The Urban Aesthetic and the perception of the artifact city at the dawn of the twentieth century

Abstract

Based on the analysis of Camillo Sitte and Charles Buls studies, the article discusses the contribution of the Urban Aesthetics in the understanding process of the built environment as cultural heritage. In the context for urban transformations throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth century – particularly related to the viability of modern life in ancient cities –, several thinkers sought theoretical and practical tools for understanding these urban structures and guide their transformation. In this search, Sitte and Buls, among others, studied the city as a historical and cognitive object, unlike most urban planners of the period who sought to solve urban problems by applying general theories to specific cases, usually without observing the historical specificities of these spaces and their irreproducible qualities. The attempt to strike a balance between old and new urban spaces, seeking to meet the development needs, however, is always an actual theme. In this sense, the brief analysis described here provide us with important theoretical basis for understanding the historical processes related to the elaboration of the urban heritage concept; and shed light also on interpretive trends obscured by the subsequent urban practice.