Lucien Magne : un enseignement de l’architecture à l’École des beaux-arts entre 1892 et 1916

The article begins with a reminder of the main orientations of the history of architecture as it was taught at the École des Beaux-Arts after 1819, when the first chair was created at the school. After the courses of Huyot (1822 to 1840) and Lebas (1841 to 1863) came those of Albert Lenoir, an assistant professor from 1856, appointed to the chair in 1869 and still teaching in 1891. His teaching course ended with the appearance of ogival architecture in the West. His successor, Lucien Magne, taught between 1892 and 1916. He introduced rationalism into thinking about architecture, succeeding here at what Viollet-Le-Duc had been unable to do in 1864 at his chair of «history of art and aesthetics ». For the students, the main aim of the courses still remained the «concours d’émulation », a competitive examination which allowed the school to grade them. The sources which have been kept allow us to appreciate something of the innovations brought by Magne to his teaching. Starting out from a documentary plate showing a series of buildings or parts of buildings of the same type, the students had to compose a detailed restitution, combining structural analysis with decoration, and which could be a complete building or a piece of furniture. Magne’s approach to the history of architecture laid particular stress on building structures (the «ossature ») before going on to an analysis of the ornamental systems of each civilisation. If he paid close attention to the thirteenth — and fourteenth — century architecture in France, he also attached particular importance to the buildings of neo-classicism.Talenti Simona. Lucien Magne : un enseignement de l’architecture à l’École des beaux-arts entre 1892 et 1916. In: Histoire de l'art, N°31, 1995. Architecture. pp. 47-57