In“A day in the life”, Rem koolhas illustrated a series of narratives by perspective photos. Through different point of view, it tells the different experience of people in the building. This makes me realize that the perspective has the ability rather than other drawing skills to describe the experience at a special moment. Also, it reminds the designer to consider the relationship between space and experience. I think this reading gives us a way to figure out what kind of experience or memory we want to create and express to the user. On the contrary, we reconsider what kind of perspective could represent the experiential imagine.

Odd.

So man has need to express the wonders of his soul, to ask his questions about the order of things, to visualize the vast system in which he is part. (These thoughts articulated by Kahn in beautiful ways.) Peter Wilson opens a reading on the competition for the Parc de la Villette suggesting two types of architectural responses to the lodged sensation, both borne of this age of the ‘cult of the new.’ The opposition he bears to mind is engendered in the alternate approaches of the crowd of a “Euro- intellect” (Tschumi, OMA, and from Schneider’s article, Eisenman), and the work of those propelled with a more direct “designers intuition” (Hadid chief on this side). Though offering no moral leaning towards one mode or the other, Wilson provides a background platform for the criticisms Schneider carries into his work on perspective and axonometry, and the House El Even Odd.
The now, proposed by Wilson as a time characterized by disjunction, elicits the trope of layering for expressive and multi lateral means towards spatial formation. With this strategy, clarity in the individual layers prior to their montage stands more essential, so too articulation. (Grids, points, lines, surfaces, recognition of the separate systems of objects, movements, and spaces, linear forests...) Towards the precise need, the Parc de la Villette reading witnesses a breaking down, or logical maneuvering within the schemes of both OMA and Bernard Tschumi’s work (similar to the operational “logics” of Eisenmans El Even Odd- the name itself a play with words). These works of design are proposed and carefully and exactly navigated with a linguistic approach, by the frame of “linguistic imperialism,” while they more than likely would stand ambiguous systems in reality.

These readings helped me to both reflect on our processes of diagramming and frame the perspective drawing exercise ahead of us. This semester, our uses of axon and perspective are closely in line with Bernhard Schneider's disscussion of these methods. As the axonometric drawing does not prescibe itself to the laws of visual perception, it opens up to presenting relationships that may not be understood from a perspectival vantage point. Axonometric drawings in our class have described construction diagrams and programmatic relationships. Our task of drawing perspectivally will force us to think at the scale of person in space and to test relationships from eye-level. The perspective's reference to human visual perception leads to a "tangible" representation, understood by the senses. As a tangible space, the representation must necessarily have a temporal and narrative component because it references real experience and direction. Rem's perspectival photographic sequences in "A Day in the Life" poetically describe the narratives of several workers in his space. The human figures and vantage points at eye-level are compelling instruments that persuade the viewer to visually stroll through his representation of space. These representations speak to the persuasive power of a perspective to be instantly accessible. Both the trained and untrained eye can understand how a perspectival space is occupied because the method of representation follows the rules of our everyday visual experience.

Bernhard Schneider's article was a much needed reminder of the opportunities that perspective and axonometry afford. For example, the intentional deception of perspective allows you to reconsider space and place. I was reminded of a Lee Miller (or maybe tina Modotti) photograph of two people standing outdoors. One person is located in the foreground and the other person is located in the background about 80+ yards back on an incline. The person in the foreground has their hand raised as if holding an imaginary tray. The photographer and subjects are along the same axis - and from the photographers vantage point, it appears that the person in the background is a tiny figure standing on the open palm of the person in the foreground. The distance/space between the two subjects disappears and they become one unit inhabiting the same place. I'm intrigued with the idea of perspectival shifts that lead to heightened, perhaps thought-provoking (or maybe just plain confusing) experiential shifts.

Bernhard Schneider’s article addressing geometric representation and human perception was interesting to me. In particular, the idea that our understanding of space relates to its perception by the eye seems to be an opportunity for architects. I am reminded of one such instance of delight which I experienced observing a walkway approach to Saarinen’s Morse and Stiles Colleges at Yale. The walkway goes between the nine story gothic tower of the gym and the faceted walkway that rises and falls as it passes between the colleges. Although the vast majority of people walking this pathway would say that it has a constant width, it is actually twice as wide near the colleges compared to near the gym. The result was very different impressions of approach compared with leaving. My impression of leaving the colleges was that the gym appears very large and at great distance, since from the vantage point of the colleges, the reduced pathway width heightened the sense of distance and scale. My impression of approach, on the other hand, was compressed since the expanded width approaching the colleges tended to flatten the perception of the scene. As a result, the walkway seemed much shorter and more like a grand approach. In thinking about the effects of a simple move such as this can shape perception of a space, I wonder now whether and to what end this idea was employed within the spaces of the colleges themselves.

In my process to organize the various programs of our project, I've found it rather difficult to integrate the different users into one another's programs. I think this is largely due to the fact that it the users have been the organizational driver. This is where I take from OMA's proposal for the Parc de La Villette. OMA states, "The 'design' should be the proposition of a method that combines architectural specificity with programmatic indeterminacy." They describe the process of layering different general programmatic elements, such as circulation, connection, and planting. With this method they have achieved a certain degree of flexibility in their program which is capable of, "absorbing an infinite number of extensions of meaning."
Tschumi's proposal for the Parc de La Villette also resonated with me in it's description as, "combining a variety of activities that will encourage new attitudes and perspectives." This is exactly our objective with the program at Murano. Although I don't see a gridded system of follies as an effective model for our site, the way in which Tschumi organized program into point-like activities, linear activities, and surface activities, could be very useful in creating a more symbiotic relationship between the users of our program.

When considering Parc de la Villette, both Tschumi and OMA were similarly and highly concerned with the social implications of their design. What is interesting to investigate, then, is the differences that manifest themselves in their proposals. This is an especially timely investigation because both teams set forth a word, or set of words, which influenced how they conceived of creating space and managed program. This, I feel, can be instructive and inspirational to us as we move forward with our nascent designs, which for the most part have similar ambitions, yet all are using different vocabulary to inform the design.

OMA clearly applied one vocabulary word—layer—to how they created space and managed program on the site. They have accounted for the unpredictability of the user in their scheme for access and circulation which promotes both axial and more random movement through the site. What I find most interesting and perhaps a bit counter-intuitive about their choice of the word “layer” as the driver for their intervention is that they are constructing an experience which will mostly be experienced in plan, rather than in section. While the layering system does allow for the conceptual interaction/intersection/overlap of the different “layers”, I’m not convinced that this would be legible to a user of the park. This, to me, sets up a perhaps undesirable dichotomy between the actual experience and the rather compelling presentation drawings of the proposal.

Tschumi, on the other hand, used the vocabulary of points, lines, and surfaces to create his proposal for the park. While being less concise, his vocabulary is one that does directly translate into the users experience. The follies most definitely will serve as “points of intensity”, as Tschumi asserts, while the lines of the highly-used grid will most definitely guide the user experience. While I actually like OMA’s proposal more in proposal form, I do think that Tschumi’s vocabulary helps to more convincingly situate his ideas off of the page and into reality, a testament to the strength of consistency all the way through a project!

