School of Architecture Tsinghua University of Beijing
MOUNTAIN’S SPIRIT Authenticity as a starting point
Secchi Gabriele December 2013
EPMA _ Architecture Master Program
‘Critical regionalism in Architecture’ professor Li Xiadong
Secchi Gabriele
December 2013
EPMA _ Master Program
Tsinghua University of Beijing
Mountain’s spirit
“If I throw a brick into the waves, after two hours the sand and the sea will have operated in such a way to structure channels and contours around the brick, merging it with the beach. After five hours the brick will have found itsproper position or ‘place’. I’m interested in finding that ‘place’ for my houses!” G.Murcuttn
Secchi Gabriele
December 2013
EPMA _ Master Program
Tsinghua University of Beijing
Mountain’s spirit
Index Abstract ......................... 1
Global formalism ......................... 3
Regionalism & Historical Concept of ‘Boundary‘
.........................
6
Mountain Spirit ......................... 12
P. Zumthor ......................... 16
Conclusion ......................... 21
1
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 Lecture in CSP University, By G.Murcutt, Pomona, 1991.
Secchi Gabriele
December 2013
EPMA _ Master Program
Tsinghua University of Beijing
Mountain’s spirit
This Paper could also be titled
MAN. SOUL. ENVIRONMENT. Investigation on the principles that shape the natural human perception
MOUNTAIN ENDEMIC APPROACH a muse for an authentic critical-regionalism
Secchi Gabriele
December 2013
EPMA _ Master Program
Tsinghua University of Beijing
Abstrarct
ABSTRACT
Why are we still discussing about the theme of “Critical Regionalism” in architecture?
The causes are to be found in the definition ‘vague metaphors and symbolic references’ of what nowadays we try to define: motivated reasons to build abstruse ‘architecture’. It is even academically recognized the loss of human identity intrinsic in any modern projects visible, for example, in the contemporary periodicals. This article wants to discover and try to find, a true definition of a new dynamic regional answer, to the discussed approach of how to invade a vernacular stratified local identity.
The paper starts from a summarized historic investigation of the concept of the boundary / bound
and the human relation with the singularity of the place. It continues trying to understand the hand-crafted functionalist mountain’s spirit when is time to realize an authentic architecture, especially based on the physical environmental characteristics, that daily shape the method to look / fell the surrounding, of the local people.
The aim of these pages is to demonstrate - trough the work of 2009 Pritzker Prize Peter Zumthor
-the, already identified, universal endemic possibility of how to approach the convoluted theme of a dynamic regional architecture, literally critic with itself.
KEYWORDS
Boundary, anthropo-investigation, physical-human habitat & perception of the space, handcraft authenticity,
critical alpine regionalism, neo-vernacular approach, local needs.
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Declaration of Authenticity
Declaration of Authenticity I the undersigned declare that all material presented in this paper is my own work or fully and specifically acknowledged wherever adapted from other sources.
I understand that if at any time it is shown that I have significantly misrepresented material presented here, any degree or credits awarded to me on the basis of that material may be revoked.
I declare that all statements and information contained herein are true, correct and accurate to the best of my knowledge and belief.
Secchi Gabriele
16th Dec. 2013
(Secchi Gabriele)
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Global Formalism
GLOBAL FORMALISM An elegiac voile that discloses ‘indoctrinated’ certainty
When you open and leaf through the pages of any ordinary contemporary architectural periodical,
you can see that most of them try to represent an image of the matter ‘architecture’ with senseless attractive pictures of the facades - maybe without any surroundings - or with incredible futuristic renders taken from an improbable camera position, or worse trying to convince the reader that an architecture simply works because the ‘thermal bridge’ between wall & window2 is well solved. For example, there is no human spatial schemes that can provide the reader with the idea of an internal office space; no genuine historical or morphological note has ever been seen beside an interior snapshot, which can at least give the idea of a real perception of the height for the local inhabitant in a “multifunctional center”.
The reach of today architecture is unbelievably amazing: it has this capacity to attract any passionate
people whichever background they have, thanks mostly to the globalization of ideas. At the same time however it is alarming how this fact weakens the authentic human meaning that our ancestors gave to the topic.
“There was a time when architecture was made with a concern for the way that the sun fell and the
windows blew, and that architecture was a backdrop for human events. It gave meaning and focus to people’s lives; it was a way in which a people and a culture explained themselves to each other, understood themselves, and spoke to the future. 2
‘Thermal bridges’ (definition). T. B. are junctions where the thermal insulation is not continuous: where for a wrong project de-
sign or an unprofessional capability of the construction company, the critical discontinuity joints of the insulation lets the cold/hot weather from outside to came inside of the building. The external temperature influences the controlled interior climate, in an uncontrollable exchange and loss of thermal energy.
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Global Formalism
To make an architecture today that has that capacity for meaning seems to me to be a desirable thing to seek. To make an architecture that is distinct from what much of today’s architecture has become, that is, packaging and fashion, seems to me to be a way to return architecture to its connection with man and therefore nature. To produce a richer and more meaningful human experience and, in the best sense of the word, to produce a man-centered architecture… that has a meaning for people and a place.”3.
