Choisy’s Projective Gaze, The Fragment as a Synthesis: Confronting Surveys of Roman Ruins Across Times

AlICe lab, Faculty of Architecture La Cambre Horta, Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Brussels, Belgium

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Abstract

In 1873, Auguste Choisy published L'art de bâtir chez les Romains, analyzing Roman architecture through innovative worm’s-eye view axonometric projections. While scholarship has emphasized his structural and constructive analysis, this research reveals a more complex engagement with compositional logic. Through systematic confrontation between Choisy's original plates and photogrammetric surveys of the same monuments, we identify significant geometric discrepancies that appear neither random nor attributable solely to 19^th-century measurement limitations. These divergences function as geometric inferences: interpretive projections guided by compositional hypotheses rather than neutral technical records. Choisy's strategic choices - including fragment selection, cutting planes, and geometric regularization - systematically embed projective interpretation within apparently technical documentation. They show how his axonometries operated as analytical instruments projecting idealized compositional logics onto fragmentary material evidence. This research demonstrates that productive engagement with historical architectural documentation lies not in correcting past inaccuracies but in understanding how different projective methods construct fundamentally different forms of architectural knowledge.