Winston Yuen Formal Analysis [Eisenman]

1018a: Theories of Authority: Seeing as an Architect Close Reading and Formal Analysis

Fall 2016 Peter Eisenman + Elisa Iturbe Wesley Hiatt

Winston Yuen

Contents

01 Brunelleschi 02 alberti 03 bramante 04 serlio 05 vignola 06 palladio

07 borromini 08 bernini and Rinaldi 09 nolli and piranesi 10 drawing contest 11 stirling

01 - Brunelleschi The Humanist Origins of Close Reading

San Lorenzo and Santo Spirito, Florence, Italy

Grids are used as organizational elements in both San Lorenzo and Santa Spirito. All of Santa Spirito’s columns strictly lie exactly on the intersections, with the geometries of the chapels utilizing this as well. In keeping with this system however, the processional space is interupted by columns, at the entrance, the trancepts and at the nave. Conversely, in San Lorenzo, these processional axes are clear of columns, but it is the axes driving the geometry and not the grid.

02 - alberti The Definition of Space as the Production of What is Not Seen

Tempio Malatestiano, Rimini, Italy

One perceives the sense of discord when first examining the existing conditions of Malatestiano. This is not only due to the interior and exterior being different, but because of Alberti’s will to impose an exterior treatment with a completely different logic to Malatestiano. Alberti’s exterior renovation falls just short of where the pseudo-transept for Malatestiano lies, where the interior condition wants to present a horizontality.

However, Alberti seeks to resolve the exterior of the apse with a much larger dome than is suited for Malatestiano, stifling the axis. Thus, is is only through excavating the full extent of the idealized plan do we understand this imposition.

03 - Bramante

Santa Maria della Pace vs Palazzo Ducale, Urbino, Italy

The critical difference between S. Maria della Pace and the Palazzo Ducale lies in the organizational grid, which manifests most clearly in the corners. By aligning the centers of the piers in S. Maria della Pace, and the columns at the Palazzo Ducale cloisters, we can see that the corner the grid intersection lies directly on the corner of S. Maria della Pace. This resolves in the corner by clashing the intended rhythm of the piers, meeting to necessitate vestigial parts by intersecting the ionic pilasters and the pedestals. Conversely, the grid is offset at the corners at Urbino such to necessitates an invented resolution—that is, the half columns (engaged) and the sistering of two pilasters that kiss at the capital.

04 - Serlio A First Critique of Homogeneous Space

Serlio Book VI, Plate LXVIII

Serlio’s speculative projects for clients have exterior organizational axes that do not align with the interior organizational axes, if there are any to be found. This is necessitated by the architectural poche. Contrary to previously analyzed designs, the part-to-whole relationship is liberated, breaking the reciprocal relationship from internal elements to the facade.

05 - Vignola

Villa Giulia, Rome, Italy

In comparing the interior and exterior facades of the Villa Giulia casino, we can see that Vignola uses a series of devices and techniques in attempts to relate them together. First we see the triumphal arch motif on repeated on both floors of the exterior faรงade. This is carried into the interior of the building with the end of the smaller arch aligning with the walls of the rooms. However, when examining the triumphal arch motif on the semicircular courtyard, Vignola attempts to reconcile the columns back to the interior with little success. Thus, what appears to be the same system being deployed on the front and back facades are two disparate formal systems only tied together by compositional devices. This system begins to fall apart further in the courtyard where these different systems begin to develop disparate centers along longintudinal axis.

06 - palladio

San Giorgio Maggiore and Il Redentore, Venice, Italy

Palladio’s formal schemes for both the San Giorgio Maggiore and the Il Redentore churches follows the principles of part to whole relationships--the formal moves of specific geometries relate from one part of the church to the rest of the scheme. However, when examining the nave, it is within the inward and outward corners that we see the rigorous systems concede. At San Giorgio Maggiore, Plladio is forced to elongate and add an additional chapel at the inward corner at the narthex in order to maintain the preordained column system. At the outward corner, a set of pilasters signals a second system. At Il Redentore, the corner conditions are resolved by a quartered pilaster, which Palladio uses to signal the start of a second system that will continue into the transept.

07 - Borromini Surface as Space

Sant’ Ivo and San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane, Rome, Italy

Both of Borromini’s churches are derived from primitive geometries that have an element of Baroque animation to the spaces. The execution of these, however, are dissimilar between the churches. In Sant’ Ivo, the equilateral triangle acts as the organizing element, with the tips of the triangles acting as the center point for the circles. This basic unit is then fractalized and crystalized in the form, generating the shape. In San Carlo, the animation is a square with fixed points of circles. This shape is then deformed with the same parameters in place, with the in betwen condition creating the form of San Carlo.

08 - Bernini and Rinaldi Baroque Heterogeneity

Santa Maria in Montesanto and Santa Maria dei Miracoli, Rome

Scenographically, the twin churches of the Piazza del Popolo appear exactly the same. Upon examining the plans, we notice that the Santa Maria dei Miracoli is elongated, with an dome. However, the composition of these two churches is much more than a simple elongation of one to generate the forms of the other. What is striking is that Bernini’s Santa Maria in Montesanto is intended to act in a Greek-cross plan, whereas the simple elongation in Rinaldi’s Santa Maria dei Miracoli creates a basilica plan. Thus, subtle details are revealed in the interiors of the churches that give rise to these observations. Double columns frame only one axis in the Santa Maria dei Miracoli, whereas double columns frame an additional cross-axis in Bernini’s church. This second axis is further reinforced by pedimenting the frieze.

09 - Nolli and Piranesi Figural Space as Ground

Nolli Map and Campo Marzio, Rome

Where Nolli scientifically creates a map of figure and ground, Piranesi’s plans for the Campo Marzio excavates and invents a fanciful and provacative recreation of Rome. This is not to say that Piranesi had no method. By excavating the modern obelisks of Rome in the Campo Marzio, we can see that pre-existing axes were used as the organizational principles that have other buildings proliferate from. Though compositionally, the Nolli Map and Piranesi’s Campo Marzio are very different, their understandings of the city are the same. That is that, axes will act as organizationl factors that frame blocks of space, which can be excavated in their own right, creating an architectural poche at the scale of the city.

10 - Drawing Contest

This drawing takes inspiration from the organizational principles of Campo Marzio, the Piazza del Popolo, and the Palazzo Ducale. That is, urban scale street axes, flanking geometries around those axes that produce scenographic moments, and the point grid as an organizational generator. Thus, schemes such as the Piazza del Popolo twin churches, arcade and plans from the Campo Marzio are used to populate predetermined axes, creating a composition that is generated by and satisfies these organizational principles.

11 - Stirling

Wissenschaftszentrum, Berlin, Germany

Transitioning to the modern era of architecture, methods of formal analysis can still be applied. Here in James Sterling’s Wissenschaftszentrum, a series of building typologies, the castle, basilica, hexagonal campanile, long arcade, and the hemicycle are used within this composition. The arrangement of these types are proportioned to the pre-existing building with a Classical facade. In arranging these plans, only two axes are used as organizing principles, similar to that of Piranesi’s Campo Marzio. Thus, the buildings themselves act as an architectural poche in space, create a figure ground relationship. As a result, a new figure of an irregular cortile is produced from the composition.