There is a reason why researches about the already lost “identity”4 in the building appearance or in the
contemporary ruthless abstruse strategy for a urban completion are still part of the main modern debates. It is simply unsatisfying, if not even irrational, the nowadays general way to understand and teach the significance of the artificial art of creating space.
“At the same time, resistance to the misconceived narrowly interpreted post-war functionalism in
architecture, paralleled by the short-lived socio-political campus movements of the 60s, allowed universities, primarily in USA, to reduce courses that dealt with the theoretic aspects of morphology and aesthetics as defined by contemporary psychology – vital courses that provide architects with an understanding of human perception.
3
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 H. Wolf.
4
Public roundtable in order to respond at the question: “What is happening to modern architecture?”,.11th February 1948 in
Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, By S. Amourgis, College of Environmental Design, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991.
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Global Formalism
This condition created gaps in architectural education that limited the architectonic vocabulary and dialectic ability to deal with aesthetics as an accountable theory articulated with reality and life. Thus, ultimately the meaning of form was reduced to the visual value of the object the integrity of which then relies totally on subjective reflexes, enhanced sometimes by associations with vague metaphors and symbolic references.”.5
It is firstly through a spontaneous attempt to study the mountain’s spirit, and secondly to use a
contemporary endemic alpine work, that this article wants to discover the new universal-regional possibilities to approach the intricate debate of what is nowadays becoming the so-called “Architecture of globalization”. Hence, should the effort to find a supposed “identity” be focused elsewhere: it is through an effective investigation of the forces of the site and the strain to define an appropriate solution for the local needs6, that the real spirit of a new architecture, regionally critical to itself should be engendered.
5
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 S. Amourgis.
6
Marco Casamonti, Sentimental education: a dialogue among Marco Casamonti, Pier Paolo Tamburelli and Cino Zucchi,
Milan, 2012 C. Zucchi: “In designing I start from a pragmatic and not semantic element of the architecture, how to solve the distribution problem. I’m sick of hearing all these architects who in order to build a little cottage first have to explain their “mission”, their “vision”, their world of tomorrow. In the sense, a certain “bourgeois is discretion” can even be revolutionary, there are times when keeping quiet is a form of radicalism.”.
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Regionalism and Historical concept of ‘Boundary’
REGIONALISM & HISTORICAL CONCEPT OF ‘BOUNDARY’ Crucial human role in the definition of the topic
A new concept that has been spread in parallel to the idea of any effective architecture is indeed the
idea of Critical Regionalism.
It is not additional theoretic reflections that this article wants to provide to the reader, nevertheless it
will try to define the main ideal purpose behind it - thanks and referred to the principal discussions held in the early past; also focused mostly on the conclusions made by the meeting “Critical Regionalism” hold in Pomona (California) in the end of 1991.
Primarily it is necessary to clarify, in a contemporary way of looking and considering the goal of such a
large debate, the concept of the boundary in the investigation: a clean definition of the samples of the research.
Starting with the first discussion about the perimeter of the cities in the far Middle Age - through a
more reflective and wider analysis of this delicate aspect at the beginning of the 18th Century7;8 - the heritage of all these theories that are leading us today or that have guided this approach in the recent past, can be seen, more or less, as an inextricable thread which touches many if not unlimited aspects.
7
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991. “[…] by the end of the 18th century (the concept of the geography and boundary in the human’s scale sense of the meaning), it had become associated with human rather than natural attributes, such as continuities and discontinuities of language, religion, ethnicity, and economy, or mental aspects significant for local people, aspects define place, belonging, community.”.
8
A. Von Humbolt, Lecture to the Royal Academy of Science in Berlin , 14th December 1826, from Critical Regionalism: The
Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, By S. Amourgis, College of Environmental Design, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991. “[…] (explanation/ definition of the elderly sense of regions) how the environment consisted of form and function and how they were interlinked”. It is in this phrase that for the first time has been introduced the new concept of “Byo-geography” like an elaboration of the concept of an organic and physiological model connected with the old idea of a region. It was a new chapter for the discovery of the region/ boundary in in the sense of a body in movement.
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Regionalism and Historical concept of ‘Boundary’
Therefore, the concept of the boundary started to come in contact with new wider and meaningful
notions: from the topography to the meaning of the site9, from the idea of a nation to an indefinite shape of the human relation10 with its cultural differences and personal peculiarities influenced by the territory. Once arrived at the point where no definition of the boundary was clear - especially when it comes to the approach of the argument - it should not have been a surprise to read the sharp article which appeared on the New York Times on the 28th of March 1992, titled “The End of Geography”11, as a reaction against the continuing frustrated attempts to define a container which confines the spatiality of the question.
Especially in this period of pure globalization and continuous outsider influences, all these abstract
definitions of the term “Boundary” seem to be an encouragement, according to the New York Times’ article, to think about the theme, without a container idea, and approach it in a way to define this border with common principles. Common principles as definers of the word “critical”, always referred to the definition that Lefaivre & Tzonis gave to the critical regionalist approach: an entity that can provide a new and sparkling way to redefine – to add something contemporary – to the simple concept of regionalist architecture.
