Carroll William Westfall. Professor. Phone:
574-631-6138. Email: Westfall.2@nd.edu
Carroll William Westfall, familiarly known as Bill, was born in Fresno,
California December 23, 1937. Married since 1982 to Relling Rossi Westfall,
he is the father of two sons Nicholas William (b. 1991) and John Salvatore
(1995). He maintains his membership at Trinity Episcopal Church, Charlottesville,
Virginia.
Professor Westfall completed a BA at the University of California (1961)
and MA at the University of Manchester (1963: thesis topic: “The
Greek Revival Movement in Italian Architecture: 1750-1815”). He
then obtained his PhD from Columbia University (1967: dissertation:
"The Two Ideal Cities in the Early Renaissance: Republican and
Ducal Thought in Quattrocento Architectural Treatises," prepared
under the supervision of Professors R. Wittkower and P. O. Kristeller).
After teaching at Amherst College, the University of Illinois in Chicago
(1972-82), and the University of Virginia (1982-98), he joined the faculty
of the Notre Dame in 1998 as Frank Montana Professor and Chairman of
the School of Architecture, serving as chairman between 1998 and 2002.
His initial work was devoted to the Early Renaissance in Rome and elsewhere
in Italy where the theory and practice of architecture intersected with
the consolidation of political authority and theological reform in the
Church. This led to numerous articles and a book, In This Most Perfect
Paradise (1974). Subsequently, he concentrated on the relationship
between the history, theory, and practice of architecture with increasing
attention to the role of tradition in shaping the practice of the present
to serve the future. A review of this interest is in his contribution
to the 1991 book Architectural Principles in the Age of Historicism
(Yale University Press) written with Robert Jan van Pelt.
A central theme of all of his studies has been the history of the city
with particular attention to the reciprocity between the political life
and the urban and architectural elements that serve the needs of citizens.
This, rather than a stylistically based interpretation of the history
of architecture, has informed all of his work. His current interests
are concentrated on tradition and classicism in architecture and the
American city and on the architect’s capacity to nourish the Christian
faith.
Selected Publications
Those in bold are of particular interest.
In This Most Perfect Paradise: Alberti, Nicholas
V, and the Invention of Conscious Urban Planning in Rome, 1447 1455,
University Park and London (Pennsylvania State University Press), 1974.
[Italian edition: L'invenzione della città, trans. Paola Violani,
introduction by Manfredo Tafuri, Rome (La Nuova Italia Scientifica),
1984]
Architectural Principles in the Age of Historicism,
with Robert Jan van Pelt, New Haven and London (Yale University Press),
1991; paperback edition, 1993.
********
“Apartments,” The Encyclopedia of Chicago, ed. James R.
Grossman et al, Chicago and London (University of Chicago Press: 2004),
p. 26.
“What are the Preservationists Preserving?” Traditional
Building, July/Aug., 2004, 225-6.
“Putting the Urban in New Urbanism,” special Feature Roundtable,
participant: Traditional Building, Jan/Feb., 2003, 22-31.
“The City in the Image of Man,” commentary on Daniel N.
Robinson, “Inventing the Subject: The Renewal of ‘Psychological’
Psychology,” Forum for Antropologisk Psykologi (Department of
Psychology, Aarhus Universitet), no. 11, 2002, 117-122.
“Epilogue: On Building in Rome,” Ara Pacis: Counter-Projects,
ed. Samir Younés, Florence (Alienea: 2002), pp. 69-71.
“Building a Good Santa Barbara,” in Plaza de la Guerra Reconsidered,
ed. Anne Petersen, Santa Barbara (Santa Barbara Trust for Historic Preservation:
2002), pp. 55-64.
“The Humanity of Monumental Architecture,”
American Arts Quarterly, vol. XIX, no. 1 (Winter, 2002), pp. 9-14ff.
Comment in “The Rotunda,” The Classicist, VI (2000-2001),
27-28.
“Architecture as Ethical Conduct,” Instilling
Ethics, Norma Thompson, ed., Lanham, Boulder, etc. (Rowman & Littlefield:
2000), 195-206.
