YAN MIN HUANG Architecture Portfolio
Preface Architecture is a journey I have been chasing. In the architecture, I see not only the building, but also the historical context, social values, humanistic spirit and ecological environment. It never stop moving, therefore I still growing up because of it cannot catch. These four projects are a story about my philosophy of life, which combines divergent abstract concepts with architecture, making the space full of flowing poetry that driving my continued pursuit and thinking of what is architecture.
Content 01 BEING
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Unmeasurable and unreasonable
02 TIME
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This is the moment
03 FREE WILL
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Contemplation and action
04 PARADOX
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What is spoken is not spoken
05 MISCELLANEOUS
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Why are there beings at all instead of nothing? —Martin Heidegger
01 BEING Each building bears a unique and specific value, its value is inextricably linked to the human, and the form of the places is related to the events it accommodates or once a c c o m m o d a t e d ; H o w e v e r, Friedrich Nietzsche 1 believes that so-called values, ideas and truths are merely artificial explanations. the world itself has no metaphysical truth and ultimate value or meaning. So, if the meaning of human existence cannot be answered through rational thinking, is the existence of architecture also irrational?
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Atom
H20 Grid structure Water molecular
Molecular aggregation
Condensation Cloud
Steam
Albert Camus2 believes that the human lives in this world, trying to find out what is the meaning of life, but to no avail. Life has no reason or meaning at all, and then there is an "absurd" feeling that was aroused by this metaphysical thinking and spiritual attitude is basically hard to define, and confusing, meanwhile, it is so "true", distant and hazy but also "near in front of us". It seems like place one's in cloud.
Abundant steam
Stratified cloud
Clouds and fog
Volume form
Moral ethics
Organized society Column structure Follow its road
Forest
Cumbersome
Complexity of the social context
Relationship between human individuals
Establishment of moral values
“The existing human, thrown into the world and abandoned to itself” – Martin Heidegger3. So we must face the establishment of moral ethics, universal values and so on, then bow to it. But there is nothing beyond the human being or the essence of things, in the norms of human’s life, determine the existence of human beings, but the existence of someone first, someone who face their own existence situation first, is the human who take the initiative to choose faith, things have its essence. 6
Membrane treatment
Internal treatment
Randomly place points into the box
Generate a random size of sphere at each point
Randomly cull spheres
Cutting spheres through freeform surfaces
Randomly cull membranes
Randomly generated holes in the culled Membrane
If we were born but without meaning, then we could create our own meaning in the world in any way that we felt was appropriate. According to JeanPaul Sartre 4 , “Without God (without the first cause)", there is nothing to prevent us from becoming the self or essence that we want, because there is no predetermined. If there is no original limitation, then the determinism will no longer be existed. Dividing the sphere into equal parts
Line each intersections into a triangle
Extract random intersections 8
Combine two different forms of membrane (upper left) and extend the extracted points into columns (lower left), combine all results at the end (right).
As members of nature, we are always searching for predictability and order: order gives us security, rational and calm, once we find order, and then we understand the whole world. However, the randomness is equally indispensable to the operation of nature and even to the existence of mankind itself. Diverse result from the various combination of random values. 9
Place a free-form surface at both ends to show the appearance of cloud dissipating. Left
Front
Back
Right
Top
When we were born in this world, we slowly experience the rules of the world, experience life, feel ourselves in this world, and want to determine our own sense of being. Finally we slowly pull away, then leave the world. In this world, each of us is individual, because all the feelings can only be experienced by ourselves. Like Heidegger said “Every man is born as many men and dies as single one.�
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"Thrown" determines that the world is completely accidental to people, the world is essentially alien to people, and also strange. There are no bright road under foot, some are just variety of roads, have neither predecessors nor successors, people must independently assume their own destiny. People live in chance, chance is everything, it is life. We h a v e t o d e a l w i t h s u c h chance, which is the only reality for us. 11
1. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 - 1900), German philosopher, cultural critic, composer, poet, philologist, and Latin and Greek scholar 2. Albert Camus (1913 – 1960), French philosopher, author, and journalist. 3. Martin Heidegger (1889 - 1976), German philosopher. 4. Jean-Paul Sartre (1905 - 1980), French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. 5. Edmund Husserl (1859 - 1938), German philosopher.