9
W. Sherman, The Architecture of Mario Botta: Narrowed Gates in an Expanded Field, Cite Spring 1987
“[…] (The desire of M. Botta) to “build the site,” the tension between contextural relationship (from the surrounding context to the impact of the local materials to the site) […].”.
10
H. Arendt, The Human Condition, 1958 in Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, By S. Amourgis, College
of Environmental Design, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 “[…] space of human appearance.”.
11
L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Architecture of Regionalism in the age of Globalization: Peaks and Valleys in The Flat World, Rout-
ledge, , Abingdon, Oxon, 2012.
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Regionalism and Historical concept of ‘Boundary’
Common principles as influences that should not be forgotten also when we include the shade of the
history12 in the method to approach the theme.
Many architects and past theorists spoke about the role of the history in our present time; focused on
a wide range of arguments, they discovered many tasks which it can influence, like: the definition of a formal shape, the arrangement of the space (outdoor, indoor, in & out), but also, the choice of the materials, the integration in a pre-existing urban web….
What can be resumed from such an unlimited extent of debates - according to Barnes13, Giedion14
and coeval theorists - is the view of the history as a continuum in movement: something which exists with or without our perception, and in such an intimate way it touches us and shapes our comprehension. This is surely a useful point to start an historic reflection about the role of the past in/for the site. It should be thought of as a sacred principle, as an energetic push, that has to dramatically shape the project.
12
Giò Ponti, In Praise of Architecture, Dodge Corporation, New York, 1960
(personal translation) “[…] the formal world where we live is richer than the ancient one, because in it, lives also the ancient principles. In our culture the elder is a “contemporary” fact. There is no antique in the culture: there is the simultaneous and marvelous presence of everything antique and present but also the arcane attraction for the future.”. Italian version: Giò Ponti, Amate l’architettura: l’architettura è un cristallo, Società editrice Vitali e Ghianda, Genova, 1957 “[…] il mondo formale nel quale viviamo è più ricco dell’antico, perché vi è compreso anche l’antico; nella nostra cultura l’antichità è un fatto “contemporaneo”; nella cultura non esiste l’antico: esiste la presenza simultanea e meravigliosa di ogni cosa antica ed attuale: e l’attrazione misteriosa del futuro.”. . 13
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 E.L. Barnes, 1964 “[…] (architectural operations) is part of a process, not a world in itself.”. 14
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 S. Giedion, 1943 “[…] the continuity of human experience always exist alongside and in contrast to our day-to-day existence.”.
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Regionalism and Historical concept of ‘Boundary’
It is not possible anymore to give to the history the ignoble role that has been given to her for such a
long time15;16. It is not possible anymore to use it like an attempt to integrate a new artificial construction in an old and entrenched human habitat17.
It is probably “habitat” the real meaning that K. Frampton wanted to express about the role of the site
in his reflection: how specific influences of architectural elements effect the dualism between construction and situation of the spot. When he refers to a practical approach of the primary function of the window18 - in his idea of its relation with the site - he places man at the center: he theorized the window as a main way to link the characters of the territory with the construction, always from the human’s perspective.
15
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 16
K. Frampton, “Towards a Critical Regionalism: Six Points for an architecture of Resistance”, in “The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on
Postmodern Culture”, By Hal Foster, Seattle, Washington, Bay Press., 8th October 1979 “[…] and what I referred to, perhaps with somewhat unfair pejorative implications, as a kind of scenography which makes a very gratuitous, or parodied, use of historicist motifs.”.
17
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 R. Bassani. ‘The term habitat is the right definition to describe the entirety and the natural shade of the place. That’s how the location has to be considered, how the environment has more than an obvious relation with the locals normality day by day’.
18
K. Frampton “Towards a Critical Regionalism: Six Points for an architecture of Resistance”, in “The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on
Postmodern Culture”, By Hal Foster, Seattle, Washington, Bay Press., 8th October 1979 “The window, a critical element in the expression of architecture, has the ability to inscribe the character of the region through its placement in the wall..”.
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Regionalism and Historical concept of ‘Boundary’
It is under the same justified relations building/environment, but with relatively a lot of differences in
the meaning of the window, that the old architect Laurie Baker approaches this theme19. Looking at his work on Indian houses, it is fascinating the substance he gives to this basic element: he simply succeeds as a regionalist architect when uses this as a controlled filter to let the environment come in the interior; it is on these terms that he catches and lets the exterior soul shape the user’s perception from inside.
Therefore ,what is admirable from these two methods of thinking the opening in the construction, is
the weight of its role in a contemporary and effective regionalist sensibility about the link between a natural exterior and an entirely artificial interior: such a dynamic and human way to experience the theme.
