Boredom and space: Blunting and jading as causes of change in architecture

This paper explores the notions of blunting and jading, correspondingly posed by Heinrich Wölfflin in the second part of Renaissance and Baroque (1888) and Adolf Göller in the lecture What is the Cause of Perpetual Style Change in Architecture? (1887). In both elaborations, the response of the individual to architecture is characterised by a negative reaction that, similar to boredom, becomes more intense as architectural forms lose the power to impress. These early preoccupations of architectural theory with the affective capacity of buildings identify exhaustion as a defining factor in the production and reception of modern architecture. In addition, they indicate a shift in the interest of the discipline, moving from the design and creation of architectural objects to the concern with space as a category of experience.