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Behind irrational architectural creation, is the endless possibilities of constant exploration of residence. The essence of "living" is the endless creation and pulsation, not the static combination of forms. Attempts to find the intersection of human thoughts and emotion in architecture. As Edmund Husserl’s 5 knowledge on phenomenology, it is the consciousness of the soul that human beings absorb the outer physical world from nature and reflect it in the inner spiritual world.
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02 TIME
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From the writings of Sartre and Camus, we see the absurdity of human beings: we all come to this world inexplicably, and we are often unwilling to accept fate, so we study hard, work, and find an answer to our absurdity. We want to know what kind of person we are. But people are easily to get used to things, all of us are the same, accept the social arrangements, be happy for the same thing, be sad for the same thing, only the same face.
But death will remind us to prevent us from continuing to sink like this. "Call of Conscience" —Heidegger, the conscience that will call us time is limited, we have to do something, but we don't know what to do.
What then is time? If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know. —Saint Augustine
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Observing the shadows light penetrates blue transp Surface
Top
Inner Water, can exist in any state in the world, regardless of whether it is installed in any container, will be in harmony with the container, water can be inclusive, can be all inclusive, but never damage their own essence, and can always return to the unobstructed state. If we exist in water as if we were in a closed universe, is the past, present and future present simultaneous? Can we feel the existence of time in an extremely quiet universe? 17
In the closed universe, time is scattered in every direction, and we are scattered in time, not at a fixed point in time, but all time is present in the present. Think of the "now" thing, and he seems to have a being. However, it disappears immediately into the "past" and no longer exists. But how long is “now�? One year, a day, one minute? It is indivisible, and it has almost no length.
Transparent straws beco medium that conducts lig dissipated at the end.
reflected when parent acrylics.
omes a straight ght. And silently
Light, is the source of all the things that exist. But in the moment, from the point of view of light, can you see the time? Through the condensation of light and time, and the universe becomes his shell, time is seen. So we quietly push the time out of a distance, and we take it as an object of thought. In this way, while we have noticed his disappearance, we have temporarily felt timeless. 18
Line points to each other without interference
Randomly place points onto the square
Separate it into four units
Draw parts of intersections of lines and points
According to the second law of thermodynamics, a nonrandom, or orderly state, if it is not prevented by consuming a lot of energy, becomes a random, disorderly homogeneity state. This irreversibility constitutes the arrow of time from non-random state to random state, while order is a non-random state. That is, the system is always more and more disordered as time goes on. 19
Generating columns in the unit
Randomly cull the columns
Draw the area of units again
Generating freeform surfaces
Surface
Add the random height of the points on each unit
Top
Random height of each unit in the domain
Beam
The height of columns varies with the free-form surfaces
This is the recognition that Camus's "absurd" concept emphasizes when time reveals the degree of its significance of disintegrating. With what intensity nature or a landscape can negate us‌‌ at this very minute lose the illusory meaning with which we had clothed them. 20
Material: Left:5mm diameter transparent straw, 5mm transparent arcylic. Upper right:Photosensitive resin(3D SLA print), Polyfoam g
glue.
It is certain that a person will eventually die. Worried lying to time, we have been escaping time. Yet we are also repeatedly thrown back at ourselves, back to our temporal nature, and that means: back to our melancholy. Feeling like we're timeconsuming means we have all the possibilities and we can see them right in front of us.
The beginning of any entire sequence of events changes the perception of time. In this moment, time will turn liquid. Because I'm moving, it moves, because I change myself, it changes itself. Action and freedom, they are inseparable. Now, however, people are also defined as completely determined, without freedom, which is also related to the experience of time, because people have long interpreted time as causal. 23
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03 FREE WILL In determinism, the world view and the view of human nature, time loses the character of an open future and becomes something predictable, because the causality of time makes the future long past dust settled, so that the future is nothing more than a calculable, extended present. According to this view, freedom is just a fantasy, from the beginning is God, or the inevitability of nature predetermined.
