A CRY FOR NON-PHOTOGENIC ARCHITECTURE
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Careful! Photo-bashing.
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“for every person who visits a private house, ten thousand people will have seen its picture”1
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We see pictures every day and we get over flooded by them. Part of modern architectural history has to do with the photographs that were taken of the buildings, these are very important for people that are not able to see a space in real life, to still have an understanding of it. But because we have started following, liking and sharing en masse, the picture has started to dictate our lives. Although you would think the opposite is true - since the supply raised, the value should decrease people desperately try every day to create a perfect image to pretend a perfect life to share with friends and family, ironically the people that should really know you. We have more than ever understood the magical power of the camera to create made up realities, that will seem indisputably true.
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Since pictures are starting to win over every other form of visualisation, architects start making hyperrealistic renders, to look just like the pictures that will be taken. Despite the fact that these are often too perfect for real life. This type of representation has definitely changed the way architecture looks, the more photogenic a building the better. We almost start designing in favour of where the camera will be positioned to take the perfect image. People see these images and are impressed by the amazing architecture and the great imagery. When someone still goes and visits a building - yes, highly uncommon because of the availability of pictures - a reaction will all too often be,
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“oh… Is this it?” Indeed, you might as well have stayed home and just looked at the picture of your adored building. Because the reality can obviously not come close to the perfected world of the image. At least, this is when buildings are created merely for the camera, buildings that exist only of a simple layer: that of a gesture. A bold one-liner to shock someone that won’t ever think of this one-liner again. Because that is the effect of them, they get told, they shock and the aftermath is surprisingly brainless. (Sounds familiar doesn’t it?) These one-liner-buildings cannot exceed their virtual reality of the image and cannot impress their audience any more than they already did.
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Say Cheese or how the photo-fetish came to being
“To enter architectural discourse, a building must be photographed and repeatedly published in widely read design magazines, or else it will be forgotten and never exist in the reader’s consciousness”, writes Serraino on the relationship between photographer Julius Shulman and American modernist architects.2
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The collaboration between Julius Shulman and the modernist architects of the case study houses in Los Angeles definitely played a big role in defining the gravitas of photography in architecture. Shulman was firstly approached by Richard Neutra in 1936 to take pictures of the Kun House Shulman’s “opus 1” in architecture. Neutra saw in the two decade younger Shulman a person who he could still manipulate. He introduced Shulman to many other architects that were creating the modernist scene in Los Angeles, one of them being Rudolf Schindler, another Adolf Loos student before the war. The picture taken by Shulman ultimately put Neutra on the map and that was exactly what he had foreseen and why he had started the collaboration in the first place.
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In 1945 the ‘Arts and Architecture’ magazine started the case study house program, set up by John Entenza. Architects were asked to create modern houses, using modern materials for the post war families in Los Angeles and Julius Shulman was the photographer of these houses. These images live on as a metaphor of what the houses are and what they represent, their images becoming such an icon that when you visit you feel that you’ve already seen them.3
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Photography was extremely important for this exercise, because it served the purpose of informing the public of what West-Coast American modernism looked like. But in some way it also killed the
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Visual Acoustics, the modernism of Julius Shulman (2008) Directed by eric Bricker [film]. Los Angeles : Arthouse films
Serraino, P. (2000) Photography and the emergence of American modernism: from the earliest international Style to the 70s in Serraino, P and Shulman, J. (eds) Modernism rediscovered, Cologne, Taschen, p.6. in Hackett, F. (2009) ‘Photography, architecture and inner space’, Building Material, No. 19, ART AND ARCHITECTURE, p. 108 2
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Visual Acoustics, the modernism of Julius Shulman (2008) Directed by eric Bricker [film]. Los Angeles : Arthouse films
architecture. By iconising some pictures to such an extreme that it becomes difficult for the original to baffle you. One thing is photographing what is there, then visiting and understanding so many different levels the photograph just can’t unveil. Which is what happened in this case, certainly with the less famous photographs. But created all too perfect images of a space, just really don’t help in portraying what is actually there, it is an idealised version of reality.4
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The problem is that afterwards too many buildings started being designed around these pictures that would be the outcome, instead of working around the experience people would have when visiting. This is where the modern problem of architecture is partially created and thus an answer of how to change this in the future lays in the description of the problem.
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The medium is the outcome.
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Pictures and renders, create lazy buildings that are just exciting in the instance that they are captured. These are buildings that lack a complexity that is needed more than ever in this superficial era and in the overload of information. We need to step back again from our general rush and our photo-fetish. We need architects that don’t care about photogenic buildings anymore, but architects that find a much bigger value in the experience of the space, the performative aspect of it. We need more spaces again that engage with their visitors and excite them on site. We need three-dimensionality that is more exciting than just a plan, just a section, just a render or a rhino model. We need to work on all senses again and make buildings where people want to go and go and go. Architecture we can’t get sick of.
