The Influence of Art and Artistic Techniques on Modern Architecture and the Architectural Design Process
Welsh School of Architecture Issues in Contemporary Architecture Vlad Posmangiu-Luchian C1228012
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ABSTRACT Art and architecture are two disciplines through which the aspirations, desires, needs, feelings, and thoughts of society and the artist/architect manifest themselves. Due to their visual quality and symbolic power, paintings can manipulate an observer’s bias and guide him through a certain narrative. By using similar techniques in the creation of the presentation, layout, and design of certain schemes, architects undertake a similar approach in their creative process, creating a link between the built environment and the artistic expression of the time. Concomitantly, there are certain crossovers where painters seem to be influenced by the work of architects, showing a reverse link between built environment and art. Throughout the essay I will be studying different techniques and examples of art in order to underline concepts and process related approaches. This represents a basis for the comparisons and drawn parallels in between architecture and art. In the end, I aspire to show if such a connection exists, and if this is the case, how the links between the two work. Furthermore, I strive to discover how these links have an effect on society.
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The manipulative architect In the book The Projective Cast, Robin Evans makes an intriguing claim: ‘What connects thinking to imagination, imagination to drawing, drawing to building and building to our eyes is projection in one guise or another, or processes that we have chosen to model on projection’1. If we are to judge this statement in its purity of expression, the space defined by the aforementioned interactions creates the universe of architecture, where mass, void, geometry, acoustic, smell, memory, light are interconnected and, together with our power of perception, they create a unitary and self-defining view of space. This perception is surely dominated by the observer’s ideas of instability and personal bias. However, by use of certain narrative processes, the contingent of observers is deliberately guided by the architect towards a common point of view. The techniques through which this process of manipulation is performed by the architect to influence the viewer’s perception, and the way and instances in which they are applied is the basis of this thesis. Of course, the methods that one can use to manipulate or influence a viewer’s perception are so many that it is absolutely impossible to discuss them all. Moreover, their number increases considerably if we mention the differences between people’s perception introduced by context, historical time, culture, and even by their personal life experience. Given this abundance of personal points of view and perspectives, the best way to analyse such a complex and relative phenomenon is by looking at events or art movements that have had the power to change human expression and the cultural phenomenon. Thinking about contemporary times, a turning point in the way we perceive the world, art and culture was the beginning of the 20th century, a time of social turmoil, two world wars, the emergence of new political doctrines, the advent of new technologies and so on. In the midst of this time of uncertainty and relative history there emerged an artistic movement that used all of its era’s intricacy by studying its quiddity and piecing it together as its form of expression. The art movement thus defined is Cubism, to which we can add Purism. How the Cubist or Purist theory and technique influenced architecture and the way we perceive it shows how the human expression interacted with the built environment and how it shaped its development. The study in this essay will be realised by looking at Walter Gropius’s and Le Corbusier’s work, the latter, an architect whose relevancy as a study subject that exceeds the temporal and contextual argument may be best described by his own words: ‘Before people would say I am a painter trying to be an architect, now they say I am an architect trying to be a painter.’ Simultaneously Cubist One of the first historical approaches taken to the relationship between architecture and Cubism was realized by Sigfried Giedion in his book Space, Time and Architecture, where he contends that there exists an irresistible force in history which gives shape and identity to the products of an era. 2 This force is described by Giedion as the correspondence between Cubism and the modernist movement in architecture. He also considers that there are three common fundamental recurring principles for both architecture and art: planarity, transparency and simultaneity. Whilst he defines planarity and transparency almost literally; planarity as the alikeness of the plate-like slabs of the floors in the buildings with the facets in the paintings, and transparency as the comparison with the crystalline constitution of the painted image with the glazed surfaces of the buildings, he lays a lot more emphasis and elaborates more on the third aspect, that of simultaneity. 3
1 Robin Evans, The Projective Cast (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1995), p. xxxi 2 Ibid., p. 57 3 Ibid.