“Everything in nature is the re s u l t o f f i x e d l a w s . ” s a y s Charles Darwin 1 . It reminds me of the movie "Matrix”, the people in the head think he has a self, but it's just a product of the program. They don't really act, they're not executing procedures, and on the contrary, they're being executed. So is there a free will of man? Or it is how Sam Harris2 said “Free will is as illusion?”
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What else could it be that's making our muscles move if it's not our brains? —Colin Blakemore
Cell
Nucleus
Brain
Now we can untie the sequence of genetic codes. We can make predictions based on DNA and re-make our genes. It is proof that man is constrained everywhere, and that man has long lost his freedom and his founding ability. The source of human action is not conscious thought, desire and intention, but the unconscious process in the mind. This process has set us action even before we are aware of it.
Chromosome
DNA
Even in the molecular immunology lab during m y c o l l e g e y e a r s , RT- P C R technology was able to replicate a single strand of RNA in large quantities into the same DNA to study the genetic code of a living organism and to explain the genetic variants in it. So science argues that all human behavior can be explained by mechanical causality. Our ability to choose our own destiny is not free, but on our biological inheritance.
The two separate strands known as RNA are bound together and carrying genetic instructions 27
Shape the DNA form by using ropes and bamboo sticks to observe the structure and find the possibility of its space while its spinning.
Build a prototype through general paper strips.
The initial configuration of the universe may have been chosen by God, or it may itself have been determined by the laws of science. In either case, it would seem that everything in the universe would then be determined by evolution according to the laws of science, so it is difficult to see how we can be masters of our fate. — Stephen Hawking
Pick DNAs from a great number of DNAs that only lightly undergo nonlinear changes in Height.
So, is free will really over? If genetics doesn't mean genetic possibilities, what exactly is it? Epigenetics argues that many genetic traits only "open" in certain environments. "Genetics means how many variations are genetically related in a certain population." says Tim Spector3. The point is that if environmental elements are added, this number will change. Therefore, heredity does not tell you the chance to inherit a certain characteristic, because it is always affected by the environment. 31
For example, we are easily confused by the similarities of identical twins, but the differences between them are as obvious as the similarities. Our genes are designed to be described as the most likely thing, and genes draw a line under who we might be. But that doesn't mean that the genetic giant sits down on what kind of person we're going to be, that our genes are all possibilities, but only the environment can decide which one might be specific.
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Material: Photosensitive resin(3D SLA p
1. Charles Darwin (1809 - 1882), English naturalist, 2. Sam Harris (1967 – now), American author, neuro and podcast host 3. Tim Spector (1958 - now), British epidemiologist a
print)
existence precedes essence, It means first of all, man exists, turns up, appears on the scene, and, only afterwards, defines himself. —Jean-Paul Sartre
Sartre’s philosophy began with Nietzsche's premise of "god is dead". He believed that "Death of God" was a fundamental prerequisite for the establishment of human freedom, for there was no more a priori to the rule of human, and that the world, for you, had nothing to do except freedom.
geologist and biologist oscientist, philosopher,
and science writer
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A city is the place of av a small boy, as he walk that will tell him what h
04 PARADOX The habits and behaviors of living things are influenced by genes. Gene expression changes with the body's environment. Different times, different environments, and different parts of the cell, or the amount of genes in the cell difference, may cause the gene to produce different behavior. Biologist Greg Wray believes that social life can indeed profoundly alter gene expression, which is so rapid and large that we can't imagine.
In that case, the relationship between architecture, environment, and people in a city is inextricably linked. With the development of society, through the predetermined design means to guide and regulate people's psychology and behavior, to affect people's reflection and choice of the real environment, improve, create suitable for sur viva l, lif e a nd me et th e psychological requirements of the environment.
vailabilities. It is the place where ks through it, may see something he wants to do his whole life. —Louis Kahn
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Taipei City
In 21st century, environment friendly has become the core value of contemporary architecture, and the thought of natural aesthetic experience has constructed a deep aesthetic, Holmes Rolston 1 believes that from the perspective of the ecosystem, nature does not exist beauty and ugliness, nature has an objective, positive aesthetic nature.
Toyo Ito, says that in the pursuit of modernity, people have lost the wild thoughts and energy that human being was born with. Therefore, the value and belief of cohabitation with nature, gradually regard architecture as a part of nature. Presents a "pure, rational, figurative" architectural image.