100 cubes!

During my freshman year in college, in my design drawing class we were assigned to draft 50 perfect axonometric cubes and then to draw 50 cubes free hand ones. I guess the intention was to get efficient at drawing 3-d in order to design objects. It’s interesting to read Bernhard Schneider divide 3d drawing in two black and white groups of axonometric and perspective. He takes into question Peter Eisenman design philosophy to use axonometric drawings, model and eventually to the building. Schneider draws the line at axonometric refers to the object and perspective refers to viewer. As industrial designers we never really presented any objects (products) in axonometric in our presentations. It seems like perspective is more effective for larger objects and along with other context next to where it becomes alive. We always draw our objects in isometrics. Perhaps because we were displaying design of an object not ones view of it. I am not sure how does the isomeric view fit in between Schneider object and viewer division. Perhaps drawing on a 60 or 30 degree angles would give a more accurate drawing and does not distort our perception.

I think Nathan and I can learn a few lessons from the park and peak where their tectonic strategy was to composition of floating spaces as well as dividing up the space/program into a series of pavilions.

These readings helped me to both reflect on our processes of diagramming and frame the perspective drawing exercise ahead of us. This semester, our uses of axon and perspective are closely in line with Bernhard Schneider's disscussion of these methods. As the axonometric drawing does not prescibe itself to the laws of visual perception, it opens up to presenting relationships that may not be understood from a perspectival vantage point. Axonometric drawings in our class have described construction diagrams and programmatic relationships. Our task of drawing perspectivally will force us to think at the scale of person in space and to test relationships from eye-level. The perspective's reference to human visual perception leads to a "tangible" representation, understood by the senses. As a tangible space, the representation must necessarily have a temporal and narrative component because it references real experience and direction. Rem's perspectival photographic sequences in "A Day in the Life" poetically describe the narratives of several workers in his space. The human figures and vantage points at eye-level are compelling instruments that persuade the viewer to visually stroll through his representation of space. These representations speak to the persuasive power of a perspective to be instantly accessible. Both the trained and untrained eye can understand how a perspectival space is occupied because the method of representation follows the rules of our everyday visual experience.

At this point, after a semester’s talk of “money shots” and GSI perspective presentations, it seems obvious that perspective drawings focus upon the subjective viewer while axonometric representations tend to relate a more object-oriented reality. And yet, after reading the Schneider piece and reflecting, it seems that both of these previously accepted notions can be reinterpreted. Leonardo Da Vinci himself found perspective drawings overly objective and insufficiently experiential. Indeed, the measured nature of the perspective defies an inherently impressionistic nature, although the frame is taken from the position of an onlooker, someone experiencing the space. Alternately, due to the many many choices associated with axonometric composition, such drawings may not be entirely objective, given the possibilities in types of axonometric drawings (which favor one or another aspect of a building) as well as some vantage point consideration. While the two drawing types are clearly distinct and communicate in very different ways, their boundaries are not so easily compartmentalized.

Perspektive, Axonometrie

Schneider’s article makes a good case not only in defining a major fault in architectural theory, but also in organizing a clear delineation between elements of architectural representation and their relationship to reality, something architects are often unwilling to do. He attributes confusion in language to a kind of “linguistic imperialism,” which I would think results from the position of architectural discourse on the edge of the academy. Because it constantly straddles the border between intellect and material construction, theorists often fall into the trap of overly codifying language as a means of sounding more important.

It’s actually simple, according to Schneider. An axonometric puts the object to advantage, perspective the perceived viewer. Yet both are completely constructed representations of an idea for a project, something that could be built, but would never look like the drawings that bring it into form. So perhaps there is some complexity there. What I think Schneider’s categorization really does is it opens up an avenue for parallel understanding of a project. And this is illustrated in OMA’s story about a day in the life of some Universal employees. The use of perspective to tell a personal story of relationships complements a more diagrammatic approach to the process of development and the conceptual underpinnings of the building.

The modeled story highlights that constructed nature of architectural representation. It gives the readers a chance to imagine what could be without ever making them believe that it is true, or final.

possiblities in concrete

this is the web page about liquid stone, at the building museum last year.

“Where is your place?”. When facing this question, I was confused at first time. After I realized “my place,” the question became interesting. In this question, the place is place where our lives go through “in” or “out” or “nearby” the place. The place provides us to have an experience and memory. But, Certeau defines a place and space like that: “A place (lieu) is the order (of whatever kind) in accord with which elements are distributed in relationships of coexistence.” and “Space is a practiced place.” Certeau clarifies the difference between place and space such as “place-being there” and “space –a determination through operations.” This was good chance to re-define. And the story is more interesting story. The function of stories is to transform places into spaces or spaces into places. The story, narration would be the enzyme to make a relationship in programs < in buildings < in architecture.

“narrative structures,” “spatial syntaxes,” “subtle complexity stories,” “geographies of actions and drifting,” “proliferating metaphors,” “spatializing operations,” “semantics of space,” “psycholinguistics of perception,” “sociolinguistics of descriptions of places,” “phenomenology of the behavior,” “’ethnomethodology’ of the indices of localization,” “enunciative focalizations.”
de Certeau commences this chapter of The Practice of Everyday Life with a litany of abstruse phrases. Only slightly intelligible on the first read, these terms are intriguing and perhaps architectural. Could one or more alone spawn a design? Or generate discussion or thought that leads to creativity? Surely the remainder of this reading enters the architectural realm, considering that to which “we” strive to give definition.
Surely the line, “transformation of the void into a plentitude, of the in-between into an established place,” will give form to at least the idea of a building. Can buildings be based on philosophical phenomenological musings?

Taken in light of our earlier discussion of mapping, especially the way in which “traditional” maps dictate space, I can start to conceive of something of a theoretical loop in regards to human activity / interaction and maps. If, as de Certeau states, “ stories have the function of spatial legislation”(122), and then these stories “‘go in procession’ ahead of social practices in order to open a field for them,” then how to reconcile this with earlier discussions (was is Cosgrove or Corner?) that place the map ahead of activity. What I am trying to get is the idea of a feedback loop whereby people define space through their narrative understanding (de Certeau’s citing of itinerary), giving rise to an official map that then consumers these story tellers, only to have people come after and layer new narratives (new maps) onto these maps, returning them to the realm of the common language. Taken together these ideas for me create a fertile ground for meaning to be constantly redefined with relation to the “official” and informal creation of space. That and the part about bridges was gnarly.

