In the fifteenth century everything changed. Human intelligence discovered a way of perpetuating itself, one not only more durable and more resistant than architecture, but also simpler and easier. Architecture was dethroned. The stone letters of Orpheus gave way to the lead letters of Gutenberg. The book will kill the edifice.
~ Victor Hugo

MEDIA NARRATIVE

In his 1831 novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Victor Hugo asserted that with the invention of the printing press the printed word would replace the cultural role of architecture. Although Hugo did not make an explicit statement that this was a positive or negative development, he did explicitly advocate for the preservation of cultural monuments like Notre Dame Cathedral because it was unlikely that buildings of such significance would be built in the future.

Although “media” did not exist when Victor Hugo made his declaration, a serious consideration of his assertion should affect the architecture we build today, how we capture architecture in today’s media, and what part the media’s portrayal of architecture plays in determining architecture’s societal role. Although Hugo was concerned with print in his time, the current video, internet, and social media make his assertions even more important to consider. Has digital media now replaced print as Hugo asserted print replaced architecture?

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…architecture will never be the social, collective, dominant art it was. The great poem, the great structure, the great masterwork of humanity will never again be built; it will be printed.
~ Victor Hugo