DUE CONCETTI DI SPAZIO
Nold Egenter
daryl wrote:
>negenter:
> The below is quite intriguing, but as I, and probably most of the NG
>readers, have no easy access to the periodical mentioned, could you please
>inform me/us as to what it was about the Land. Arch. developments that
>disturbed you?
> As it is, I have only a vague impression of homogeneity and
>uniformity in layout. Perhaps a comparison with classical Japanese garden
>design would illuminate.
> Thanks in advance.
>da...@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca
>
> In article <33639B...@worldcom.ch> you wrote:
>
>: But there is also a great danger that the same disastrously
>: reductionistic drawing-board-graphism we know from modern architecture
>: and urbanism is now increasingly projected onto the horizontal extension
>: of the 'built environment'. What I have seen some time ago at a
>: meeting* on 'architecture and gardens' strongly supports these fears.
>: - Projects realised in Japan by Peter Walker and Shunsaku Miyagi
>: - Gardens designed in France by Philippe Niez and Alexandra Schmidt
>: (Mirmande, Seuilly)
>: - Franco Zagari's Italian garden in Osaka, or his design for Piazza
>: Matteotti in Catanzaro.
>
>: It might be important to start a discussion on this basic theme of any
> : design related to private or public spaces.
>: -------------
>: * In the meantime the results of this meeting are published (in French):
>: Nadia & Jean-Michel Hoyet (ed.): Rencontres Architecture et Jardins,
>: Actes; 1996, Chateau des Forgers, Pesmes (Haute-Saone), France
>: ISBN 2.911911.00.8 (~17.- US$)
>
>--
> . . . daryl . . .
> Lost in c'Space . . .
daryl
thank you for your message. I agree that the problem is not an easy one,
but once you have realised it, you will be amazed to what extent
designers of all subdomains (landscape, architecture, urbanism) are
careless about one of their absolutely basic tools: space.
My reaction against the bloodless geometrisation of horizontal extension
of architecture is based on this wider problem of space. The following
gives some main points.
Our homepage essentially presents results of research into the
anthropology of space and architecture done essentially in Asian as well
as in Euro-Mediterranean cultures. It revealed that there are:
TWO BASIC CONCEPTS OF SPACE
1) A humane concept closely related to human perception and its sensory
dialogue with the environment.
2) The modern concept of an infinite and homogenous void of universal
extension
* Modern homogenous space
The modern concept developed essentially since the 14th century in
Europe. It is initially related with the great names in astronomy
(Copernic, Tycho Brahe, Giordano Bruno, Galileo Galilei, Kepler, Isaac
Newton). It was increasingly confirmed by the great global discoveries
and thus became part of our modern worldview. Baroque architecture
clearly shows early impacts with its ceilings opening towards the skies.
Its impacts on culture however became fundamental with early
industrialisation. Traditional as well as invented objects were
geometrically designed in two dimensions then produced 3-dimensionally
in high quantities with adequate processes. With modernism architecture
integrated these methods introducing also a-historical functionalism
from technology.
* Humane polar (or complementary) space
In contrast to this, the humane concept of space is not universal, on
the contrary, it is basically environmental. But, since human conditions
in regard to environmental space were and are very similar one can
consider it of global value. But what is essential about the
distinction: the humane concept of space is structured entirely
different from homogenous space.
1) It is not abstracted from materia and quality and
2. It combines categorially opposed parts to harmonious units. The
following files in our site may describe this other type of space more
in detail:
http://home.worldcom.ch:80/~negenter/012BollnowE1.html
http://home.worldcom.ch:80/~negenter/061aFramewrkTX_E1.html
http://home.worldcom.ch:80/~negenter/410aJapHouseIntro1.html
http://home.worldcom.ch:80/~negenter/400JapGardHTx1.html
Now, if we try to localise the use of the complementary or humane type
of space geographically and culturo-historically, we find a lot of
indications that it was used in ALL premodern cultures of the world. We
find it in Asia in historical cities as well as in rural domains, we
find it in Euro-Mediterranean cultures ancient and up to premodern
times. It is related to:
* Elements of buildings like gates, doors, facades,
* different types of buildings like houses, palaces, sanctuaries,
temples, as well as
* settlements, towns and cities.