There were two main factors to this article that I found difficult and imensly intriguing (most likely because I had difficulty with them). Primarily the references he makes are thing that are not even remotely recognizable to me... making it difficult to follow his discussion. Secondly, the distinction he makes between space and place are contrary and in fact opposite to the way that I would personally define those words. I would define place something like his "intersections of mobile elements" and space as "an intantaneous configuration of positions" though I would never have been able to describe the two so concisely. Especially in reference to architecture and the idea of "place making" that is so popular. I think of "place" as what happens when the "space" is occupied. Interestingly, in reading through the article the reversal of the definitions of these terms in my head made me pay much more attention to how the two words were used.

"A diagram architecture is not necessary an architecture produced through diagrams.... Instead, a diagram architecture is an architecture that behaves like a diagram, indifferent to the specific means of its realization." This paragraph points out the answer that I struggled to find last semester. In the process of the design, I tried to find the potential through the translation from the reality to the abstract diagram. while I wondered if the architecture should rigorously develop from the analysis, the images representing the virtual and potential informaiton. After comparing the assertion of Stan Allen and my project, I realized what the diagram gives us is the chance to study and create in a special way.
"... since nothing can enter architecture without having been first converted into graphic form, the actual mechanism of graphic conversion is fundamental." To me, the diagram is really a particular way belonging to the architecture. Different from the statisics analysis, the use of diagram does not describe the things but the relationship between different elements and the potential of things themselves.

As students in architecture, we usually struggle to make a efficient diagram showing things such as concept, process and analysis. And when I think of the feature of diagram, the visual character of diagram is simplity. To me, it means the diagram is abstract tool to represent the idea and the process of design. But Stan Allen defines the diagram as the organization, “description of potential relationships among elements, not only an abstract model of the way things behave in the world but a map of possible worlds.” And these possible worlds became full of invisible images and information opposing to materiality of buildings. In this invisible time, the diagram has potential to be efficient method as well as strong tool in architecture because “a diagrammatic practice locates itself between the actual and the virtual”. I have been persuaded by Stan Allen to here.

Next, the diagram architecture is… “ a diagram architecture is an architecture that behaves like a diagram”. Like diagram, architecture confronts the period of immateriality and invisibility. And Stan Allen insists that a diagram architecture produces complex performative effects with a unfixed architectural envelope and is located in the architecture’ place in 21th-century. In my opinion, architecture is basically including human behavior and providing the place for human activity. In spite of the character of new century as information and images, I wonder how architecture integrates between fundamental function of architecture and immateriality of this period. Could diagram architecture is one of method for this?

A post is a post is a post.

Patched together here is some praise for an architecture that is at once complete and open ended, discussion of the abstract machine and its processing capacity. It stands for flexibility over stiffness, the organization of present as well as future conditions. What I find difficulty in (if I have it right) is the suggestion that meaning and purposivness in diagrammatic architecture resides solely in the surfaces and materiality. Interpretation is inherent. It is what we do, cognition and apprehension already processes of translation.
The analogy of the architectural diagram to electrical flow is a sturdy visualization beyond that exception. “The diagram may be the channel through which any communication with architecture’s outside must travel, but the flow of information along these channels will never be smooth and faultless…” This web of circuitry brings to mind the creative practices mentioned and espoused in Lucy’s lecture this week- words as things, planning as participatory, intricate, convoluted.

Stan Allen describes the diagram as “not a thing in itself but a description of potential relationships among elements, not only an abstract model of the way things behave in the world but a map of many worlds.” This is a curious assertion as I always considered the diagram to be much more of a direct and concise representation of information, while mappings aimed to discover something new about a set of relationships.
I was stuck by the connection Allen made between the transactional nature of architecture and the diagram. It makes sense then that the diagram is such an appropriate tool for architects, in that the tasks of translating processes, organizing information, and conveying ideas are the tasks of both the architect and the diagram. The architect, in a sense, is the diagrammatic element in the realization of a project. Ito further expresses the importance of the diagram in architecture in its demystification of the process, which should be the architect’s objective. This is an important point. It illustrates the diagram as not only a tool of communication, but also regulatory system to clarify the idea and the designer in check.

do diagrams really matter?

do diagrams really matter?

In this essay Stan Allen argues and states a lot of architects' portfolios, theory and practice who do use diagrams to create architecture. He goes into various types of them. Similar to corner he does believe they are not just a single statement but rather they transposition ideas rather than translating them. Diagrams are generative and create new ideas. He even goes as far as dividing the diagrams into stages of generating ideas, creation and communication. All the bell and whistle about diagramming or mapping is wonderful and i believe its a great tool to initiate design. With diagramming one is trying to gather all of information/data that surround their project, compare relationships and discover new information that might help you design more actively. I think the more difficult bridge to cross is applying one's diagram and relationship to the design. The diagrams can help but eventually they not going to be formal generation for one's design.

Stan Allen describes diagramming in a very dense mater creating a rhetoric which is not very legible from everyone. This is the struggle of architecture creating a credible profession next to science based professions. its seems like more and more architects/architectural theorist write in such a dense manner in order to claim a higher standard for architecture in society. so architecture theory wont be the nightstand reading for everyone. therefore architecture language/ rhetoric become more and more exclusive and only we can understand and talk about among our selves, excluding the engineers, doctors and lawyers. Are we benefiting from this exclusive language? just remember Mr. Allen's does describes "diagram architecture travels light, leaving the heavy stuff behind"

really?

Lost in Transposition?

A diagrammatic practice is, among other qualities, direct and adaptable as it is described by Stan Allen's Diagrams Matter. While these seem to me desirable qualities in a design practice, I wonder how the diagrammed design succeeds in directness and adaptability more than the methods he is arguing against. I read the operation of transposition as a decontextualising of an element of a system mechanically, and then allowing new meanings to emerge from the assemblage of elements into a diagram. I question whether the produces something that is merely different rather than something that is relevant. Consider the example of Alexander of Macedon's dream as it is provided in this essay. Aristander's transposition of satyr into sa Tyros directed Alexander to lead a successful attack, but did the actual name satyr have a primary role in his dream? What if the name of the dancing visage had been transposable to mean "Tyros is not thine"? The answer, likely in my opinion, is that some other justification would have been found for pressing the attack, perhaps by transposing the word for dancing to indicate imminent victory. For what is absent in the story is the scenario: the quantity of provisions remaining, the moral of soldiers, the weather, evidence of the condition of the enemy, and so on. Perhaps diagrams act in an analogous way in architecture: perhaps they serve as oversimplified justification for a specific design (even in the case of the most abstract diagram), while the collective experience and instincts of a project's designers act to determine the success of the design.

