SIGNED BY ROBERT VENTURI AND DENISE SCOTT BROWN: LEARNING FROM LAS VEGAS

VENTURI, Robert. SCOTT BROWN, Denise. IZENOUR, Steven. Learning from Las Vegas. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press, (1972). Folio, original full blue cloth, photographic onlay, original glassine dust jacket. $6000.

First edition of this revolutionary book of architecture, signed by Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown. With rare original glassine dust jacket.

Architect Robert Venturi, city planner Denise Scott Brown, and architect Steven Izenour's manifesto expressed their critiques of the plainness of modernist architecture, and extolled the virtues of a different aesthetic in which architects were more receptive to the tastes and values of average people. "The target of Venturi's attack is Mies van der Rohe's formula 'less is more', a phrase coined to denote a form of aestheticised functionalism. Venturi's response, illustrated by historic examples, is 'More is not less', or, in a particularly aggressive formulation, 'Less is a bore'. Venturi sets out to put his experience of Mannerism and Baroque to the service of a new concept of architecture by returning to the complexity in form and substance, of these two styles; at the same time his experience of contemporary Pop Art turns his thoughts to the everyday world of the consumer society" (Kruft, 440). The influence of this work extends far beyond architecture: it is credited with inspiring the post-modern movement in art and literary and social theory. This first edition includes a section on the architectural work of the Venturi and Rauch firm, and more and larger photographs than do revised editions. Without errata slip.

Book fine, fragile glassine dust jacket with creasing, shallow chipping to extremties with no loss of text. A near-fine signed copy of a landmark work in postmodern architectural theory.