Photography as an instrument of modern construction

Abstract

This editorial examines photography as a critical instrument in the construction, interpretation, and preservation of modern architecture and landscape. Drawing on a series of case studies, it argues that photography does more than record completed works; it actively reveals the technical, spatial, social, and cultural processes through which modern environments are produced and understood. The analysis begins with Mogens Lassen’s collective housing at Ordrupvej 70, where construction photographs document the innovative Systemhuset sliding steel formwork system and demonstrate how technical experimentation shaped modern architectural form. It then considers aerial photography in Tibor Farkas’s planning work for Hungary’s Lake Balaton region, showing how the elevated view evolved from a compositional tool into a means of detecting environmental degradation and fostering ecological awareness. In Caracas, comparative photographic records of modern public housing projects expose the tension between the political image of progress promoted in the 1950s and the later informal adaptations made by residents. The article also discusses Bernd and Hilla Becher’s systematic documentation of industrial structures, highlighting photography’s role in recognising obsolete industrial buildings as architectural and cultural heritage. Finally, the International Carlo Scarpa Prize for Gardens is presented as an example of how photography and documentary film can support research, community engagement, and the transmission of landscape memory. Across these examples, photography emerges as a polyvalent medium: a record of construction, a tool of analysis, a witness to social transformation, and a catalyst for heritage preservation. The article concludes that visual documentation is not secondary to architectural practice, but central to understanding the relationship between modernity, technology, territory, memory, and cultural value.