I agree with Stan Allen that diagrams may be significant in their offering of new ways of thinking about organization, potential relationships, etc., however, I am concerned with the possible bullshit factor behind them. Stan Allen puts forth the idea that diagrams do in fact contain gaps and are indeed flawless, but not to the extent or degree I find necessary. Diagrams contain more than the information of the proposed subject, they are driven to a great extent by the idiosyncracies of the maker. They are an extension of the author's experience, knowledge, skills, and perhaps most importantly their 'agenda.' I appreciate the Toyo Ito passage for addressing the dependence of diagrams on the 'self expression of the individual.'
I'm also interested in the reader of diagrams. How do they serve different audiences. For architects and students the connections and/or relationships may be easily read. For clients, or a variety of clients, they may be understood as complete and honest or perhaps meaningless-incomprehensible abstractions. I haven't studied this subject matter in depth, and it may be a bit premature to state that I'm all together cautious of them - not a true believer in their potential weight. Yes, they may be generative but I don't see how they are "open." The maker has already determined the starting point and set the course - so, if the reader moves on from those points, isn't it along a prescribed trajectory? I thought the Panopticon reference was great. I read about this as a kid and haven't visited it since, but if I remember correctly the design and diagram promoted an efficient system for prisoners and guards. The central location of the guards would allow them a view of the prisoners from a single, central vantage point.. blah blah, and Bentham's 18th C. diagram fully illustrated this potential. Well, the guards were located in this central position, surrounded by prisoners who were in fact watching them all the time! creepy.

information in flux

Allen, Berkle, and Bos' ideas on the place of the diagram in arch. resonate much more with me now, than when we last reviewed them. Specifically, the idea that a truly well crafted diagram will not lead to a conclusion, but rather an iteration that represents a snap shot of interrelation. My thoughts then drifted to my working in Illustrator, with its vector-based interface. On a really dumb level, I am really taken by the menu option of "place", and that a file, once placed in the document, can be altered apart from the document, and that this newer version will find its way back into the illustrator assemblage. Further that the vectors themselves exist in a fluid state, and that they are only fixed until I shove them around to create a different image, but one that speaks to its constituent parts in the same way the image did before I tampered with it.
Further, when considering Allen's comments on how a diagrammatic building would also treat space and program as open ended possibilities, I though of the free space within the MEDIATHEUQE, and how it is configured to respond, like my illustrator doc., to the changing modes of media production / presentation that it is meant to contain.
I need food.

marketing architecture for an open-ended future

Stan Allen is marketing a position for architecture to remain relevant as the intellectual direction of the world shifts. It is something that Charles Jencks, Le Corbusier, Wittkower etc. have done, as the world of ideas slowly morphs from one fascination to another. First, he opens the concept of diagram, giving it “multiple functions,” and “instrumental abstractions.” Diagrams create possibilities. He then jumps to information technologies, the force which is changing the way the world operates. IT requires lighter, more responsive architecture… performance…”a field in which diagrams matter.” Here we see what we need for the future, but before going on to explain how architecture, rearticulated, can fulfill those requirements, Allen stops to historically ground the discipline as predisposed toward this type of thinking: “architecture is already implicated in a number of media, and the architect is out of necessity constantly moving from one medium to another.” As he pushes his new ideas about architecture forward, he is careful not to let the age of the discipline impede its flexibility. Architecture “does not insist on historically sanctioned definitions,” but its technological skepticism gives it the freedom to use tradition alongside innovation. According to Allen, architecture “travels light, leaving the heavy stuff behind.” Therefore it is the perfect response to what IT requires, and a relevant discipline in the 21st century. It behaves like a diagram, loose fitting, transposable, multiplicitous…it allows for flaws, imperfection. It’s open-ended. Society is changing so fast it is impossible to tell where it is headed; therefore the best way to stay marketable is to offer critique without taking a firm line, to generate and not limit or control. I agree with his calls for generative design, and with the usefulness of diagrams. But regardless of whether I like what he says, I think he has done a marvelous job of articulating a form of logic for a discipline on the border of academia that propels it into the midst of academic exploration and makes it receptive to any number of shifts in theory or technology.

difficult words

Definitions of words and precise use of language has been one underlying theme in our studios during this first year of architecture school, and our readings of architectural theory has supported the idea that words in architecture seem to have a dual functionality. One one hand they add a level of precision to the communication of visual ideas, leading to the creation of a specialized language for architecture. Other uses and methods of understanding words and discourse are utilized by both Stan Allen and Van Berkel & Bos.

Stan allen uses many communication-related language to explain the importance of the diagram. Many of these words I had to look up.

language
literature
translation
transposition - translation/interpretation/transformation??
hermeneutics - a method of interpretation
rubus - a representation of words or syllables by pictures of objects or by symbols whose names resemble the intended words or syllables in sound

Stan Allen uses the analogy of the the interpretation of the dream of Alexander of Macedon to demonstrate the materiality of words. He concludes with, "In this sense, words are made to behave like architecture rather than architeture being made to behave like discourse."

Van Berkel and Bos utilizes the idea of discourse theory to describe the efficacy of diagrams.
...out of time...! ... perhaps more later..

Clean up on aisle 6!!!

Ah, Stan Allen. I love this guy. So does the stimulant pharmaceutical industry.

After rereading particular sentences multiple times I think I finally understand the gist of what Stan0 is getting at. He is merely attempting to define an architecture driven by "real" circustances stripped of subjective influence. Diagramatic architecture takes literal, functional information related to a project and layers it to reveal other literal functional relationships, scenarios, and effects. These in turn are used to inform the architecture. Architecture inspired by this methodology is grounded in real world circumstance and not in the personal expression or whimsy of the architect. Notions of meaning or interpretation are theoretically removed. Architecture derived through this methodology is what it is. This isn't to say that the final relationships used to inform the design aren't complex or obvious. Rather that they are grounded in actuality. Such an architecture isn't open to interpretation. Interpretation is rendered moot by the fact that no meaning was intended.
Allen doesn't say that diagram architecture is right or wrong, better or worse than other styles. It just is what it is, much like the architecture it motivates.

maps and diagrams and bears-- oh my!

With Stan Allen’s assertion that a diagram isn’t necessarily “a thing in itself, but a description of potential relationships among elements… a map of possible worlds”, the thin line between map and diagram, which we attempted to navigate last semester and which never quite came into focus in my mind, is once again blurred. The manner in which Allen describes the diagram, as an abstract tool for organization and the discovery of new potential organizations, very much accords with my understanding of Corner’s definition of a map (as distinct from a “trace”). To further my confusion, enter Toyo Ito, who states that a diagram “describes how a multitude of functional conditions must be read in spatial terms, into an actual structure”.

As I struggle to understand the difference between a map and a diagram—if, in fact, one truly exists—I seize on Allen’s assertion that diagrams function through matter/matter relationships, as opposed to through matter/content relationships. He asserts that a matter/matter relationship turns “away from questions of meaning and interpretation, and reassert function as a legitimate problem, without the dogmas of functionalism”. Do maps, in fact, operate from matter/content relationships, as opposed to matter/matter relationships?

Indeed I believe that maps are concerned with matter/content relationships, as put forth by Corner. While maps, according to Corner do uncover” realities previously unseen or unimagined”, they gain their agency by doing so “across seemingly exhausted ground”. This seems to me a particularly matter/content relationship. However, despite this rather tenuous differentiation, I remain fundamentally confused about the difference between the two. For now, I am content to use whatever I am making—maps or diagrams—as generative tools and abstract machines, to inspire, but not resemble, what they produce.

