The “Architecture Histograms” form a catalog of thirty three-dimensional diagrams, with a homogeneous and isotropic surface, intended for use in the design of objects, furniture, environments and architecture, by means of a grid that is transposable to varying scales. These Histograms, also entitled “Tombs of the architects,” for Superstudio, result from their refusal of any convention or any idea of design and architecture. Observing that it is impossible to propose new forms without adopting the logic of the past, Superstudio proposes to make the idea of “quality” in architecture disappear. “An endless grid, in which everyone can live (and die) without being physically or spiritually consumed” (Superstudio), the Histograms refer to the idea of immutability, to the “search for an inalterable image” of nature. The consequence of a general reductive process, the Histograms represent a new mental process, free of models and imitations. Their reticulation is all invasive: territory, objects of furniture, architecture, city, in a “total rethink of the typologies of classicism.” Architecture is nothing more than a mental diagram, a grid without beginning or end. This three-dimensional conceptual step of their theory led to the production of a series of furniture pieces, Misura (1969), elements for self assembly composed of silkscreened laminated plastic, followed by the Quaderna series, produced by Zanotta in 1971.