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Just like being able to rewatch a good movie several times and finding unobserved details. A good building should be just the same. But this is only possible with a certain level of complexity, a layering of information present in the project. This is all too often lacking. Such a complexity is usually not very photogenic, but will impress the viewer when he actually visits the space. A curiosity will be created from the fact that so much great has been written or told on the experience of a building, but that there is no way for you to feel this excitement than to actually go to a specific space. This is true architectural engagement that a building should ask of its audience in order to create a rupture with the present and its overload of fake experiences.
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Not to be reproduced5
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Moveable elements within a building is one of the ways in which this complexity can be achieved. Although very little buildings have moveable parts, it could allow for a certain layering that can stay fascinating because the building can be different every time you go. It is maybe even the fact that this movability can only be witnessed when one enters such a building that makes it architecturally more relevant. It is almost as if different buildings, different architectural scenarios all coexist within one space. This motion often makes room for a certain level of surreality, the motion could be halfway or leave a significant gap from where it left off. Thus creating moments not directly understandable for the audience. It is this split-second - or longer - of doubt that forces you to think how a building works, how it got to looking so odd. This level of engagement is what makes moveable portions of buildings truly exciting. As if the visitor is joining in a dance, only the architecture knows the answer too. Not to be mistaken by the architect, he will probably not foresee the full extent of the surreality his work will create.
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Hypnotised by what you saw you will want to see this performance again, a dance very unlikely to be given by a static building. So it is this niche of complexity, performance and surreality - that only parts in motion can create, that is highly intriguing for me and allows for buildings with so many layers and reads that they become more exciting and ask from the inhabitants or visitors to engage with the architecture around them. Different examples can be found in the current architectural landscape, they have very different mobility elements and create different effects. Diller and Scofidio + Renfro’s Shed in New York, OMA’s Bordeaux house in France, the weekend house in Merchtem by OFFICEkgdvs, Shigeru Ban’s Nomadic Museum, Cedric Prices’ Fun Palace and so on. There is definitely already a presence of these complex moveable environments, all having a different impact on the visitor and his experience. They should work as examples for future architects. To keep in mind the complexity, spatial and performative qualities needed for truly intriguing moments of architecture. Shulman in Visual Acoustics: “When I was asked by Schindler to photograph the Daughtery House and I showed him the pictures, he said ‘Shulman, the light you use is the same on both walls, that is not natural!’ 4
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a painting by René Magritte
Pierre Chareau and his Maison de Verre - built in 1932 in Paris - show how far performative architecture can go, although not very known this house is a milestone for theatrical buildings. This theatricality is created by the five theatre spots that are pointed on the Nevada-glass-tilefacade, thus refracting the light throughout the living room, the difference between natural and artificial light almost inexistent. This house forces you into certain directions, certain circulations. It is the house that leads the dance, and you can only follow. One last crucial aspect within the house are the moveable elements. There are pivoting doors, to create circulation, doors that made the doctor6 bow when he let his patients out of his office - he couldn’t walk them out to the front door, so the door of his office made the doctor pay respect to his clients.7 The staircase that goes from the Doctors office to his study is constructed of metal gridded steps, so his wife couldn’t walk up without people having the ability of looking underneath her skirt, and thus again the Maison de Verre would decide how you would act within it. There are staircases that can be pulled up and brought down, windows you have to turn a wheel to open them up. The bathroom is created by moveable walls and divisions, openable cabinets and meshed screens. To optimise the space available but mostly control when you could glimpse at your partner and make even the morning and evening routine into a private performance only for the dancers and their choreographer. This is a highly cinematic piece of architecture that you can only visit to experience all the little tricks applied, all the little details you could keep revisiting to see new ones every time.
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In the process of making the house, Chareau hardly made drawings, or at least that is what we assume. Plans were not the best way to represent this incredible machine of a house that was coming together. Being in situ, working their with the clients every day, that is how they came to site specific elements that could only work there and then. Maybe that is truly the way architecture should be generated in the future, we need time again. Time to test out, time to visit, time to create on site something that couldn’t be seen in plans or sections, things so complex you didn’t even imagine them coming together. But once the building starts getting built, you see opportunities that weren’t clear before. The Maison de Verre is a house that cannot bore and that cannot be reproduced.8
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Dream-realities
“Magritte used his direct surroundings and changed them into dream realities” - Jan de Vylder on René Magritte9
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Architecten de Vylder Vinck Taillieu is an office in Ghent that puts intuition and making central in their work. The fact that they use this method instead of rhino modelling is why they get to the designs they do and are very different from most offices. They create buildings on site or on physical models, still the best way to get a feel of what the reality will look like. Their incredibly playful and surreal touch is what makes their buildings a delight to visit. The Twiggy boutique is one of their many projects in which this portrays. What could have been a generic store, turned into something unexpected on all levels. Extra stairs were needed to make the building work, so they added the circulation on the back facade, creating a trompe l’oeil the size of the circulation. Creating an external extrusion where the stairs lay into, from the right angle it seems as if the facade is perfectly normal, but from another you see and understand the game at play. They kept all the floors in the interior, except one. Thus creating a highly surreal atmosphere of two floors clashing together, the reminiscence of both original spaces still there. Creating odd moments of flying fire places and wall panels. They created doors or openings next to the main access, mirrors and exposed tubes enhancing a feeling of bizarre that stays with you after you visit.