In some ways, the writings of Stan Allen and Berkel & Bos correspond to the notions presented by Corner’s mapping essay. One recurring notion is the role of the diagram or map as a generative tool. In particular, the forward-looking capacity of the diagram is emphasized. Berkel & Bos write: “The diagrammatic or abstract machine does not function to represent, even something real, but rather constructs a real that is yet to come.” Allen writes of how the diagram anticipates “yet to be realized relationships” and asserts: “A diagram is therefore not a thing in itself but a description of potential relationships among elements, not only an abstract model of the way things behave in the world but a map of many possible worlds.” This idea of examining and discovering future potentialities via diagramming relates to Rem Koolhaas’s use of mapping to evocatively consider future possibilities, as presented by Corner. The correlation with Koolhaas and Corner continues in the discussion of layering as a representational tool. Allen describes how “diagram architecture looks for effects on the surface, but by layering surface on surface, a new kind of depth-effect is created.” Koolhaas’s work exhibits this depth-effect.

I appreciate the essays’ discussion of diagrams as a means to navigate architecture’s oscillation between “the world of ideas and the physical world” and traverse and address dualities within architectural practice. Although I have made great strides in my understanding of how a diagram operates, the boundary between idea, diagram and design remains indistinct in my mind. This blurriness is compounded by seemingly contradictory statements such as: “To see architecture as a built line diagram is practically the reverse of our position. More to the point is the general understanding of the diagram as a statistical or schematic image” (Berkel & Bos); and “a diagram architecture is an architecture that behaves like a diagram, indifferent to the specific means of its realization” (Allen). While I do understand the different terms with which the two essays consider the relationship between building and diagram, as I consider my work, the leap between one and the other remains a chasm that is of yet not easily traversed.

"the compulsive force of legitimizing arguments"

The van Berkel & Bos essay brings the illusive, theoretical language of Allen's article back into the real world for me. The point they make that diagrams are typically used as a post-rationalization, or a tool to convey architect's lofty theoretical ideas to the common man is disturbing to me. In school we are taught that diagrams are generators of ideas, and catalysts for creation, yet in my experience in practice, it only starts out that way. The diagram at some (early) stage of design development is put aside and in its place are snazzy renderings and cost estimations. Only post-construction or pre-publication is the diagram reintroduced, only now it has to reflect the thing that has been created. In a process such as this there is little to no generation of ideas coming from that inital diagram.

I find it facinating to think of a building as a diagram or as Stan Allen put is "an architecture that behaves like a diagram." A structure that has the ability perpetuate ideas, uses, and readings in minimal moves. Though I am not completely convinced as to how the examples he has given do this. Or perhaps it is that all buildings already act in this way... similar to how a renaissance painting can have new meaning and perpetuate new ideas for someone living in the 21st century. Perhaps all buildings, being "works of art" have the potential to fuction as a diagram, it all depends on who is looking at them. For example, Brian MacKay-Lyons spoke about in his lecture last week about how the simple vernacular houses on the coast in Nova Scotia were "diagram" of sorts that generated his theories and ideas of architecture despite the fact that his professors thought he was crazy and claimed that the houses weren't worth looking at.

What is this garbage?

Just Kidding. I just had to get that out. Really though, I don't know if my negative reaction to this reading is because reading this made me feel inadequate, or if I really do understand most of it, and just don't agree with its structure, meaning and vagueness. No matter what, it definitely left me with a feeling of not really getting it....was that embedded as a subversive purpose? Or are they just talking about construction documents?

Either way, personal insecurities aside, there is much to be talked about here. The most compelling (and most lucid) concept presented was that of "stealth diagrams" by Stan Allen. His deconstructions of architectural diagrammatic practice embodying the place between architectural ideas and their realization is powerful. "The diagram is not simply a reduction from an existing order. Its abstraction is instrumental, not an end in itself." As a 'transactional abstraction', diagrams are creative conduit—another medium for translation—an opportunity. Furthermore, his assertion of this conduit being invisible, or immaterial information being the fuel for the abstract machine is very interesting. It's about the creative energy that is inherently and invisibly embedded(or coded) into the product itself. It's provocative in suggesting that the material is a product of the immaterial, or that architecture is a means of actualizing the virtual.

In "Diagrams-Interactive Instruments in Operation", the concept of "the diagram as a visual tool designed to convey as much information in five minutes as would require whole days to imprint on the memory" makes a lot of sense. It would seem obvious then, that their capital comes from the 'invisible' codings that precede their realization. I would also agree with Stan Allen that this conceptual 'apparatus of conversion' is left unexamined. There are so many tools at an architects disposal to fuel this 'abstract machine', and if we can only find out the right ingredients and settings, we might just translate some damn good ideas into architecture. For me, working digitally still feels more like a bottleneck than an opportunity, because it forces me to continue to work in the virtual, which often feels too many steps away from formal realization. However, it can add another dimension as the conversation between iterations, even though in the end, you don't see it, you just see what it does.

milione statistiche!

http://194.243.104.170/cgi-bin/broker.exe?_service=venis&_program=pgmfile.urbanaudit5_01.sas&_debug=0&pgm=0

Clip/Stamp/Fold: The Radical Architecture of Little Magazines

when architects were activists...

Crit Characters

Check out this funny article about crit characters. Which one are you?

http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/story.php?artid=2282

The yearly rising of sea level threatens the Venice and other islands in the lagoon. It does not only affect the preservation of historical heritages in the city but also the ecosystem on the lagoon level. The proposal of building mobile gates to resist the threaten gives people a choice to solve the problem. However, the debate on building gates makes me think if it is necessary to tackle this problem. The cycle of tide eroses the shore of islands, and the global warming rises the level of sea. All of these are Nature. Why do people have to resist the force of nature?
Before solving problems, I think people should think what they really need to protect. Also, why is it worh to protect? Especailly, the tourism and the declination of real Venetian population strikes the native culture. The Venetian lose their own consiousness gradually. Instead of spending lots of money to find the solution, it is more necessary for us to recognize the radical problem.

It is interesting how the Insula has tackled the problem of the crumbling infrastructure. Keahey describes the process as filling hand crafted cobble stones, “with special cement reinforced with carbon and Kevlar fibers that are strong, long-wearing and temperature-resistant.” It is a beautiful idea of the old hand-crafted bricks working with new state of the art materials to keep this delicate city from sinking into the lagoon. Although I think most Venetians would disagree, I would like to see these materials above the water, perhaps as an installation piece, a commentary on preserving the old with new materials, and supporting the city.
What’s more interesting is the Venetian response to the necessary maintenance the Insula carries out. It’s almost as though the Venetians romanticize the past and the rotting infrastructure more than the visitors. They prefer the rusty iron and the crumbling brick walkways to a city that stays afloat.
Even though this solution is materially very well considered, it is temporary fix and the proposed permanent solution in Venice Against the Sea is to, “turn the lagoon into a walled lake…” which seems totally insane, but I guess it’s no more outlandish than dredging the canals as often as the Venetians do.