Moreover, the sense of the consideration that 20 Lefaivre & Tzonis have expressed about the local work
of A. Aalto is clear and reasonable. They investigate his productions in a regionalist alternative analysis, to arrive at the conclusion that: “ […] (Aalto’s regionalism) is a selection of materials, adaptation to the site, relation of the profile of the building to the landscape […]” and only later, even if it was in conflict with mainstream globalist USA’s architecture, the authors define the most interesting part of Aalto’s approach “[…] (his feeling about) the way of life of a region […]”21. Thus - as a new sensible hint to face the debate - this seems to be the right way to access the regionalist field.
19
S. Bhooshan, Significance of Laurie Baker, Architect and Professor of Habitat Design, Bangalore.
20
L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Routledge, Architecture of Regionalism in the age of Globalization: Peaks and Valleys in The Flat
World, Abingdon, Oxon, 2012.
21
L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Routledge, Architecture of Regionalism in the age of Globalization: Peaks and Valleys in The Flat
World, Abingdon, Oxon, 2012.
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Regionalism and Historical concept of ‘Boundary’
More than an entire generation of theorists and architecture masters tried to solve the local debate
of finding a strategy to invade the natural environment: the permanent topic - which is never absent of any reflection - is the concept of a human-centered perspective when it is time to intrude a local habitat.
What should never be missing is a sensible and instinctive background as a starting point to design
into the territory.
J. Ruskin, Autumnal Cloud filling the Valley of Geneva, the Jura rising out of it, seen from the Brezon above Bonneville, scanned of watercolour over graphite, 119 x 237 mm, probably autumn 1862 “Especially in this period of pure globalization and continuous outsider influences, all these abstract definitions of the term “Boundary” seem to be an encouragement, [...], to think about the theme, without a container idea, and approach it in a way to define this border with common principles. “. “[...] the view of the history as a continuum in movement: something which exists with or without our perception, and in such an intimate way it touches us and shapes our comprehension.”.
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December 2013
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Mountain’s Spirit
MOUNTAIN’S SPIRIT A convoluted case to explain a straightforward path
“For, to myself, mountains are the beginning and the end of all natural scenery; in them, and in the
forms of inferior landscape that lead to them, my affections are wholly bound up; and though I can look with happy admiration at the lowland flowers, and woods, and open skies, (where) the happiness is tranquil and cold […] it appears to me like a prison, and I cannot long endure it”22.
How deeply can an endemic environment change human perception in the consideration of the land’s
shape and general space? How can the morphology of a place influence a subjective idea when it comes to defining the image of a routine formalism?
It should be an intrinsic principle, especially for anyone who is going to put his hands on the behavior
hue of a specific area, the way to look at the natural surrounding as a catalyst for the local idea of form and consciousness of ordinary spaces. Hence, it should not be a surprise to see the ridges and the slopes, but also the peak, as key roles in the idea of the deep-rooted feeling to the ground that experience mountain’s people.
22
J. Ruskin, The Mountain Glory, Volume IV, Chapter 20, in Selections from the works of John Ruskin, By Chauncey B. Tinker,
Professor of English in Yale College, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1908 “[…]For, to myself, mountains are the beginning and the end of all natural scenery; in them, and in the forms of inferior landscape that lead to them, my affections are wholly bound up; and though I can look with happy admiration at the lowland flowers, and woods, and open skies, (where) the happiness is tranquil and cold, like that of examining detached flowers in a conservatory, or reading a pleasant book[…] it appears to me like a prison, and I cannot long endure it.”.
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Mountain’s Spirit
When you look at the physical factors and the irregularities of the environment, it is indisputable
that the importance of the gravity is shaped differently, for example, in the perception of the weight23; in the comprehension of the varicolored morphological space, but also in the refined and sometimes overworked selection of materials (for instance a simple wooden board as main element to an interior paving, or a rough sharp piece of stone as part of wall cladding…). It is an incredible and natural invisible hand that mitigates the ordinary understanding of the place and inspire the final feeling of the user when it comes to perceiving the habitual space. It is fundamental to read this as a continuous convoluted process for a better understanding of the mountains feeling and the sensation of the multifaced meaning , which mountains provide to everything. Every speech should indeed start according to this diatribe.
Though the real meaning he wanted to express was different, Giò Pontì24 found the perfect term to
define this conceptual idea of how to analyze any information: he titled his first book “Architettura è un Cristallo” (“Architecture is a Crystal”). It is interpreted as a definite numbers of essences, summed in a complex but pure and limpid definition, of how the soul of each meaning should be.
23
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 “Where the buildings meet the ground he (architect L. Kroll) uses (mostly) earthy materials; […].”.
24
Giò Ponti, In Praise of Architecture, Dodge Corporation, New York, 1960
Italian version: Giò Ponti, Amate l’architettura: l’architettura è un cristallo, Società editrice Vitali e Ghianda, Genova, 1957.
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Mountain’s Spirit
As one of D. Hockney’s25 photo collages, wants to capture the attention of the observer, in a glimpse,
and donate him the different meaning of each variation of color, spatial and temporal significance, the same one that seems to be sheltered in the alpine practical approach.
