The operating tradition of the Compagnonnage du Devoir du Tour de France

1. The “working tradition”of the Compagnonnage du Devoir du Tour de France This paper represents part of a more articulated research actually in progress in the Faculty of Architecture of Polytechnic of Bari on the stone-cutting architecture as koinè of the Mediterranean masonry tradition. The paper’s content concernes methods and principles of transmission of knowledge and know-how of the Compagnonnage du Devoir school, articulated into three critic knots as: - The continuous renewal of the knowledge and the construction of a specific cultural domain; - The teaching architecture of formation; - The applied research in building and restoration yard (the buildings are considered as built books). The continuous exchange, between learning and construction, allow the development of a “working tradition” that renews his knowledge during its own doing. 2. The knowledge domain. Theory and experience The didactic of cut-stone building art needs the construction of a specific cultural domain constituted by theoretical knowledge and experiencial know-how, a description of the arts, seen as the written codification and application of sciences, as a phenomenological expression of scientific-theoretical principles. As a consequence, the process of learning the art of stone masonry should be divided into three stages: - The cognitive phase: the initial study of elements and techniques necessary to on-site construction work - The executive phase: a working sequence is repeated, starting from the observation of craftsmen’s techniques and following his methods. - The synthetic description of the work into the norms of the specific cultural domain. 3. Training. Principles and Methods The culture of professional training in Compagnonnage du Devoir school is characterized by real humanism because the traditions surrounding stone construction, assume a dynamic identity of a development of processes and techniques through the constant renewal afforded by each individual, human work experience. The “travelling” training, the so called Tour de France, is the principal and necessary training nucleous, during which the students alternate studying and work in different cities as the maitres artisans alternate work and teaching, assuring the transfer of the new technical acquisitions from the yard to the school. 4. The restoration yard of the cathedral of Rodez. Knowledge and know-how. In the cut stone – building yard take place the learning and trasmission of “stereotomic” know-how. The restoration of an old stone building, considered as a “maintenance”, is the most important moment in the forming experience of the Tour de France, in which theoretical studies and building art become experimental applied research of the Compagnon. Among the case-studies, the restoration of an old building, such as the Cathedral of Rodez (France) constitutes an extraordinary possibility for: - studying the relation between form, cutting and bulding technics from the stone; - finalizing the techniques to the replication of the building elements; - codifying and transmitting the techniques, making eternal the tradition.