Venice will never die.

I find it so fascinating how many people romanticize Venice as an ephemeral city, always in a death-like dance with ecology, geography, tourism and time. It just seems so convenient to advertise the risk and decay, the unsustainability, and the ongoing, feeble, costly attempts by humans to preserve a city that we might just love to consume to death. I propose another perspective to this cynical, fatalist view. Venice is extremely resilient. It will not sink into the lagoon. It will not become a ghost-town of decayed buildings, whose history and culture sink away into the bog of the lagoon, and out of our mortal minds.
Too many people love it. They love it for its precariousness, its romance, its risk, and its power. It's a social and ecological underdog, with prime realestate in the world's hearts and minds. Its image goes far beyond what its poorly-constructed forms and foundations can support---Venice is an Idea. And as long as we humans remain mesmerized by the Idea, we will continue to protect it with our hearts and souls, and Venice will not disappear. I would argue that it's physical form may continue to change, as it negotiates its Image in our minds, and continues to woo our hearts(and wallets) with its risky mystique, and we continue to demand more than it can afford. In the end, if there is one, I would imagine that it could only come when we fall more in love with the ecological, the natural and the power of nature and time, and finally decide to give Venice back to the earth that it came from.

In reading Venice: Tourist Maze and Venice Against the Sea, it seems to me that the symbiotic and oppositional relationships of Man and Nature intersect in Venice. As Keahey documents in the later book, The analytical power of society has been put to work, drawing scientists from halfway around the world to battle the sea. This, to save a city whose survival and prosperity were achieved in no small part because of its natural surroundings. The ephemeral lagoon provided an ever-changing barrier, impossible to know except by those who lived there, effectively ensuring Venetian control over the approach to the city. Perhaps the romanticism that draws hordes of tourists to the area has some of its origin in the founding and thriving of a city in such a precarious location.

The more in-depth my study of Venice goes, the more difficult I find it to believe, on a personal level, that so many tourists continue to be drawn to this city perpetually mobbed by even increasing throngs of foreigners. Like Davis and Marvin, one can’t help but wonder “what do tourists go there to see”? As San Marco has come to be the key signifier of the terrestrial tourist experience in Venice, so too has Venice come to be the key signifier of the tourist experience on a global scale. I was particularly interested (though not entirely shocked) to learn of the incredibly low percentages of tourists that, while in Venice, choose to engage with the city’s history by attending the Galleria dell’Accademia, the Museo Correr, or even paying admission to the ducal palace. In this sense Venice, the historical seat of commercialism, has gone as far as a place can go in terms of commodifying itself. Tourists now flock there simply to be in the middle of, as Davis and Marvin put it, “the Something Big”. By adding to the masses of humanity that pass through Venice’s streets every year, the tourists are directly participating in the ever mounting value of Venice as a tourist destination. Similar to how a designer handbag is coveted not for its function but rather for its ability to grant status to its carrier, Venice is made attractive by the tourist’s desire to be considered a tourist of the world rather than for its unique heritage or simply for its cultural significance. In many ways Venice has become like the designer shops that now find their homes in the heart of the city; it too is a brand, so commodified that it too has begotten knock-offs, which do little but heighten global desire for the real thing.

While reading The Tourist Maze I became interested in the psychology of the tourist and his/her persistance in searching for a personal relationship with venice that would satisfy an image or myth of the city. Davis and Marvin describe in detail the set of annoyances, obstacles, and jams that tourists trudge through in mobs, while at the same time dreamily determined to find and frame their image of venice. The authors write,

"As anyone who has ventured out into the town's back sreets can testify, it is almost always easy to frame a camera or video shot - or just a personal memory, for that matter - that will combine some or sometimes all of the elements of "Venetianness" that allow one to say, "I'm here, I'm in Venice." This is a place where, after all, "unlike just about anywhere else on earth, the most important thing is simple physical presence."

I'm interested in the persistance and capacity for tourists to mentally block out, frame, and tint their experience in Venice to match their dreams, to convince themselves that they have some personal ownership and connection with the city.

Dangerous Waters

The discussion of Venice is not complete without the inclusion of the water. "The Tourist Maze" makes the connections between the problems caused by water in the city and the tourist who invade its sparse bits of land. The inital discussion is of the famous smelly water, which they discribe as the second most famous myth of the city only to the "fact" that the city is sinking. It is amusing to think that the same stink and muck that the tourist complain about is partial caused by them or their fellow tourist, leaving waste of all kinds behind as they shuffle from attraction to attraction. Countering the point of the actual inhabitants of the city (both temporary and permenent) causing the dirty water is the fact that for years on the terrafirma industry was dumping chemicals and waste into the lagoon and agriculture was allowing unregulated runoff directly into the water surrounding the city. In an effort to keep the lagoon acessible to residents and visitors alike, the canal dredging has been to blame for stirring up this toxic that settles over time.
An interesting relation between the water and tourist comes about in the discussion of the acqua alta and the flooding/sinking quality of the city. Interestingly that the discussion of how to "save" the city also includes a discussion of how to save it without saving it too much. A fear of changing the city so much that visitors will no longer flock to the city. The final discussion is one of modernization of a city that is attempting to stay premodern. The change from rowed to motorized boats is one of necessity and convience but yet is having a profound effect on the decay of the city. The delicate balance of land and water that has been Venice's situation since its first inhabitants seems to only escalate. Now the perdicament of maintaining the living museum while at the same time being environmentally concious and continuing its livability has become stickier than the muck that fills lagoon.

Venice against the sea, not a fair fight.

Venice Against the Sea outlines the serious weather and geologic factors that are conspiring to drown the city. Keahy delves into the factors of subsidance, the harmonizing of tide, storm, and wind, and the overarching threat of global warming as the primary threats to Venice. All of the above are mortal dangers to Venice because they are tipping the delicate balance of Venice and the Sea in the sea's favor.

On the front page of this morning's NY Time's was an article detailing the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (a U.N. body). The assessment does not bode well for Venice, flood gates or no. While the new report projected a modest rise in seas by 2100 — between 7 and 23 inches — it also concluded that seas would continue to rise, and crowded coasts retreat, for at least 1,000 years to come. In light of the immense physical forces arrayed against Venice, can the city ever believe it can win such a fight? Perhaps for a generation. Can you fight the ocean and win? Or as a Dr. Pollack asks, "Why are we fighting to save Venice". I think that is a great question to ask and something that we should discuss in class. Are we saving the art? Are we saving history? Are we saving our self confidence that our science and technology can master anything? I think it would be a great lesson illustrating the damage we are causing the planet if the ocean rose up in one 15' wave (not very big but it wouldn't take much) and washed Venice from the map. That is said a bit tongue in cheek but I'm also a little bit serious.