What makes the alpine soul or, more in general, the mountain’s spirit so universal, appears to be,
the various-colored, practical and functional approach in every, in particular rural, architecture. It feels as an extensive proof, as a common term, the conclusion that can be perceived from the Ruskin’s work26.
When it is added the role of being a local inhabit, the meaning of the theory goes over: it arrives to
a point where it is mystically accepted the interchangeable association between the man’s physicality / the human’s manner to live and the natural environment27 / architecture presence28. Furthermore, when Ruskin writes about his love for mountain, he associates it with the role of the architecture itself.
25
Martin Gayford, A Bigger Message: Conversations with David Hockney, Thames and Hudson, London, 2011.
26
J. Ruskin, The Mountain Glory, Volume IV, Chapter 20, in Selections from the works of John Ruskin, By Chauncey B. Tinker,
Professor of English in Yale College, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1908 “They (the mountains) seem to have been built for the (entire) human race.”.
27
Zhang Bo, En Jingxuan, Luo Zhongzhao, Comparison Of Chinese And Western Architecture, China Intercontinental Press,
2008 Qing Nang Hai Jiao Jiing:“Stone are bones of mountains, earth is flesh of mountains, water is blood of mountains and grass and woods the skins and hairs of mountains.”.
28
J. Ruskin, The Lowland cottage: England and France, Oxford, sept. 1837 in Architecture of Regionalism in the age of Global-
ization: Peaks and Valleys in The Flat World, By L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Routledge, , Abingdon, Oxon, 2012 “If our object … is to embellish a scene, the character of which is peaceful and unpretending, we must not erect a building fit for the abode of wealth or pride, … beautiful or imposing in itself, such an object immediately indicates the presence of a kind of existence unsuited to the scenery which it inhabits.”.
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Mountain’s Spirit
The sense he gives to the time and building’s ‘beauty’ can be seen as pure and harmonious.
The sense he gives to a universal sense of peace which belongs to general idea of the “cottage” can be
seen as a neat, skilled, hard-built container of such a personification of the functions as a real beauty29.
An aim so theoretical and so philosophical, that really seem to be, the most practical path to follow /
the handy key to access to the question of pure regionalism nowadays dormant epoch. J.Ruskin, Illustration for “The poetry of Architecture” (1837-38), in The Architectural Magazine (February 1938) “[...] yet it was nothing in itself, nothing but a few mossy fir trunks, loosely nailed together, with one or two gray stones on the roof: but its power was the power of association; its beauty, that of fitness and humility.”. J. Ruskin, The AiguilleBlaitière, ca. 1856, in Works, Facing, VI, 230, Scanned image by George P. Landow
29
J. Ruskin, The Mountain Cottage: Switzerland, part III, ca. 1850 in Architecture of Regionalism in the age of Globalization:
Peaks and Valleys in The Flat World, By L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Routledge, , Abingdon, Oxon, 2012 “Well do I remember the thrilling and exquisite moment when first, first in my life (which had not been over long), I encountered, in a calm and shadowy dingle, darkened with the thick spreading od tall pines, and voiceful with the singing of a rock-encumbered stream, and passing up towards the flank of a smooth green mountain, whose swarded submit shone in the summer snow like an emerald set in silver; when, I say, I first encountered in this calm defile of the Jura, the unobtrusive, yet beautiful, front of the Swiss cottage … the loveliest piece of architecture I had ever had the felicity of contemplating; yet it was nothing in itself, nothing but a few mossy fir trunks, loosely nailed together, with one or two gray stones on the roof: but its power was the power of association; its beauty, that of fitness and humility.”.
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P. Zumthor
P. ZUMTHOR Handcrafted knowledge communicate authenticity
Peter Zumthor, son of a cabinet-maker, was born in Basel in 1943. He learned the carpenter’s art in
1958 at the age of fifteen. In 1968 he became a conservationist architect for the Preservation of Monuments of the Swiss Canton of Graubünden. It is probably during this work that he understood the qualities of the construction mainly related with the different conditions of rustic building materials. These are probably the most important heritages we can see in his contemporary projects and that define him as a pure alpine architect.
It seems that the sense given to the mass and to the meaning of each material’s personality is proper to
Peter Zumthor’s work: the roughly hand-crafted impression that comes from the perception of his production, is something that can be defined as a conceived attempt, already singed in the Ruskin’s odes30, to find the genuine meaning of every part and detail. When the Swiss Architect in one interview tries to clarify his studio’s opinion about the meaning of the materials, he doesn’t simply connect this role with the manual sense of the applied arts (capability of engineering, concreteness of the building, taste of handmade work…); he also links all these souls with the local identity.
30
J. Ruskin, The Mountain Cottage: Switzerland, part III, ca. 1850 in Architecture of Regionalism in the age of Globalization:
Peaks and Valleys in The Flat World, By L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Routledge, , Abingdon, Oxon, 2012
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31
P. Zumthor
His choices of endemic materials and combinations of them, naturally catch the deep sense of the
personality of the place. It is in his book “Thinking Architecture”32 that all these methods of working present themselves; as we can read when he writes about his childhood, his experience of architecture without thinking of it, it seems that this intrinsic sensibility, to feel each daily object, is innate: a deep-seated opening to the infinite daily multifaces sparks.
