histories. In this respect, it is telling to compare what ethnologists, art historians and architects have to say.

The useful and the pleasant : the question of aesthetics in the survey of rural architecture conducted by the Musée National des Arts et Traditions Populaires (1943-1947) A policy for protecting rural architecture and landscapes developed out of a survey conducted by Georges-Henri Rivière for the Musée National des Arts et Traditions Populaires from 1943 to 1947. Besides soliciting monographs, this survey sought to discern the decorative elements and distinguish the functional from the aesthetic. Using cases observed in the Margeride and Aubrac areas of France, this article examines this survey's results, the shortcomings of the grid used for analysis, and the position as an expert that was filled by those who conducted the survey. This survey's problems are explained by going back to Riviere's comments both on the nostalgia for a golden age and on the functionalist theories dominant at that time. A more open approach to aesthetic analysis is proposed that calls for taking into account the observer's subjectivity and knowledge of local architectural systems. Thus can be understood the relative coherence of value systems and of the practices of an agricultural, or rural, way of life, even in contemporary forms.

Peasant houses and aesthetics in the Lyon mountain area In the mountains to the west of Lyon, France, the style of farms (two opposite buildings joined by an open shed to form a square farmyard closed by a high wall) gradually developed from the late 18th till the early 19th century. This major architectural evolution occurred along with a transformation of farming practices and society. Aesthetic choices were produced by a cultural system where social practices were being uniformized, family strategies were rooted in the land, and there was a concern for protecting the household world. Through the choices of the builders of these farms, aesthetics can be understood as a reserve of meaning for expressing the dialectics of the particular and the general, of the intimate and the ostentatious, of the private and public realms.

Styles and models : houses with archways in the northern Hautes-Alpes department Houses with archways are thought to be typical of the Vallouise Valley, France, even though they represent a small proportion of houses there and are found elsewhere too. The only feature that distinguishes them from other houses in Vallouise is the facade. All houses have the same structure, interior distribution of space and system of circulation. The archways on the facade thus seem to be a deliberate embellishment independent of a house's internal layout. This style of house was adopted during the second half of the 18th century by well-off farmers and local officials, who chose it out of a stock of forms that was neither typically rural nor specifically Alpine.