Architecture & Cultural Data: New publications

Dr Deborah van der Plaat, one of our project Chief Investigators from the Digital Archive of Queensland Architecture (DAQA), has two new edited books out this year. The first is Light, Space, Place: The Architecture of Robin Gibson (with Lloyd Jones, Melbourne: URO Publications, 2022). This book reveals that Gibson’s “body of work, while carrying many of the formal trappings of high modernism, was actually underpinned by a distinctive vision of Brisbane as a sub-tropical city, sensitive to climate and place, and alive with people.” The second book, with John Macarthur, is Karl Langer: Modern Architect and Migrant in the Australian Tropics (London: Bloomsbury, 2022). This book tells “Langer's story through a series of edited essays focused on key themes and projects. Published as part of the Bloomsbury Studies in Modern Architecture series, which brings to light the work of significant yet overlooked modernist architects, it is both an examination of an architect's work and international legacy, and also a case study in the trans-global dissemination of design ideas.” Both books offer fascinating histories of the significance of architecture to Australia’s cultural heritage, artistic and cultural sphere and everyday life.