They were all designed according to this type of forming complementary
units. It was somehow the pre-modern 'world-style'. It had basic and
formative impacts on human culture. Since space is interwoven with all
cultural expressions, it can be said that this type of space was
intrinsically interwoven with all aspects of culture. With this
anthropological assumption we might be able to better understand what
happened with modernism.
MODERNISM DESTROYS AN AGE OLD SYSTEM OF HUMAN ORIENTATION IN SPACE
Modernism introduced an entirely different space concept which was
conceived to exist in itself - without man - and which injected
categories valuable in the universe. At the beginning many admired
modernism, it was so entirely new and offered tremendous new
possiblities. As long as modernism was punctual, its impacts were not
felt.
But in the sixties, the huge cancerous modern agglomerations around
historical cities were strongly questioned. Particularly in Germany
where the historical substance had been wiped out by the war and shortly
after - in the proces of the so called 'reconstruction' (Wiederaufbau) -
had been replaced by modern architecture. Suddenly there were Mies-slab
cities all over! The reaction was very strong. It lead to what was
called the 'crisis of modern architecture' at the end 60ies and at the
beginning of the 70ies. It was generally realised: something was wrong
with modernism.
However, the problems were quickly covered up. Many art historians used
the theoretical crisis of architecture to impose their theoretical
apparatus on architectural schools. THEY now made THEIR theories. The
'death of modernism' was dramatically declared, they now brought in
their own premodern terminology, and declared postmodernism as a new
style. In this superficial process of theory-forming (pure
'architectural fundamentalism': Vitruvius was dug out again!) the real
problems got covered up: the conflict of space concepts.
MAN - SPACE - ARCHITECTURE
Man had only be considered very marginally by modern architecture. His
bodily measurements and other functional aspects were used in stereotype
ways. Functional classifications were developed.
But man - in relation to architecture and urban form - is much more than
just that. He lives with memories. And, paradoxically architecture and
urban form support this capacity. Historical buildings may last hundreds
- or even many thousand times the short period of man's own life. The
human memory compares the past with the present. Architecture, our
extra-cranial memory!
This creates the conflict we are speaking about. Modernism could never
compete with historical architecture. It remained 'outisde' the
historical cities, which were preserved. And in these agglomerations and
satellites the products of modernism were considered chaotic, without
humane dimensions. The real reason was not recognised.
If we assume however that modernism imposed a universal concept of space
on a primary one which had developed over hundreds of thousands of years
in the cultural domain, we might understand why the 1:1 scale experiment
of modernism went wrong. It was an attack on something basic for humans:
orientation in space.
Only one example: In regard to space (access-place-scheme), or as an
information system in space, the premodern facade, whether of a gothic
cathedral, a Renaissance palace or a simple row house in any premodern
urban district was not basically different from the door of a
palaeolithic hunter's hut. It was a threshold encoded with all the
semantic, symbolic, social, political implications related to its
paradox function of separating, at the sme time uniting inside and
outside.
When modernism started to turn the entrails of a building to its
outside, this important indicator became obsolete, became merely part of
a 'curtain wall' for instance. The codes got lost. Note that the
composition of a facade was not just an antiquated task of French
Academy, but a very complex system of codes which allowed instant
decoding on the spot. Curtain walls. All codes lost.
If we thus look at modernism (and postmodernism!) as a dissolution
process of codes essential for the human orientation, then, there are
strong reasons to question such extensions of the modernistic
drawing-board mechanism of space representation from the vertical into
the horizontal, into gardening and landscape architecture, as mentioned
in my former letter. It is true, one can certainly relate their
geometric 'drawing board graphism' to Renaissance garden architecture,
or the gardens of French absolutism. But these were onesided precursors
of our through and through rationalism of today. If we realise its
problems, it would not be very wise to use them as idols.
Not to be mistaken: I am not pleading for reactions, but for the study
of a basic thing: SPACE!
Regards,
Nold Egenter