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Another example is the Famous agency they did in Ghent. By leaving parts of the original construction in place, and leaving some brick walls with their door frames or actual doors, a play between open and closed is created between old and new. You can either open a door, walk through it and close it again, or walk just next to this door where there is a big opening into the actual space. The door itself becoming an odd artwork as it were painted by Magritte. Very often this freedom of circulation or maybe more so the different options that are given to you as audience, are what make the projects of ADVVT so performative. As a visitor you feel engaged with the building, you feel as if your presence in the architecture matters for it to function, a feeling very little evoked. Some buildings are made almost without thinking about the humans inside them. The ADVVT projects urge for human presence, an engagement with architecture this strong is created due to the
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Jean Dalsace, client for the Maison de Verre. He was a progressive thinking gynaecologist. The fact that the house had to incorporate the household, their social life, servants and the doctors practice, created a challenge for the circulation and division of the house. 7
The only way of opening the door was to move the handle downwards, which forced the doctor to bow.
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Previous research on the theatricality of the Maison de Verre
‘De vylder Vinck Taillieu’ (2016) Reyers 2020, Canvas online, 31 January 2016. Availlable at: https://www.canvas.be/video/ reyers-2020/reeks1/de-vylder-vinck-taillieu (6 December) 9
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many layers and complex details that are often to be found in their buildings. As a visitor you can wander around and you can keep searching for strange moments. You could visit over and over again and every time be surprised of what a building can actually do to you.
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! ! performative over photogenic !
Just like you have to see a performance with your own eyes. Just like a concert of a truly good band is ten times better than the album could ever be. This is how we should start thinking about architecture again. And especially the architects should want to create spaces that are so layered and intriguing that a person can’t get enough of it. Or do we really want to be the Madonna and Britney Spears of architecture? Nice on album but when you see them in concert all that still stands is the good show. Some things need to be felt and witnessed again. A critical view of the audience is a key element within this.
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These were just two examples of architects that truly work in favour of the experience of the inhabitants of the space, there are many more but there can never be enough. We are in need of thoughtful and considerate architecture more than ever. And a layering of elements whether it is the aspect of time, movability, surrealism, materiality, lighting, etc only matters partially. It is the vision of the architects to create a space that truly engages the audience that is important. This happened in the past, cathedrals are hyper-performative spaces. You would stand underneath this building much higher than anything you knew - at a time where skyscrapers weren’t around yet - they must have terrified the audience! It was unbelievable that something this magnificent was built by humans. And then you go in, the acoustics overwhelm you, you have to walk very lightly or everyone will hear you, you have to whisper. The architecture to decide how you should act within it.
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Performative architecture isn’t something only of this era but it should be something to sustain in the future, an aspect of architecture thought off first instead of last. Architecture that overwhelms you not because it is out of scale but because on the other hand you can explore every detail of it, because it creates a dream-reality, a new world for you to wander in.
p.s.: You are probably wondering why there aren’t any pictures. I hope I was able to spark off your imagination enough that you are curious to see for yourself. Go and visit these buildings and dance with them instead of lazily looking up their pictures. Architecture is more than images!
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Futagawa, Y. (text) and Futagawa, Y. (edit and photographs). Residential masterpieces 13: Pierre Chareau: Maison de Verre (Maison d’Alsace). Tokyo: A.D.A. Edita Tokyo, 2012 Taylor, B.B. Pierre Chareau: Designer and architect. Cologne. Taschen, 1992 Vellay, D. La Maison de Verre, Pierre Chareau’s Modernist masterwork. United Kingdom: Thames and Hudson Ltd., 2007 Vellay, M. (text), Futagawa, Y. (Edit and photographs) and Bauchet, B. (text and drawings). La Maison de Verre. Tokyo: A.D.A. Edita Tokyo, 1988 Vellay, M. and Frampton, K. Pierre Chareau, architect and craftsman, 1883-1950. New York: Rizolli international publications, inc., 1984
Hackett, F. (2009) ‘Photography, architecture and inner space’, Building Material, No. 19, ART AND ARCHITECTURE, pp. 108-113 Frampton, K. ‘Maison de Verre’, Perspecta (Vol. 12), 1969
Editoriale
DOMUS
spa,
(6
December
2016)
De
Vylder
Vinck
Taillieu.
Available
at:
http://www.domusweb.it/en/news/2015/03/12/
eth_de_vylder_vinck_taillieu.html Campens, A. Vernacular Variations. (6 December 2016) editoriale Domus spa. Available at: http://www.domusweb.it/en/architecture/ 2013/03/04/vernacular-variations.html
Visual Acoustics, the modernism of Julius Shulman (2008) Directed by eric Bricker [film]. Los Angeles : Arthouse films ‘De vylder Vinck Taillieu’ (2016) Reyers 2020, Canvas online, 31 January 2016. Availlable at: https://www.canvas.be/video/reyers-2020/reeks1/de-vylder-vinck-taillieu (6 December)