“Verità e bellezza nell’architettura moderna,”
L’altra modernità 1900-2000, ed. Gabriele Tagliaventi,
A Vision of Europe, III triennale internazionale di architettura e urbanistica
di Bologna, Savona (Dogma: 2000), 109-115.
“The Nature and Justice of Cities,” Building
Cities, ed. N. Crowe et al, London (Artmedia: 1999), 20-23.
"Civic Art, Civic Life and Urbanism," Carolina Planning, Vol
24, No. 2 (Summer 1999) pp.23-28.
Review of Paul Zanker, Pompeii: Public and Private Life, trans. Deborah
Lucas Schneider, Cambridge, Mass. and London (Harvard U.P.: 1998), CAA
Reviews, Sept., 1999, at http://www.caareviews.org/reviews/zanker.html
“Architecture and Democracy, Democracy and Architecture,”
Democracy and the Arts, ed. A. Melzer, J. Weinberger, M. Zinman, Symposium
on Science, Reason, and Modern Democracy, Michigan State University,
1994-95, Ithaca and London (Cornell University Press: 1999), 73-91.
“Learning from Pompeii: The Final Report on Urbanism, Pompeii
Forum Project,” http://cti.itc.virginia.edu/~jjd5t/cww/1997/report2.html
“Learning Good Urban Form from Pompeii and Elsewhere,
Supplemental Report of the Pompeii Forum Project,”
http://cti.itc.virginia.edu/~jjd5t/cww/1998/sup-rep.html
“Historicism and Architecture,” with Robert Jan van Pelt,
Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, ed. Michael Kelly, New York and Oxford (Oxford
University Press: 1998), vol. 2, pp. 412-415.
"Renewing the American City," in Urban Renaissance, Gabriele
Tagliaventi, ed., International Conference on Innovative Urban and Architectural
Policies: A Vision of Europe/University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy,
catalogue published Bologna (Vision of Europe: 1996), pp. 52-69 (text
in English, Italian, and French).
“The Classical American City in Image and in Chicago," Modulus
23: The Architectural Review at the University of Virginia, 1995, 52-71.
"Allan Greenberg and the Difficult Whole of Architecture,"
introduction to Allan Greenberg: Selected Works (Architectural Monographs
no. 39), London (Academy Editions: 1995), pp. 6-10.
"Thinking about Modernism and Classicism," The Classicist,
I (1994-95), 6-10. Also at www.classicist.org. (Also published in slightly
altered form as "The Two Natures and the City," in Making
Towns: Principles and Techniques, ed. Steven W. Hurtt and Dhiru A. Thadani,
School of Architecture, University of Maryland, 1994.)
"The True American City," in The New City:
The American City, University of Miami School of Architecture, II (1993-94),
pp. 8-25.
"Architecture as Ethics," in Building Classical: A Vision
of Europe and America, ed. Richard Economakis, London (Academy Editions;
Ernst & Sohn: 1993), 182-187.
"Chicago's Better Tall Apartment Buildings: 1871-1923," Architectura,
XXI (2/1991), 177-208.
["The Classical City, Chicago, and Alfred S. Alschuler," Threshold:
Journal of the School of Architecture, University of Illinois at Chicago,
5/6 (1991), 90 102. (Published in a form lacking my approval and distorting
my thought; a corrective appeared in the Modulus 23 publication cited
above.)]
"Classical American Urbanism," in New Classicism:
Omnibus Volume, ed. Andeas Papadakis and Harriet Watson, New York (Rizzoli)
and London (Academy), 1990, 73-75.
"Purpose and Form in the Renaissance Palace," Roma, centro
ideale della cultura dell'Antico nei secoli XV e XVI, ed. Silvia Danesi
Squarzina, Milan (Electra), 1989, 316-336.
"From Homes to Towers: A Century of Chicago's Best Hotels and Tall
Apartments Buildings," in Chicago Architecture 1872-1922: Birth
of a Metropolis, ed. John Zukowsky, Munich (Prestel-Verlag) and The
Art Institute of Chicago, 1987, 267-289.
