Introduction

Countless architecture DVDs are produced every year, the numbers increasing exponentially, filling more and more shelves in architecture libraries. Scholars are increasingly involved in their production and new hybrid genres are emerging, combining film with specialized texts. Perhaps the most impressive example of this is the extraordinary Arquia collection put together by the Fundación Caja de Arquitectos of Madrid. This substantial and growing collection constitutes a serious curatorial effort to identify some of the best films of recent years and present them along with an essay by a noted architect or historian-for example, Joseph Rykwert, Rafael Moneo, Juan Navarro Baldeweg, Alejandro Zaera Polo, Josep Quetglas, Benedetta Tagliabue. The combination of film and text, sometimes with the addition of new documentation, allows for rethinking both the films and their architectural subject. In a relatively short time, the DVD medium has moved from simple conversion of existing films or production of promotional...