[Utilitarian goals and artistic autonomy architectural forms and their functions]

In the late 19(th) century, authors writing on aesthetics often referred to architecture to justify establishing a new hierarchy between things beautiful and things useful, a change underwritten by the rising sociological and anthropological perspectives on art. Meanwhile, architects debated the origins and evolution of artistic styles from the earliest forms of art to the most advanced monumental art works, a debate that fundamentally transformed the relationship between artistic expression and material determinism.