FLOW, INTERSECTION, LOOP

BIANCA DE ALMEIDA EGLINGTON

FLOW / INTERSECTION / LOOP

CONTENTS 3. RATIONAL INTRODUCTION 7. FLOW TEMPORAL AND SPATIAL TIME AND SPACE 15. INTERSECTION SUBJECT AND OBJECT MATERIAL AND IMMATERIAL 21. LOOP CONSUMPTION AND SUSTAINABILITY ENVIRONMENT AND ETHICS 27. ABSURD CONCLUSION

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RATIONAL INTRODUCTION

Two major historical precepts that have determined the rational line of architectural development over the last century are key to understanding the potential for change and development in the current and future course of architecture.

Le Corbusier argued that the zigzag or indeterminate path of sensorial responsiveness, being the path of least resistance, is a depravity of a human’s intelligence1. Determined straight lines achieve rational intentions, they signify the ability of man to overcome trials and tribulations, and achieve harmony through the unflinching focus on a determinate goal. Architecture that is existentialist embraces the chord of time and space in a manner of mimetic absurdity; it supposes the irrational by mediating temporal and spatial flow and enabling it to exist along an indeterminate path.

Louis Sullivan stated that form follows function, referring to function as rational utility and diminutively to form as subjective perception2. This linear principle fails to satisfy the holistic architectural practitioner concerned with the material and immaterial connections between subject and object. The layering of mimetic threads of material and immaterial form and function creates a synergy that places architecture in the central role, connecting inhabitant with the inner and outer worlds. This connection could potentially expand further through a much needed paradigm shift that recognises the interdependency of ethics and environment and the absurdity of our linear approach to consumption and sustainability. The synergy created in architecture that is designed for maximum temporal and spatial flow and intersecting subject and object 3

will too exist in a coherent loop of sustainability and consumption. This proposal lies in stark contradiction to the present condition fixated on linear rational arrangements. Architecture that inverses the status quo and connects with the absurd has the potential to enrich our lives in far excess to what it consumes and could rationally ever be perceived to be.

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FLOW

TEMPORAL AND SPATIAL TIME AND SPACE

7

SPACE

TIME

SPACE

TIME

8

FLOW

Architecture exists within the human construction of rational perceptions of spatial and temporal zones, bound within the here and now. Inversing this perception of zones, so that the building is unbound facing spatially and projecting temporally from the inside out, is the objective of existentialist design.

Dependent on the hierarchical directive, the temporal sequence creates the connection with time for the inhabitant.

The movement from one space to another demonstrates the relevance and interdependency of space and time. Kengo Kuma writes that ‘diagonals suggest the shift from space to time and from time to space’3. The zigzag path moves forward on a lessthan-straightforward trajectory, movement oscillating between opposing forces. Movement appears to ascribe to the opposite is true, as it is always onward, to and fro, vibrating in harmony and gauged by momentum.

Leibniz refers to this as a chord, with relation to a clear perception of indeterminable differentiated states4. Le Corbusier asserts that this harmony is representative of an axis in accord with nature and the universe5. This contradicts his earlier position that the zigzag or sinuous path is primitive and animalistic6. Theorist Juhani Pallasmaa on the other hand, argues the significance of this path between human and world and refers to it as the ‘haptic continuum of the self ’7.

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FLOW

An example of this sensorial continuum is the archetypal Portuguese granite mountain village that is fused between time and space in flowing zigzag momentum in response to the immediate landscape.

TIME AND SPACE IN HARMONIOUS ACCORD

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In contrast, the deterministic straight line depraves the senses of connection along the path and therefore, forgoes either memory markers or learning curves.

In architecture, the straight line is unmemorable and inhuman; a quality that might suit the occasion. Peter Zumthor describes the art of drawing the inhabitant through the intended spatial and temporal sequence by composing ‘a kind of voyage of discovery’8. A nonrigid or interactive distinction between spaces creates flow, a spatial and temporal concept that demonstrates circulatory force and movement. Architecture, and art for that matter, mediates flow passively, unlike that of a boat or a car. It is an often-undisclosed inertia, with the potential to aggressively disrupt flow. Architecture in stasis will suffer from sick building syndrome9. A lack of flow, in the case of a singular and stifled enclosure, will not cultivate life force. Devoid of space and time, it lacks a connection with the broader temporal and spatial sequence in either material or immaterial landscapes.

STIFLED ENCLOSURE

SPATIAL AND TEMPORAL FLOW

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INTERSECTION

SUBJECT AND OBJECT MATERIAL AND IMMATERIAL

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MATERIAL

OBJECT

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IMMATERIAL

SUBJECT

INTERSECTION

A trajectory overlapping the echoes of the past in a crisscross formation represents the dimensions of space and time and the subsequent accumulation of existential and rational experiences. Pallasmaa notes that revealing the history and the sequence of trial and error suggests a dimension of time and space in which ‘the inner and the outer worlds’ are intertwined10. The accumulation of this experience expands the immaterial and material worlds in existential synergy, and is symbolic of the empirical symbol for multiplication. Architecture that forms the connection between these landscapes manifests in a union between subject and object. It is architecture that is art, is both ontological and epistemological encapsulating metaphysics and science, not to be mistaken with the false dichotomy of the rationalists.

