The UIC Barcelona School of Architecture lecturer Alfons Puigarnau has just released his volume titled Hitchcock: anatomía del suspense. Espacios y lugares, (Hitchcock: The anatomy of suspense. Spaces and places), published by McGraw-Hill. The book is made up of a series of hitherto unpublished texts that analyse architectural design strategies inspired by the filmography of the British filmmaker and ‘master of suspense’, Alfred Hitchcock. Published in both digital and printed format, the volume includes more than 400 pages and 200 black and white images, as well as a prologue by Stephen Jaeger, emeritus professor at the University of Illinois. In addition, students from UIC Barcelona School of Architecture Ignacio Infiesta and Marcos Puig have also collaborated on the book.
The book is divided into three main sections on Cinema, Architecture and Music, and features eleven chapters that “move metaphorically through the human body, creating, as the title suggests, a veritable 'anatomy of suspense'", said the professor. By exploring the spaces and places of suspense that make up Hitchcock’s filmography, Puigarnau carries out “a critique of the rationalism of modernity, in which space acquires a cold and mathematical dimension that can be experienced in a relational and human way through a sense of place”, he added.
“In the midst of the digital revolution and the post-truth era, Hitchcock shows younger generations that suspense is a form of knowledge and a stimulus for emotion. Even if they see him as an eccentric filmmaker, they connect with him through black humour, sarcasm, and the genius of the unrepeatable,” the lecturer pointed out.
Hitchcock: anatomía del suspense. Espacios y lugares is the result of Alfons Puigarnau's past decade of experience as a lecturer in Ethics and Aesthetics at UIC Barcelona School of Architecture, a subject studied by hundreds of students from over forty different countries during this time. “For the students, Hitchcock's work has proven to be a revelation about architectural and urban space and, indeed, about their own position in the world”, concluded the professor.
The McGraw-Hill publishers ranks number 13 in the general ranking of foreign publishers best rated by experts, and ranks 30 among Spanish publishers, according to the latest Scholarly Publishers Indicators, Books in Humanities and Social Sciences (SPI) ranking published in 2018.