Let’s focus on Vals’ Therme project for a while, to see what he wants to express with his contemporary
intervention.
31
M. Ligas Tosi, Interview to P. Zumthor, 2nd April 2004, e-article “http://architettura.it”
(personal translation) “[…] I think that, in the architectural field, the materials can have poetical qualities. I think that they should ring again and shine, they should be limpid and transparent. The matter of building is the art of conform an essence with sense, started from a multiplicity singularities.. I respectfully look at the art of joining the things, at the capacity of the builders, artisans and engineers. The human knowledge of how to make a project reliable, of how practically something is built, simply touches me. In my work I try to give to my constructions a meaning that can give the gratitude back to this awareness. Moreover , I try to design my constructions that can defy this capacity. I’m truly inside the practice of doing architecture, of building something simply perfect. Architecture should not be abstract, it has to be concrete […].”. Italian version: M. Ligas Tosi, Intervista a P. Zumthor, 2 aprile 2004, articolo digitale “http://architettura.it” “[…] Ritengo che nel contesto di un oggetto architettonico i materiali possano assumere qualità poetiche, che debbano risuonare e risplendere, essere limpidi e trasparenti. Costruire è l’arte di conformare un tutt’uno dotato di senso, a partire da una molteplicità di parti singole. Guardo con rispetto all’arte del congiungere, alle capacità dei costruttori, degli artigiani e degli ingegneri. Il sapere dell’uomo relativo alla realizzazione delle cose, implicito alla sua bravura, mi impressiona. Cerco quindi di progettare delle costruzioni che rendano giustizia a questo sapere e che, inoltre, siano degne di sfidare questa bravura. Sono votato alla pratica vera e propria dell’architettura, al costruire, alla cosa realizzata nel modo più perfetto possibile. L’architettura non deve essere astratta, bensì concreta.[…].”.
32
P. Zumthor, Thinking Architecture, Konkordia Druck GmbH, Bühl, Birkhäuser, Basel, Boston, Berlin, 1996
“[…] There was a time when I experienced architecture without thinking about it. Sometimes I can almost feel a particular door handle in my hand, a piece of metal shaped like the back of a spoon. […] I remember the sound of the gravel under my feet, the soft gleam of the waxed oak staircase. I can hear the heavy front door closing behind me as I walk along the dark corridor and enter the kitchen, the only really brightly lit room in the house […].”.
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P. Zumthor
Vals33 is an antique nucleus (1200 m.a.m.s.l.) of rooted houses clustered around a seventeenth-century masonry church, which gives them the typical important reward of an emblematic ordinary alpine village. Vals’ Therme is an alpine complex of internal and external swimming pools that softly lean against the steep slope of the natural surrounding landscape. The main scene is occupied by the two warmer baths, which take place in the center of a stretched rectangular plan which are suggested in the draw, like the horizontal idea of the all intervention. Both of them are surrounded by ordinary functions, which are part of any modern thermal baths (sweat stone area, massage area, meditation room..): all settled in an orthogonal planar position of compensation. The stunning background of the Swiss architect evidently emerges from a 3D study of a planar realistic rendering. The complex is composed of a balanced distribution of woody velvety concrete walls, which massively define the subdivision of the area, and a noble studied gripping space, floating above a limpid iron healthy pool water, to whom is imposed the role of a subjective guide for the perceptionof the final user34.
33
Polytechnic of Torin, The build’s matter: Vals’ Therm…, research by department of Architecture, prof. Pierre-Alain Croset, Oct
2008. Italian version: La materia del costruire: Terme di Vals…., Politecnico di Torino, ricerca a cura della facoltà di architettura, prof. PierreAlain Croset, ott. 2008.
34
P. Zumthor, Presence in Architecture: Seven Personal Observations on Presence In Architecture, School of Architecture in Tel
Aviv University, 2013, “www.archdaily.com” Transcript from the reworked report of the interview While teaching at Harvard, Zumthor tasked his students with designing “The house without a form,” for someone whom they share a close, emotional relationship with. They were to present the site with no plans, sections or models. The objective was to inspire a new sort of space, described by sounds, smells and verbal description: “When I look at this kind of house without a form, what interests me the most is emotional space. If a space doesn’t get to me, then I am not interested [...] I want to create emotional spaces which get to you.”.
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35
P. Zumthor
It is not only for the human feeling of the internal void, but also for the nuanced perception of
the materials, that the opera of Zumthor can be seen as an artificial essence - soaked with stratified layers of authentic emotional personality - that belongs to the rough colossal harmony of the mountains36. It is from the basic research of the connection between his childhood and the meaning of every natural-artificial interaction, that Zumthor starts to shape his own architecture in a contemporary era of global innovation.
The analysis of his opera can be defined as a sharp design of the profile and the angles of the entire
system, as an innovative use of desaturated concrete form’s mark of wooden veins, or as an intelligent crisp smoothness fascinating use of light as a mask for the logical understanding of how the skeletal engineering structure works.