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Although dependent on the former two principles, simultaneity is crucial in helping us understand the connection between cubism and architecture. It also provokes Giedion to discuss a link with the theory of relativity, grounding the idea by claiming that Albert Einstein started one of his essays discussing this exact term.4 Nonetheless, one is able to argue that Einstein’s use of the term undermines the normal understanding, only demonstrating how its range was reduced in relativistic physics. Although this might indicate that the association is overzealous, it should not overshadow his initial claim about how simultaneity could apply to both architecture and painting. Classically defined by the early documents of cubist criticism, simultaneity generally refers to the presentation of multiple impressions of a subject in one image. 5 For example the way we perceive L’Arlesienne (Figure 1) is both frontal and from one side. This prompted Gideion to discuss how in modern architecture, due to the transparency of the material and the geometric juxtaposition of volumes, the procedure of simultaneity gives the viewer the possibility to see different sides and areas of the building at the same time. He continues Figure Picasso, L'Arlesienne, 1911-12 by pointing out how this effect is present in the Bauhaus workshop wing, where, due to the transparent walls, one is able to get both glimmers of the inside and different sides of the building at the same time. 6 Although there is some truth to this idea, the way a painting creates this effect of simultaneity is contrasting. The cubist image is constructed with an overabundance of aspects, their individual spatial unity and placement being fragmented and disrupted in order to present everything at the same time. This seems to differentiate between architecture and painting. However, architecturally speaking, there is no fracture in the Bauhaus wing. Quite the opposite: in this case the transparent communication makes the space look ‘seamless and isotropic’7. More so, if one is to consider the traditional, cellular and compartmented buildings, their fragmented character and the disjointed effect they create are easier to notice. At this point, it is important to mention that writings about Cubist paintings of 1910s and 1920s hardly ever suggest that plastic compositions had anything to do with the broken character. 8 Even Picasso’s biography, written by Gertrude Stein and published 30 years after the advent of cubism, whilst underlining the fact that his compositions were logical, systematic quests to reveal the quiddity of things9, omits to bring into discussion any idea of
Figure Bauhaus Workshop Wing, Dessau. Walter
4 Robin Evans, The Projective Cast (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1995), p. 57 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid., p. 58 7 Ibid., p. 59 8 Ibid.
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brokenness. Eunice Lipton, too, adds that Picasso’s work started to grow the broken, fractured, dismembered qualities only in the 30s, where images were mostly assumed to portray the Spanish tragedy. 10 A different discussion about simultaneity arises though in the creation stage of both the Cubist painting and the design process of the modernist building. Here, one can argue that, due to the existence of multiple instances of simultaneously presented images, the fracturing and displacement that occurs is reduced to an actual visual byproduct11. This is a fact that leads the partisans of the newly emerged art current to compare the way they work with the way architects or engineers draw. Georges Braque was quoted in the Architectural Record of 1910 saying that in order to paint the complete woman, he had to paint three figures, not just one. 12 This is much in the way an architect needs the three fundamental drawings of a house - the plan, the frontal elevation, and the side elevation- in order to define a space. Even Picasso’s statement that all the facets of one of his nude portraits could be cut from the canvas and reassembled to make a full-bodied model can easily be interpreted as the geometric representational quality that a technical drawing possesses, as if it were ‘an anthropomorphic equivalent of Mercator’s projection’. 13 The analogy of painting with technical drawing is very potent, indicating a similarity in the creative process between the two mediums. The stage that modern painting sets is one of violent opposition towards perspective, an attitude which is found in Le Corbusier’s paintings. To the old arguments referring to the representational inadequacy that perspective possesses, examples being statements like perspective being partial vision, or showing not what we see but mere convention, Cubism introduces a new, modern argument: ‘ Perspective is Euclidian’14. The emergence of the new, non-Euclidian geometries (e.g. Lobachevsky, Bolyiai, Riemann) meant that the limitations of the old Euclidian geometry had been superseded and, consequently, the painters had to exceed the boundaries that perspective imposed. It also demanded a change of process and representation in architecture. Helped by the advent of cinematography, architecture develops the idea of the Architectural Promenade, a main tool in Le Corbusier’s repertoire. To a certain extent, the presence of simultaneity and relativity are at the core of this modernist concept. Le Corbusier’s Architectural Promenades moments, exist concomitantly in one or more designed structures defining and enclosing simultaneously an experience which is critical for the reading of the whole. At the same time these moments tend to define the building as a whole, relatively indicating and defining the larger whole through key smaller moments which, like a fractal, maintain the bigger idea of the promenade. A good example of this practice is constituted by the Villa Savoye, later mentioned in the present essay. Transparency as a tool for design