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INTERSECTION

The architectural premise that form follows function was declared in accordance to the development and favour of industrialisation and refers to function as rational utility and form as thus, subjective perception11.

Shifting the paradigm and considering form and function in an existentialist manner from the perspective of the absurd, the principles inverse and refer to function as existential metaphor and form as the embodiment as such, the utilitarian object. The architect, as an artist, is in the unique position to be selective with their approach – which means it is always the latter. The artist designs for the perception of the observer and in that process function itself becomes a metaphor. Nietzsche describes this actually archaic ontological notion in his Doctrine of the eternal return12. A similar application of these principles is the connection between consumption and sustainability known as circular reference.

FU

NC

TIO

N

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FO

RM

LOOP

CONSUMPTION AND SUSTAINABILITY ENVIRONMENT AND ETHICS

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CONSUMPTION

A

SUSTAINABILITY

CONSUMPTION

A SUSTAINABILITY

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LOOP

Architecture is sandwiched somewhere in the middle of consumption and sustainability in a mediating role between the two parties. It is the architectonic of ethics and the environment. Consumption exists within the fold of sustainability, and vice versa. The relevance of ethics and the environment is how one is differentiated from the other. In theory, the ethics of consumption independent of sustainability exists in a finite straight line. And the ethics of sustainability, independent of consumption too exists, inversely in an infinite straight line. Adding environment and referring to the laws governing natural systems, consumption and sustainability are intrinsically linked in a cyclical and self-perpetuating loop. However, environment now also refers to the laws governing technical, or industrial, systems that operate largely with built-in linear obsolescence13.

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LOOP

Architecture too has been industrialised and rationalised, yet has the potential to be designed by way of the ontological principles governing our natural systems. Chaos theory is now more widely recognised as complexity theory as we begin to better comprehend and rationalise natural systems by way of computer assisted technologies. These technologies have the potential to assimilate the technical and the natural system and unlock the potential of the absurd.

Architectural technology is a major key to establishing that connection with the environment. Architectural practitioners are responsible for propagating these changes and can do so, through renewed discourse that centres on ethics.

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ABSURD CONCLUSION

The interconnectedness of architecture places it in a pivotal role for instigating the changes we dare to see in the world. The prevailing linear rational paradigm is reaching its deterministic culmination, creating the opportunity for an equal and radical paradigm to exist in harmonious intensity. Inversing the rational and embracing the absurd is the key proposal; more rational than rational in its irrationality. Consumption and sustainability designed in the manner that is selfperpetuating in circular reference to one another. And architecture designed to mediate this cycle through closed-loop discourse and practice inclusive of ethics and environment. Subject and object are designed in dichotomic measure with architecture facilitating the connection between the two by the layering process of material and immaterial design. Architecture of spatial and temporal design guides the inhabitant through the journey of space and time, and connects the inhabitant with a flow of memories and experiences that transcends the limits of linear rational boundaries. Architecture of the zigzag, the cross and the loopy, together we reach for the mimetic stars.

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+

+

=

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END NOTES 1.

Le Corbusier, 1924, p18

2.

Sullivan, 1896

3.

Kuma, 2008, p45

4.

Leibniz in Deleuze, 1993, P28-31

5.

Le Corbusier, 1931, p208

6.

Le Corbusier, 1924, p18

7.

Pallasmaa 2009 p100-101

8.

Zumthor, 2006 p43

9.

Rostron, 1997

10.

Pallasmaa, 2009, p108, 109

11.

Sullivan, 1896

12.

Nietzsche in Eliade and Trask, 1954

13.

McDonough and Braungart, 2002 p93, p98

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Deleuze, G. (1993) The fold: Leibniz and the baroque. University of

Minnesota Press: Minneapolis.

Eliade, M. and Trask, W. R. (1954) The myth of the eternal return:

or, Cosmos and history. Princeton University Press: New

Jersey.

Kuma, K. (2008) Anti-Object: The Dissolution and Disintegration of Architecture. AA Publications: London.

Le Corbusier. (1971) The city of to-morrow and its planning.

Architectural Press: London.

McDonough, W. & Braungart, M. (2002) Cradle to Cradle:

remaking the way we make things. North Point Press: New

York.

Pallasmaa, J. (2009) The Thinking Hand: existential and embodied

wisdom in architecture. John Wiley & Sons: West Sussex.

Rostron, J. (ed.) (1997) Sick Building Syndrome: concepts, issues and practice. E & F Spoon: London Sullivan, L. H. (1896) The tall office building artistically considered.

Retrieved 7 November 2011 from Triton College:

http://academics.triton.edu/faculty/fheitzman/

tallofficebuilding.html.

Zumthor, P. (2006) Atmospheres. Birkh채user Verlag: Berlin.

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Prepared 11 November 2011

By Bianca de Almeida Eglington University Of Melbourne Master of Architecture 21st Century Architecture Lecturer: Annmarie Brennan Tutor: Hing-Wah Chau

www.bibilatigre.com.au