In the diversity and complexity of nature, aesthetic experience's description is a mixture of subjective and objective nature, and human aesthetic experience depends on the nature of the object of appreciation itself. If the object does not have the nature of beauty, the aesthetic experience will not appear. But aesthetic experience does not have a clear concept, so if things make people ask questions, then the aesthetic experience will be because of their questions in their own silent fermentation? And by questioning subjectively confirms the inner value of people. Simplified process
Same height peripheral wall
Light transmission openings
Height decline from top to bottom
Height decline from outside to inside
Color blocks are equal in height
Wall
Place wall at the end of paths
Wooden grille facing lower area 38
Hidden is flower. —Zeami2. Masayuki Kurokawa3 believes that driving the other's creativity by hiding some parts and not showing them all. Or because some of them are hidden, so the viewer can participate in the creation of the performer in a certain part. Open but narrow? separate but connected? seems close but far? bright but dim? intention and chance? knowledge and hunch? internal and external? relevance and independence.?
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Material: 2mm diameter Wooden stick, tracing paper, bristol board, Polyfoam glue, adhensive sticker
Like the phenomenology proposed by Husserl, emphasize the dynamics of the subject, and ask questions of things, Focus on how to open up a new perspective on things, rather than incorporating the conceptual framework into what you experience. Exclude all default positions and default methods, and visually describe the phenomenon of things, in turn, ask questions of things, looking for their essence.
In this process is carried out by reflection, and it is also the description of oneself that describes things. Must continue to face themselves again, in order to live, perhaps to find their own starting point, nothing but a desire to know where their existence is from.
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1. Holmes Rolston III (1932 - now), American philosopher 2. Zeami Motokiyo (1363 - 1443), Japanese aesthetician, actor, and playwright 3. Masayuki Kurokawa (1937 - now), Japanese architect
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0 Rrepresentation
MISCELL
NCTU 2018 Fund Representation by one material. The overall impression of those model is liveliness, motion, flow, and a juxtaposition of both simplicity and complexity. Left: One A3 paper. Lower left: Clay. Lower right: Alumium wire.
By observing the exhibition of architecture which is called GIA project as known as floating boundaries in Nation Chiao Tung University in 2018. I was quite attracted by the circulation design with light planning in this exhibition that introduce a sense of flow, and how people were assembled at the specific area within the translucent curtains and are colored in white, where there fleeting behavior are the ones that revealed the different scale.
From 2D to 3D
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The Bauhaus school in Germany produced some of the most influential figures in modern design. Although mostly remembered for it’s revolution in the field of architecture. The textiles art form bauhaus I choose that reminded me of Piet Mondrian whose abstractions work that still inspired the world a lot.
Dismantling this textile art to refocusing the relations of each block, then built a volume by these elements with couples of specific rules.
05
LANEOUS
damental Design II
Case Study
Micro Hutong was a building experiment by Zhang ke, the architect who founded the Standard Architecture studio in Beijing. Nowadays this project was slotted in to transactional Hutong neighborhoods as a hostel in Beijing. Micro Hutong took the historical siheyuan( 四 合 院 ) as a reference, featuring five tiny concrete cubes that project at angles into a central courtyard within just 30 square meters. Also, the corrider with rough, irregular concrete around the periphery of the central courtyard, created a glamorous sensory. Their aim of this project - is to search for possibilities of creating ultra-small scale social housing within the limitations of super-tight traditional Hutong of Beijing. Which is a excellent case to proceed a study. 1st floor 2nd floor corrider Folk Public space Private space Communal space Sight In addition to directly observe the entire aspects of the floor plan, dissembled the cubes form corridor, in order to truly understand the relationship among the volumes, and stimulating a reinterpretation as a solution of this space.
By dividing this space into three parts, obtaining further more informations to determine the role of each area. Cubes installed a floor-to ceiling window that face onto the courtyard, where creates a forthright relationship between the cubes in the dynamic volumes and an urban vestibule in the front part of the building.
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NTU 2018 Graduate Institute of Building & Planning Architecture Design I & II Xizhou tribe reconstruction project
Selected skecthing 2017
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