9 Ibid 10 Robin Evans, The Projective Cast (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1995), p.59 11 Ibid. 12 Ibid., p.60 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid., p.62
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A different take on the congruencies between modernist architecture and Cubist paintings or techniques is the famous study Transparency: Literal and Phenomenal, written by Colin Rowe and Robert Slutzky. The main differentiation is its bringing into view of transparency as a main driving force in the design processes Rowe and Slutzky discerning between two types of transparency with dissimilar manifestation but with a similar conceptual basis. Thus, they contend that transparency can be an ‘inherent quality of substance – as in a wire
Figure Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, La Sarraz, 1930(left) and Fernand Leger, Three Faces, 1926 (right)
mesh or glass curtain wall’15, or it can be ‘an inherent quality of organization’16. If the former term describes transparency as the property of an object or material of being capable of ‘physically transmitting light, so as to render bodies lying beyond completely visible, that can be seen through’ 17 or the possibility of being ‘penetrated by light’18 or ‘admitting the passage of light through interstices’ 19, the latter term defines a more abstract and unintuitive property. To be detected in a work of art, transparency becomes more involved with further levels of interpretation which Gyorgy Kepes, in his Language of Vision, defines as: ‘If one sees two or more figures overlapping one another, and each of them claims for itself the common overlapped part, then one is confronted with a contradiction of spatial dimensions. To resolve this contradiction, one must assume the presence of a new optical quality. The figures are endowed with transparency: that is they are able to interpenetrate without an optical destruction of each other. Transparency however implies more than an optical characteristic, it implies a broader spatial order. Transparency means a simultaneous perception of different spatial locations. The position of the transparent figures has equivocal meaning as one sees each figure now as the closer, now as the further one.’20 This definition gives birth to a type of transparency which is completely segregated from any type of physical quality and defines a property remotely associated with the idea of perfectly clear, or see-through. Furthermore, at this point one arrives at the paradox in which the meaning of the word ceases to define something completely clear, but instead defines now something which is ‘clearly ambiguous’ 21. This double nature and ambivalence of 15 Colin Rowe, The Mathematics of The Ideal Villa and Other Essays, (Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press, 1997), p.161 16 Ibid. 17 Merriam Webster Online Dictionary, <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/transparent>, [accessed 1 April 2015] 18 Ibid. 19 Ibid. 20 Rowe, p. 160 21 Ibid., p. 161
Figure 4 Picasso, The Clarinet Player, 1911
Figure 5 Georges Braque, The Portuguese, 1911
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the term can be best studied by comparing two paintings, both of them belonging to the same period and both of them Cubist in nature but each of them using different transparency typologies (see Figure 4 and Figure 5). Transparency as painting technique Although in both these paintings the viewer can see that the spatial and ordering factor is a pyramid, whilst Picasso defines it by using a strong contour, Braque uses a more ‘complicated inference’22. In Picasso, the observer has the feeling of a ‘positively transparent figure standing in a deep space, and only subsequently does he redefine this sensation to allow for the real shallowness of space’ 23. Therefore, the deep space creates the background for the shallow space, which is defined by the object itself, whilst the transparency of the shallow space allows for the deep space to be observed through and interact with the other. Quite the opposite is reading, with Braque, ‘a highly developed interlacing of horizontal and vertical gridding, created by gapped lines and intruding planes’ which ‘establishes a primarily shallow space’, and, consequently, ‘only gradually does the observer become able to invest this space with a depth which permits the figure to assume substance’24. In other words, Braque sets out the shallow plan by using a grid which is independent of the figure but which in its own inside relationships and interactions between the constitutive elements defines and constrains the actual pyramid. The shallow plan exchanges its position with the deep plan and through its own medium it defines it. This works almost antagonistically when compared to the way Picasso’s shallow plan seems to juxtapose on top of the deep plan, constraining the ‘peripheral incident’ 25. Thus, Picasso’s painting is an example of literal transparency, where we look through an object and perceive the background, and Braque’s is an illustrative case of phenomenal transparency, where, although we are not provided with any physical, ‘perspicuous object’26, it is the actual interference of the grid that creates the idea of a presence. Although the stylistic processes of frontality, suppression of depth, contraction of space, definition of light sources, tipping forward of objects, restricted pallete, oblique and rectilinear grids, and propensities towards peripheric development are used in both cases, the types of transparencies that they represent are not necessarily tied to the process but to the context and abstract space defined by the painting. 