"Buildings Serving Commerce," in Chicago Architecture 1872-1922:
Birth of a Metropolis, ed. John Zukowsky, Munich (Prestel-Verlag) and
The Art Institute of Chicago, 1987, 77-89.
"On Razing the Primitive Hut," Art Criticism, III, no. 1 (1986),
11-26.
"Home at the Top: Domesticating Chicago's Tall Apartment Buildings,"
Chicago History, XIV (1985), 20-39.
"Towards a New (Old) Architecture," Modulus
16 (The University of Virginia Architectural Review) (1983), 78-97.
"Benjamin Howard Marshall of Chicago," The Chicago Architectural
Journal, II (1982), 8 27.
"Adam and Eden in Post Modern Chicago," Threshold:
Journal of the School of Architecture, University of Illinois at Chicago,
I (1982), 102 119.
"The Golden Age of Chicago Apartments," Inland Architect,
XXIV, no. 9, (1980), 18 26.
"Manners Matter," Inland Architect, XXIV, no. 3 (1980), 19
23.
"Modern Times: What Happened to the Critics?" Inland Architect,
XXIV, no. 9 (1980), 17 23.
"Chivalric Declaration: The Palazzo Ducale in Urbino as
a Political Statement," in Art and Architecture in the
Service of Politics, ed. Henry Millon and Linda Nochlin-Pommer, Cambridge,
Massachusetts (MIT), 1978, pp. 20 45.
"Alberti and the Vatican Palace Type," Journal
of the Society of Architectural Historians, XXXIII (1974), 101 121.
"Society, Beauty, and the Humanist Architect in Alberti's de re
aedificatoria," Studies in the Renaissance, XVI (1969), 61 79.
"Painting and the Liberal Arts: Alberti's View," Journal of
the History of Ideas, XXX (1969), 487 506; reprinted in Renaissance
Essays II, ed. William J. Connell, Rochester (University of Rochester
Press: 1993), 130-149.
"Antolini's Foro Bonaparte in Milan," Journal
of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, XXXII (1969), 366 385.
Various Recent Activities
(partial listing of lectures given and other activities undertaken since
1995)
Co directed the University of Notre Dame School of Architecture
field trip to China, June-July, 2004; lectures and other presentations
at the Virginia Department of Historic Resources, Richmond, Virginia;
Colloquium on the American Founding, Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts;
Claremont Institute, Newport Beach, California; John Henry Cardinal
Newman Lecture in the series on Christianity and the West: Interaction
and Impact in Art and Culture, Washington; Institute for Psychological
Studies Human Nature Project, Washington, D.C.; Juror, Palladio Awards,
Traditional Building Magazine, New York; lectures at Texas
Tech University; joint program with Notre Dame Alumni Association Hesburgh
Lecture Series; University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada; panel discussion
of Advisory Council Members, 10th Anniversary celebration, Institute
for Classical Architecture, New York City; presentation at The Idea
of Greece, Classic and Contemporary, Virginia Wesleyan College; participation
in Seaside Institute, Seaside, Florida; lectures at Texas A&M; American
Institute of Architects, Historic Resources Committee conference, Rome;
National Building Museum, Washington, D.C.; Cornelius O’Brien
Conference on Historic Preservation, South Bend, Indiana; 100 Years
after the McMillan Plan: Public Debate hosted by Newington-Cropsey Cultural
Studies Center, National Press Club, Washington; L’altra modernità
1900-2000 Conference, A Vision of Europe, III triennale internazionale
di architettura e urbanistica di Bologna, Bologna, Italy; Symposium:
Plaza de la Guerra Reconsidered, Santa Barbara Trust for Historic, etc.
Preservation, Santa Barbara, California; keynote address, The Savannah
Symposium on the City Square,” Savannah College of Art and Design,
Savannah, Georgia; Charles and Shirley Weiss Urban Liveability Symposium,
University of North Carolina Chapel Hill; Olmsted Symposium at Yale
University; Prince of Wales’s Summer Program in Architecture and
the Building Arts, Charlottesville; Member, Pompeii Forum Project, Pompeii,
Italy. > Back to Faculty