It was just announced that UC Berkeley was part of a team that was awarded a $500 million grant to explore alternative fuel sources. Apparently this is a big deal. $500 million dollars to figure out a way to curb carbon emmissions. Wow!!! That is sooooo much money. Well, maybe not so much when you consider that Venice is going to spend several billion just to save itself.

...but I can't wait to go.

As we continue to discuss the survival of Venice through both the onslaught of the sea and of its many tourists, I can't help but think that a basic level, the problems are the same. Of course they have different effects on the landscape and require very different approaches to 'solutions,' but both tourists and the sea are something without whom Venice, at this point in history at least, cannot live. Both threaten to overwhelm the city with their presence, and yet each are vital elements that hold an essential part of Venice's character.

Davis and Marvin highlight the long history of tourism in Venice, and the adeptness of the Venetians to tailor their customs to fit tourists needs, and maximize profits. The preservation of the character of historical Venice would not be so imperative without the desires of millions of people backing that undertaking, would they? I think of an old "Main Street America" town on the Mississippi in comparison. It is similar in size to Venice's current population, though a bit smaller. Once, it was a major port for transporting exported goods from the Midwest down through New Orleans, and for distributing goods from the South. The town is no longer necessssary for transportation, or industry, because the northern Mississippi isn't the center of trade. Because of its out-of-the-way location, the town does not attract tourists, and it slowly dies. Most residents have been there since birth, and over 50% of the population is on welfare. Of course there are a lot of factors that complicate and differentiate the two cities, but because Venice is now so dependent on tourism, I think that to construct an idea about the future of Venice, we must include the tourists, and while being critical of their activities, attempt to find the potential in the good tourists can bring. Perhaps a new perspective on the city. And at the very least, an appreciation of what is there.

In the discussion of the phenomenon of San Marco’s never ending stream of tourists, Davis and Marvin quote one such tourist: “‘Venice must be a paradise’ for the flaneur,” followed by a romantic vision of a Venetian dandy. I was struck by this notion and wondered if Baudelaire had ever visited Venice, to observe the evening promenade of the city, finding anonymity in throngs of tourists, then as now. A couple pages later, the authors respond directly to my musings, claiming “participants in the traditional Venetian liston were very different from Baudelaire’s nineteenth-century flaneur, who by definition kept an ironic distance from the social and cultural world through which he strolled, “to take part in the bustle of the city in the security of his anonymous state.” Perhaps the public promenade performed by the Italians cannot be subject to the flaneur’s intrusive and inevitably foreign gaze, by why not the tourists themselves? Davis and Marvin write that there is no chance that a tourist might “adopt the pose of the flaneur and gaze upon those around them with bemused detachment, for all they will see in San Marco is a super-saturation of tourists all very much like themselves, equally there to see this ‘must see’ place.” I question this supposed inability for visitors to act as flaneur, but have not come to a conclusion. Will we be able to detach ourselves from the famous sights, the romantic vision, in order to gaze with skepticism, with amusement, at our fellow tourists? And because we too are tourists, does that prevent us from a cultural critique of other tourists? There is no doubt that we will be able to find ourselves anonymous, one of an immense crowd, amidst the bustle of San Marco, so why not strive for an objective observation of the city, and of the tourists, who in many ways have become the local population and everyday life of Venice?

Here's some Venice photos of mine...

from when I was there last... There's some photos from a big storm we had while on Murano..-I spent a few nights on the island...
Click here...

From Map to Mapping

My basic thought that mapping was just a map that gives us the information or fact. At last seminar I could realize that mapping has the capability to create one in design. In other words, we can select and combine the information on map with intention; the map is able to be a new creation itself as well as a good tool for designing. And the mapping has widened from these articles. Mapping would help to judge the social or political issues and to show the science. Specially, it is good chance to understand how to make the map from information in ‘Million Dollar Blocks’. When I observed the process of mapping, I could understand the intention of the work more and have an idea about the power of map. To me, mapping is but only the result but also the process. So, during the process of mapping we can think and think something and we can finally create the thing.

Both of William Rees Morrish and Jane Wolff’s drawing make me think if audiences can realize what information the authors of map try to convey. Their drawings demonstrate the way how they extracted the information from the data they received and made them acceptable. I am curious about the role that architects should play. It seems that architects should be the media between the professional and the public and translate the professional language of architecture. Back to our project, I think we should think about the way that could simply address our idea and make sense.

Jane Wolff’s Delta Primer provided both an insight into the destabilizing effects of human interventions in an ecological system and also graphical techniques to represent changes in a system over time. I appreciated the ability of her graphics, particularly the Mount Diablo/The Delta graphic (k), to describe a location as well as the lowering of the agricultural surface over time. Causality was not implied, though, as perhaps it is more so in the section/plan/section graphic (q). However, I do feel that some of the graphics are tracings, such as the maps that appear to be framed excerpts from USGS maps. Also, the graphic explaining the meandering river seems to be more preoccupied with its graphical appearance rather than with the realistic behavior of a meandering river. While I think these graphics can strive to achieve more in the way of analysis and generative qualities, these offerings do seem relevant to our ongoing attempts to understand the complex system of cultural and ecological forces and their affects in the Venice lagoon, and to our anticipated design intervention(s).

To configure earth, human, spiritual information and moments of mutual association, inevitable collision…

Civilizing Terrains draws out a further bend in this conversation, considering the fundamental surfaces where these connections occur a set of models in themselves. In geomorphosis: decomposition of mountain to plain, “each [mountain is] a statement about the relationship between forces of change, material, structure and microclimate. The result is a model [or diagram or map for our purposes] illustrating the transformation of vertical mass and volume through decomposition…”
Matter’s the proxy for the non- particle, for energy? Mention to Ellora’s Kailas intends this maybe– where the mountain itself stands as effigy to the divine version of the same name. Carving a mountain out of a mountain a two hundred year way. A full scale model, the Bourges map.


Cosgrove closed his introduction with the referenced suggestion that the spatial and technical practices and readings pulled through from cartographic history no longer hold. The zoom function discussed in the final page of the Columbia project offers the integral solution to the charge of the rhizomatic map. And how modern an apparatus. Distanced information at once proximate, and the ideal for our age. "Information is the oxygen of the networks that make up our cities" More open source then, for better maps.

What capacities, what stagings, what engagements will be sold in the cartographic future?

Graphic Powers...

These readings do a few really interesting things for me: One, they represent a simple means of graphic codification of human relationships with the earth. Their graphic distillations of big ideas offer another tool for site study and design response. The second interesting topic in the readings is the relationship between justice, democracy and landscape. By codifying somewhat ubiquitous terms, and representing them graphically, the authors offer the reader a simple skeleton of ideas, which can easily serve as a starting point for further inquiry. For me, the means in which the information was presented provided a range of potential outcomes. I will finish this post later, after class. More to come!!