27 Thus, the transparency techniques are autonomous from all the other techniques, they can be applied without any interference, making them a central aspect of the work of art, and of its expression. Concluding the explanatory comparison of the two paintings, the search for correspondence in architecture imposes another limit that must be defined. The major difference that appears when translating the two 22 Ibid., p. 163 23 Ibid., p. 163 24 Ibid. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid., p. 164 27 Ibid., p. 162
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transparency concepts into the architectural realm is created by the third dimension: depth. ‘(…) while painting can only imply’28 the existence of depth, ‘(…) architecture cannot suppress it’29. Corbusier and Villa Savoye Jerzy Soltan, longtime associate of Corbusier, has recounted the architect’s fascination with Piero Della Francesca’s The Flagellation of Christ, which, when studied, shows echoes that propagate into Corbusier’s own work. The main study aspect is constituted by the juxtaposition and merging of the two types of transparencies in the two imaginary separate planes of the composition, in The Flagellation of Christ this technique being applied through the creation of the left-right division. This leads to the construction of two types of space: ‘deep space and shallow space’ 30. Figure The Flagellation of Christ, Piero della Francesca with the Establishing a motif, the binary alternation of the deep space, defining the infinite, with the shallow space, acting like a stage for the phenomenal transparencies to take place, gives a good basis for design and space logic. This method of organising compositions is present in most of Corbusier’s early houses published in the ‘Oeuvre Complete’ series, of which Villa Savoye is part of.
28 Ibid., p. 166 29 Ibid., p. 166 30 Thomas Schumacher, ‘Deep Space Shallow Space’, The Architectural Review, CLXXXI no 1079 (1987), 37-42 (p.37)
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The easiest way to reveal the use of this conceptual tool is by looking at the presentation photographs of the Villa Savoye’s architectural promenade taken by Lucien Herve under the close guidance of Le Corbusier. At first sight, they seem to describe stage set like compositions, almost enriched by a sequential art characteristic. Very similar to a letter he addressed to Madame Meyer (Figure 8), in which he discussed her future project, Corbusier uses moments on the architectural promenade to define and explain the spaces inside and outside the buildings, a fact that could show a glimpse at the design process that the architect would go through. Reiterating the aforementioned argument about the simultaneity of space and relativity of process, this example of the architect’s work is a firm proof of the application of the concepts. In the way the pictures are carefully composed we can catch a glimpse of the connection to Piero Della Francesca’s painting. The alternation between deep and shallow space allows Corbusier to create a potent contrast while enabling the two types of transparencies to give birth to a unity of motif. In the same manner in which one would go about creating two different paintings, he carefully composes the shallow space, with the objects being protagonists of the drawn space and revealing themselves due to the oddity and relationship of the intuitive grid. This process through which he brings to life the space by using insertions of small significant objects, weaves and contrasts with the apparently infinite deep space. He creates an interplay of transparencies, a dialogue between the phenomenal transparencies present in between the objects in the room and the literal transparencies that define the infinite, deep space that draws the Figure 7 Presentation Pictures by Lucien Herve Figure 8 Letter of Corbusier context of the building. Although shot under the supervision of Le Corbusier to Madame Meyer oscillating from the long, wide window, to spaces of open vastness, the deep space is representative for the literal transparencies which also create a more palpable context. There is also an ongoing dialogue between positive and negative space, appearing at the interaction between shadow, mass, and the transparent. Whilst the positive space, mostly confined within the Deep space, is well lit, clear and most of the time a natural, exterior environment, the negative one is the realm of shadows, mystery, and usually the place where the protagonist resides. Thus, if in Piero’s painting Jesus’s persona is presented in the left, negative panel, creating a space of suffering and drama, in the same manner in Corbusier’s presentation photographs the golf clubs, the flower pot, the hand washing sink, the furniture are all protagonists in the machine-à-habiter, defining the purpose and the moment one should imagine when first seeing the space. Additionally, the interaction between the negative and positive enriches the semantic of the negative space. By registering the shadows cast by the positive space inside the negative one, there is a sense of in between, but also a sense of revilement created by the layering specific to the use of the transparency technique. Furthermore, the discussion about the simultaneity of the space is valid when interpreting the drawn spaces defined by all the frames. The interior pictures are composed in such a way that there is a glance towards other parts of the building, this creating the same effect as that mentioned by Giedion when describing the Bauhaus building. Villa Garche as Phenomenal Bauhaus as Literal