It is not surprising to see this way of working as one universal example of a neo-vernacular approach of
regional architecture: specifically as a new, already accomplished way, to rethink the alpine critical regionalism.
35
P. Zumthor, Presence in Architecture: Seven Personal Observations on Presence In Architecture, School of Architecture in Tel
Aviv University, 2013, “www.archdaily.com” “We actually never talk about form in the office. we talk about construction, we can talk about science, and we talk about feelings [...] From the beginning the materials are there, right next to the desk […] when we put materials together, a reaction starts [...] this is about materials, this is about creating an atmosphere, and this is about creating architecture.”.
36
P. Zumthor, Presence in Architecture: Seven Personal Observations on Presence In Architecture, School of Architecture in Tel
Aviv University, 2013, “www.archdaily.com” “Every once in a while, I get this feeling of presence. Sometimes in me, but definitely in the mountains. If I look at these rocks, those stones, I get a feeling of presence, of space, of material.”.
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P. Zumthor
Anon., Vals: Thermal Baths, Vals,ca. 2010, avaiable online at: “www.openhousebcn.wordpress.com”
“[…] as intelligent crisp smoothness fascinating use of light as a mask for the logical understanding of how the skeletal engineering structure works.”.
M. Masetti, Thermal Baths, Vals, 2012, avaiable online at: “www.archdaily.com”
“ It is not only for the human feeling of the internal void, but also for the nuanced perception of the materials, that the opera of Zumthor can be seen as an artificial essence (soaked with stratified layers of authentic emotional personality) ”
“[...] as a sharp design of the profile and the angles of the entire system, as an innovative use of desaturated concrete form’s mark of
Anon., Vals: Thermal Baths, Vals, 2013, avaiable online at: “www.pinterest.com”
““The complex is composed of a balanced distribution of woody velvety concrete walls, which massively define the subdivision of the area, and a noble studied gripping space, floating above a limpid iron healthy pool water, to whom is imposed the role of a subjective guide for the perceptionof the final user”
“The strength of provincial culture resides in its capacity to condense the artistic and critical potential of the region while assimilating and reinterpreting outside influences”37
37
W. Sherman, Remark of K. Framton, in The Architecture of Mario Botta: Narrowed Gates in an Expanded Field, Cite Spring
1987.
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Conclusion
CONCLUSION
When it is time to invade a new crowded or immaculate territory, with an artificial form of art, there
should be a necessary question that comes to mind: the minimal local impact of the project which is going to configure the future temperament of the region.
A critical regionalism, mitigated by contemporary forces, should be seen as an authentic key to shape
the environment.
It is indifferent if the operation is in a more or less developed culture, the contemporaneity of the
project lives in the parallelism of human behavior and the solution of the needs. There is no differences if the project is in a western region, (which assesses the straight familiarization spectator – building integrity38, as one of the main characteristics,) or in an oriental land (which assesses the human – nature dualism and the space & time as one unit). The deep-rooted method which is used on the research of the regional needs mustn’t be changed. The resolution of the needs is supposed to be - in any complicated and new panorama39 - local and efficient.
38
Goethe, Goethe’s Sturm und Drang, II point, 1972 in Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, By S. Amour-
gis, College of Environmental Design, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 “This awareness is aroused by establishing as effective affinity between building and spectator, a sense of highly emotional familiarity.”.
39
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 L. Sicheng, c.a. 1940 “Chinese architecture between tradition and modernity faces a grave situation. Something new must came out of it, or Chinese architecture will become extinct.”.
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Conclusion
The main purpose should be, trying to find the purity of a continuous human tradition40 that only
belongs to the intrinsic soul of the place and site.
“[…] We are only beginning to know enough about ourselves and about our environment to create a
regional architecture. Regionalism is not a matter of using the most available local material, or of copying some simple form of construction that our ancestors used, for want of anything better, a century or two ago. Regional forms are those which most closely meet the actual conditions of the life and which most fully succeed in making a people feel at home in their environment: they do not merely utilize the soil but they reflect the current conditions of culture in the region.”41
40
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991 E. Schneider-Wessling :”[…] site means also history and tradition … and mainly is concerned with the intentions of the people that live there […].”. 41
L. Munford, The south in Architecture, in Southern Roots + Global Reach: Reflections on a Theme By P.L. Laurence. Centen-
nial Symposium Clemson University, South Carolina, 1941.
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Related Citations
RELATED CITATION “[…] architecture is a <<form of an essence>> and not a <<form of his own form>>”42 “[…] architecture gives birth to a lifestyle of humans, not a style of the buildings”43 “[…] Home should be a <<machine à habiter>>.”44 Giò Ponti
“Architecture has always represented the prototype of a work of art the reception of which is consumed by a collectivity in a state of distraction.”45
W. Benjamin
42
Giò Ponti, In Praise of Architecture, Dodge Corporation, New York, 1960
Italian version: , Giò Ponti, Amate l’architettura: l’architettura è un cristallo, Società editrice Vitali e Ghianda, Genova, 1957
43
Giò Ponti, In Praise of Architecture, Dodge Corporation, New York, 1960
Italian version: , Giò Ponti, Amate l’architettura: l’architettura è un cristallo, Società editrice Vitali e Ghianda, Genova, 1957.
