2000.01.03 03:38
Re: sculpture versus architecture
Pinar Dinc writes:
What about the notion of life? In order to call a composition as a work of architecture there must be a life in it. A life around it does not make it architecture, I think. The composition must embrace a life style, must be an accompaniment of a life style but not be the focus of it. The objects which are for perception only, cannot be called architecture. They are called sculpture.
Steve Lauf replies:
What Pinar writes comes across as very true as a reasonably way to approach "what is architecture?" as opposed "what is sculpture?" And for the most part I agree with the notion that architecture accommodates life. So I then ask if this 'definition' must be broadened to include all built forms that once accompanied life and a life style, but over time have come to no longer do so. I am thinking of ancient ruins, be they Stonehenge, the Pyramids, the Parthenon, the cave temples of India, etc. These are commonly referred to as examples of architecture, yet today they are clearly "objects which are for perception only." Have these architectures become architecture/sculpture hybrids? Furthermore, no one now lives in Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye, nor, it might be argued, does the life style around which the Villa Savoye was designed to accompany now exist. Is the Villa Savoye a master work of modern architecture that is now an "object which is for perception only?" Or is it merely that the 'life style" the Villa Savoye now accompanies is one where great buildings (if they're lucky) become cultural shrines, where the buildings now accommodate our 'perceptual worship'?
2000.01.03
zeitgeist and architectures
[This] theme accomodates REMOVE, reenactment architectures, tsPOWa, 19120/19111, and even eBay pics and copyright free texts. In general terms, zeitgeist + architectures incorporates archtiectures of the past, present and future, and all the ideas regarding the body, the imagination and architetures come into play.
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2001.01.03
in "Beyond Style"
I spent a good bit of last weekend reading throughout Precis: Beyond Style (1985), and, as luck would have it, the articles by authors other than Stern and Libeskind were the most interesting and worthwhile.
"Building Metaphors" by Arthur C. Danto contained at least this one sentence which I had to repeat: "It is rather an architectural reenactment of a Renaissance reenactment of a dreamt classical city believed to be real, and because it is a city in connotation it can and does emblemize the city it is part of." Danto is referring to McKim, Mead and White's campus of Columbia University. Of course, I do not know the whole of architectural literature, but this quotation is the earliest direct connection between architecture (design) and reenactment that I come across thus far.
"On Style as Personal Expression" by Carlos Gomez de Llarena begins with: "Style, specifically the question of personal style, is hardly discussed today in architectural criticism and even less evident in teachings about architecture." Although I can't be at all certain, I imagine that the case of "personal style" is still the same today (ie, fifteen years since de Llarena's article.) I remember a woman, a fellow classmate in my first year design studio, who had an affinity for Art Nouveau, and she actually was able to apply an 'art nouveau' sensitivity to contemporary design projects. Of course, the woman was not exhibiting a solely personal style, rather I saw her as having found an affinity with the (established) style, and thus rendered application to her own designs. Further, of course, this woman's designs were consistantly chastised by the design critics. I hence always thought there might just be something terribly wrong about nipping creativity in the bud just because of "stylistic" differences. Anyway, de Llarena's article is a thorough analysis of (architectural) personal style and its more or less self-evident yet often denied implications.
"The Rise and Transformation of Modern Style: A Polemical History" by Edward Mendelson is a study of "High Modernism" versus "Low Modernism", and, although a little dated, nonetheless offers a neat way to dissect modernism. I now wonder if the term "Hyper Modernism" has yet been coined, that is, "beyond modern" as opposed to "post/after modern". I think a case can already be made for the classification of a Hyper Baroque, which is the European style corresponding to the century between roughly 1650 and 1750, and Hyper Size is perhaps the best description of what comes after S,M,L,XL.
Interestingly, in "Madness and the Combinative" Bernard Tschumi uses the word "hypertext" (which I'm guessing may have first been used within Tschumi's The Manhatten Transcripts, which I have not read). It was actually strange for me to see 'hypertext' associated with architecture fifteen years ago. It reminded me of the days (also fifteen years ago) when I used to regularly read The Face (a UK 'popular style' magazine). There were always lots of ads for new music CDs, mostly from groups or bands I never heard of. It never failed that when I looked through an issue of The Face that was a year old, I then recognized all the bands and music being advertised. The points being, introductions virtually always have a strong tint of foreign-ness, and it takes time for information to be assimilated. One of the reasons I like history is because you can often actually find those times when "traditions" first were foreign.
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2002.01.03
ideas
4. ...what the Starlux really reenacts.
6. outer spatial architecture
08010301 ICM plans rearranged 3392ni01
08010302 IQ mirror-copy plans 2392i30
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13010301 Working Title Museum 004 site plan extent IQ04 IQ07 3392si01
13010302 Working Title 002 working model 2324i13 b c e
15010301 OMA Guangdong Baosteel Building
16010301 [virtual] Museum Museum site plan 22002 Ottopia
2428i06
16010302 [virtual] Museum Museum site plan 22002 IQMC
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16010303 30th Street Station Railyard schematic master plans 910.vw
2430i15
16010304 30th Street Station Railyard REMs infill master plan 910.vw
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16010305 Danteum Plus Ultra site plan 22002 IQMC
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16010306 Danteum Plus Ultra model site plan 22002 IQMC
2433i04
3392vi07
17010301 Alvar Aalto/NRT Oy Renovation of the Aalto University Undergraduate Centre
18010301 smallest plans 10x10x10 Cube Ury House Arbor Street House Maison Dom-ino Maison du Peintre Ozenfant Tempietto Porta Pia Mount Pleasant Schröder House Ridgeway House Vanna Venturi House Glass House Villa Baizeau Frug House 2 Single House Weissenhof Princeton Memorial Park Tower Eclectic House House VI Venue Frug House 1 Francisville Housing Unit Eames House and Studio Gallery B Fisher House Farnsworth House Gooding House Composition Three Wall House 2 Maison de l'Homme Glass Pavilion Urban Components
2232i03
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