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In order to clearly put into perspective Corbusier’s use of phenomenal transparency in another one of his creations, Villa Garche, a good approach is by taking advantage of the same method used to emphasize the differences in the two paintings above. Thus, by comparing Corbusier’s Villa Garche with Walter Gropius’s Bauhaus, both of them buildings of the same time and architectural style, the evidence is easier to put into
Figure 10 Villa Garche
Figure 9 Bauhaus
context and reveal. By looking superficially at the two buildings one may say that they are quite similar in a plethora of aspects. Comparing the garden façade of the Villa Garche with that of the Bauhaus we can start with the recessed lower ground floor, which acts like a pedestal for the building, and continue with the highly glazed facades, the flat roof, the use of concrete and glass, the presence of simple, box-like geometries and the lack of immediate built context. At the same time, there are quite a few things that set them apart. With the Bauhaus building the glazing seems to be a continuous, transparent surface kept in tension between the two panes of concrete, with the interior concrete slab
Figure Bauhaus
slightly visible behind the surface of glass. The threshold between the inside and the outside of such a building is maintained by textile curtains and the evolution of space is linear, going from the shallow space towards the deep space. Its transparency is created by the material related transparency of the façade and the visual permeability of the building’s skin. When compared to the above mentioned paintings and techniques, it is easy to see it as a fair example of literal transparency, similar to that in Picasso’s painting. Figure Villa Garche
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At the other end of the spectrum, Villa Garche uses a different method of exposure. Just like in Braque’s painting, the constitutive elements set out a grid which layers the different moments of the actual façade. Eisenman describes this layering as being ‘plans tipped to an upright position’31 that give you the possibility of simultaneously perceiving the whole from the flatness of the façade (Figure 14). We find this correlation of depth and interplay of relationships in his painting Still Life (Figure 13) which negates the three-fold dimensionality of perspectival space but makes the relationship of depth to appear through the layering technique. Both Villa Garche and the Bauhaus are good examples of modernist architecture making use of different artistic tools to enrich their narrative and semantics. Conclusion - Artchitects The link between the Figure 3 Axonometric of Le Corbusier’s Still Life, 1920 (Left) Still Life, Corbusier architecture and the different techniques and artistic procedures of Cubism and Purism seems to be clear and well pronounced when the power of comparison is brought into discussion. Although the concepts of transparency, of negative and positive, shallow and deep space or simultaneity may come Figure 14 Villa Garche, Axonometric Diagram (Left), Villa Garche Garden Façade, Le from an artistic background, their use and intent remain the same when used for a visual and perceptive effect in architecture. Although their application in the architectural realm imposes quite a lot of difficulty, much the same like translating a text from one language to another, the main intent and meaning remains the same and still manages to manifest itself. Given the fact that the techniques used can be found in both architecture and in the plastic art of the time strengthens the idea of them being view shapers as much as tools for design. In the creative process, it is hard to firmly delimitate where the point of juxtaposition between art and architecture appears, due to its spontaneous, sometimes unintended nature, but through iterations and sequential evolution it is safe to say that common points of conceptual intent are created by both mediums. Although Le Corbusier, has not prompted a direct connection between his architecture and his art or the art he admired, the multitude of crossovers and similarities seem to prove that undoubtedly they have shaped and modelled the way the architect designed and thought about his buildings. In the same manner, given the fact that mostly all of the members of society interact with the built environment and most of their life experiences are tied to designed space this creates a link between art/architecture and people that in the end expresses and modifies itself again through the changes that it provokes inside the two creative mediums. This perpetual dialogue between the spirit of an era and society is what guides a culture through the passing of time and shapes its own future, much like the evolution of a painting with each brush stroke it gathers or an architect’s design with each design decision that is added.