44
Giò Ponti, In Praise of Architecture, Dodge Corporation, New York, 1960
Italian version: Giò Ponti, Amate l’architettura: l’architettura è un cristallo, Società editrice Vitali e Ghianda, Genova, 1957.
45
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design, California State
Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991
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Related Citations
“There is a spiritual value residing in the particularities of a given joint that the “thingness” of the
constructed object, so much so that the generic joint becomes a point ontological consideration rather than a mere connection”46
K. Frampton
“Perhaps we need to understand the awareness of a code not in a regular and clas-
sicist sense but as the search for a minimum level of acceptability and sharing. Adolf Los says that man is elegant when he disappears among the others (in western civilization) […]” 4748
46
C. Zucchi
K. Frampton “Towards a Critical Regionalism: Six Points for an architecture of Resistance”, in “The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on
Postmodern Culture”, By Hal Foster, Seattle, Washington, Bay Press., 8th October 1979
47
Marco Casamonti, Sentimental education: a dialogue among Marco Casamonti, Pier Paolo Tamburelli and Cino Zucchi,
Milan, 2012
48
Marco Casamonti, Sentimental education: a dialogue among Marco Casamonti, Pier Paolo Tamburelli and Cino Zucchi,
Milan, 2012 C. Zucchi: “In designing I start from a pragmatic and not semantic element of the architecture, how to solve the distribution problem. I’m sick of hearing all these architects who in order to build a little cottage first have to explain their “mission”, their “vision”, their world of tomorrow. In the sense, a certain “bourgeois is discretion” can even be revolutionary, there are times when keeping quiet is a form of radicalism.”.
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Bibliography
BIBLIOGRAPHY
J. Ruskin, The Mountain Glory, Volume IV, Chapter 20, ca. 1985 in Selections from the works of John
Ruskin, By Chauncey B. Tinker, Professor of English in Yale College, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1908
Andy Blunden, The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction, from the originally published “Das
Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit”, By W. Benjamin, 1935
L. Munford, The south in Architecture, New York, 1941 in Southern Roots + Global Reach: Reflections on a
Theme By P.L. Laurence. Centennial Symposium Clemson University, South Carolina
Giò Ponti, Amate l’architettura: l’architettura è un cristallo, Soc. editrice Vitali-Ghianda, Genova, 1957
Giò Ponti, In Praise of Architecture, translation by Dodge Corporation, New York, 1960
K. Frampton, “Towards a Critical Regionalism: Six Points for an architecture of Resistance”, in The Anti-
Aesthetic: Essays on Postmodern Culture, By Hal Foster, Seattle, Washington, Bay Press., 8th October 1979
W. Sherman, The Architecture of Mario Botta: Narrowed Gates in an Expanded Field, Cite Spring 1987
S. Amourgis, Critical Regionalism: The Pomona Meeting –Proceedings, College of Environmental Design,
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, California, U.S.A., 1991
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Bibliography
P. Zumthor, Thinking Architecture, Konkordia Druck GmbH, Bühl, Birkhäuser, Basel, Boston, Berlin,
1996
Zhang Bo, En Jingxuan, Luo Zhongzhao, Comparison Of Chinese And Western Architecture, China
Intercontinental Press, 2008
Polytechnic of Torin, The build’s matter: Vals’ Therm…, research by department of Architecture, prof.
Pierre-Alain Croset, Oct 2008
Politecnico di Torino, La materia del costruire: Terme di Vals…., ricerca a cura della facoltà di Architettura,
prof. Pierre-Alain Croset, ott. 2008
J. Ruskin, The Mountain Cottage: Switzerland, Chap III, ca. 1850 in Architecture of Regionalism in the age
of Globalization: Peaks and Valleys in The Flat World, By L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Routledge, , Abingdon, Oxon, 2012
J. Ruskin, The Lowland cottage: England and France, Oxford, 1837 in Architecture of Regionalism in the
age of Globalization: Peaks and Valleys in The Flat World, By L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Routledge, , Abingdon, Oxon, 2012
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Bibliography
L. Lefaivre & A. Tzonis, Architecture of Regionalism in the age of Globalization: Peaks and Valleys in The
Flat World, Routledge, , Abingdon, Oxon, 2012
Marco Casamonti, Sentimental education: a dialogue among Marco Casamonti, Pier Paolo Tamburelli and
Cino Zucchi, Milan, 2012
S. Bhooshan Significance of Laurie Baker, Architect and Professor of Habitat Design, Bangalore
M. Ligas Tosi. Interview to P. Zumthor, 2nd April 2004, e-article, available online at:
“http://architettura.it”
P.Zumthor, Presence in Architecture: Seven Personal Observations on Presence In Architecture, School of Architecture in Tel Aviv University, 2013 avaiable online at: “www.archdaily.com”
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December 2013