31 Architecturality, Transparency II, Layering of Planes/Layering of Surfaces, <https://architecturality.wordpress.com/tag/transparency/> [Accessed 1 April 2015]
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Illustration Sources Cover Illustration Still Life with a Siphon, 1921, Le Corbuiser’s Secret Laboratory, from Painting to Architecture, p.155 Figure 1 Picasso, L'Arlesienne, 1911-12, Robin Evans, The Projective Cast (Cambridge, Massachusetts:
The MIT Press, 1995), p. 58
Figure 2 Ibid. Figure 3 < https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/G--
B3flbGLlcNice9EFiWdoBXmAh3XHM5jlZU1r7_0tGuNUv6YoAR0SJ4nHWuGVzF_zPomorekj6h3 ASXBJxHqF5kZqSnGDZ_UpdWZo4hYkElOZC_FwtBLgfkA> [accessed 1 April 2015] Figure 4 <
http://www.picassoandmatisse.com/paintings/picasso/big/picasso_The_Clarinet_Player_19111912_.jpg> [accessed 1 April 2015] Figure 5 http://uploads0.wikiart.org/images/georges-braque/portuguese-1911.jpg [accessed 1 April 2015] Figure 6 Robin Evans, The Projective Cast (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1995), p. 145 Figure 7 Thomas Schumacher, ‘Deep Space Shallow Space’, The Architectural Review, CLXXXI no 1079 (1987), 37-42 (p.37) Figure 8 Le Corbuiser’s Secret Laboratory, from Painting to Architecture, p.163 Figure 9 <http://www.technologystudent.com/prddes1/bauhs1.png> [Accessed 1 April 2015] Figure 10 <http://1618.in/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/Villa20Stein20Garches.195224414_std.jpg> [Accessed 1 April 2015] Figure 11 < museografo.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/bauhaus002.jpg> [Accessed 1 April 2015] Figure 12 < http://s3.amazonaws.com/europaconcorsi/project_images/3204329/Villa_Stain_full.jpg > Figure 13 <https://architecturality.wordpress.com/tag/transparency/ )> [Accessed 1 April 2015 Figure 14 <https://architecturality.wordpress.com/tag/transparency/ )> [Accessed 1 April 2015 Bibliography Brawne, M., Architectural Thought: The Design Process and the Expectant Eye, (Amsterdam: Architectural Press. 2003) Benton, T., The Villas of Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret, 1920-1930, (Switzerland: Birkhauser Verlag AG. 2007) Corbusier, L., Le Corbusier’s Secret Laboratory: From Painting to Architecture edited by J.-L. Cohen,., (Germany: Hatje Cantz. , 2013) Evans, R., The Projective Cast: Architecture and Its Three Geometries, (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press 1995). Johnston, G.B., Drafting Culture: A Social History of Architectural Graphics Standards, (United States: MIT Press 2008). Levine, N., Modern Architecture: Representation and Reality,( United States: Yale University Press 2010). Meuser, N. & Schillaci, F.,. Architectural Drawings, Germany: (DOM Publishers 2013). Rowe, C., The Mathematics of the Ideal Villa and Other Essays 1st ed., (United States: M.I.T. P. 1976) Schumacher, T, ‘Deep Space Shallow Space’, The Architectural Review, CLXXXI no 1079 (1987)