SIDL / delta / terrains

this past break i took a long trip driving around California. since i am from east coast i wanted to find a connection with my new home. i wanted to see what was around me and experience what California means. Jane Wolff, with her maps explains and informs information about California and the delta. i really found her mapping drawings very useful and fascinating. i also appreciated that she place as geographical map next to it in order to give a context.

the planning of Washington dc was really interesting to me. how the city i am from was layed out so planning and rigid planning. my question is why was Texas and most of Northeast/Atlantic region not part of the national survey?

the SIDL essay about architecture and justice was also very informative. they call maps as partial and data never being raw and impartial. they mention they look at maps not as tools but as images to help researchers, but is that a tool as well?

In the Million Dollar Blocks article the use of mapping as a visualization tool allowed the project team to uncover critical relationships between sets of information. From there, trends were uncovered that present a new method of analyzing our criminal justice system, as it revealed concentrated spatial areas, or “blocks” that have a high density of poverty and incarcerated citizens.

What I find exciting about these mapping techniques is their ability to support and argue for change in social public policy that redirects government expenditures from prisons to vulnerable local infrastructure. I’m interested in how other social inequities can be examined and further understood through mapping exercises that reveal structural problems in government policy. The design of mapped data sets therefore has a great potential for arguing for policy change.

Of the three readings, I was particularly struck by Cadora and Kurgan’s piece on Million Dollar Blocks. Besides the cogent graphic explanation of this phenomenon, the article really rang true as I lived in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, amidst clusters of million dollar blocks.
Clinton Hill is a primarily black residential neighborhood with black-owned businesses situated near Pratt, integrating some art-student types into the mix. I had no idea I was living in a community so directly affected by the criminal justice system. My ignorance towards the number of people incarcerated in my neighborhood is very telling of my disconnection with the community. This is partly due to the fact that I was very much a part of the first wave of gentrification in Clinton Hill.
Gentrification seems like a tired debate, but further realizing my detachment to the community in which I once lived, I would like to rehash it in relationship to the mappings presented in this article. Perhaps mapping of the million dollar blocks as they are described by Cadora and Kurgan, overlaid with a mapping of gentrification of these areas. Gentrification in Brooklyn could be another version of the million dollar block, in the millions of dollars Manhattanites are spending on Brooklyn brownstones. More likely than not, these mappings would be inversely related.

landscape

What emerges, for me, from the readings this week is the interrelation of spatiality with information and policy. Indeed SIDL suggests that these forces exist in a cyclical feedback scenario. In the case of Morrish’s description of landscapes Delta and SIDL’s rethinking of prisons as exostructures, there is the position that very way that we view the landscape can shape the way we interact with it. There are some important differences, however.
Morrish, in our excerpt, concludes by saying that we should design in relation to the systems that the landscape has established for itself, and in doing so we might rekindle a previous reverence of the landscape.
SIDL seems to suggest that through the project of mapping, we might uncover an otherwise hidden landscape that socially responsible design must respond to.
As these discussions relate to our explorations of Venice, I can start to conceptualize the challenge of responding to the ecologically sensitive area that is the lagoon, while also taking into account the as yet unrevealed landscape that arises from the intersection of Venice’s history as a land largely formed / informed by tourists with the physical boundaries that relate to Venice’s ecology. What are, if any, the exostructures formed by people trafficking in and out of Venice? What are the images that those people carry with them, and how does that now relate to construction of Venice?

Here (click the title of the post) is a satellite image from the causeway that connects Sacramento to the areas westward (The Bay, ect…) I saw this area flood last year during the record rainfall that the central valley experienced. In certain places only treetops and roof tops were visible. It always struck me as a weird place, swampy, but one can make out roadways that disappear into the marsh.

the delta

It is interesting to think of the California Delta in relation to Venice in that the two locations are so similar in their creation of land, as well as in their settlement/development. Both places created by silt deposited by flowing water creating land that is inbetween solid and liquid, and in a constant state of change. Both resulting dense settlement patterns clinging to the most solid of land.

Of the different methods of visually representing data put forth by these three designers, I found Laura Kragen’s work particularly insightful and compelling. This is due, in part, to my greater interest in her subject matter; hers is a story that is currently unfolding, and it is her maps that are enabling it to be told. In Morrish’s work I often felt as though the images were gratuitous. While I greatly enjoyed his discussion of the role of geographic formations as the drivers of human settlement throughout history, his paragraphs coupled with the definitions he provided told the entirety of the story, and the images were closer to illustrations than maps. This is in direct contract to Kragens’s work, where the maps produced are the story. Kragen’s maps are generative and can be used as tools to begin developing new approaches to the problem of the “geography of incarceration and return” in our inner cities.

I thought that the relationships presented in the Morrish article/drawings were valuable in drawing connections between political moves and geographic formations, especially in the differing ways that geography is used. The stark contrast between the Egyptian settlement along the Nile and the US grid of the West and Midwest begins to speak to grossly different value systems. But the translation of geographic form into an architectural language, represented later in the article, is valuable as an approach to interacting with site.

The "Architecture and Justice" article brings together more disparate information to imply a mroe specific point, which I find encouraging. The progression of presentation throughout the article offers insight into the effects of reorganizing data to prove a point. And while they are explicit in acknowledging their purpose, Kurgan and Cadora also bring about new conclusions simply in the juxtaposition of mappings of different elements, for example, the poverty and incarcerated peoples maps.

I found Eric Cadora and Laura Kurgan’s "Architecture and Justice" particularly compelling as a discussion of visual imagery and spatial representation due to the social justice issues that saturate their work and lend real world urgency to questions of aesthetics, design and visual communication. From lists of “hard data,” the team generates visual statements via graphic language that employs mappings in order to aid in the visualization of social ills. In the use of striking visual representation, the group responds to their own question: “what can we do with this data?” Here, one sees how raw data is implemented—designed—in the analysis of criminal justice concerns. Presenting multiple layers of information, "Architecture and Justice" uses information as a resource in order to examine and evaluate issues of public policy and inadequate social structures. By reconfiguring data in a visually compelling manner by means of mappings, the project not only emphasizes its own implications, but also successfully adds greater depth to the consideration of the given information. Thus, spatial imagery proves influential on a public and cultural scale, a reality that I find inspiring as a novice designer concerned with social justice issues.

lodging info.

here is the website of the student hostel on guidecca that is one of your housing options.

testing

testing

Louis Sullivan

I paraphrased Louis Sullivan on ornament in our recent meeting. Here is the full quotation (rather more articulate than my rendering):

"The ornament, as a matter of fact, is applied in the sense of being cut in or cut on, or otherwise done: yet it should appear, when completed, as though by the outworking of some beneficent agency it had come forth from the very substance of the material and was there by the same right that a flower appears amid the leaves of its parent plant."

"Ornament in Architecture," in Kindergarten Chats and other writings (N.Y.: George Wittenborn, Inc., 1947), p. 189.

Light and Atmosphere--inspiration from Olafur Eliasson

check the article here---maybe this can inspire our atlas?

mcmaster-carr

is on the web here.

the 2 books I reccomend purchasing

here are the two books I reccomend you get and keep for the semester; they are of particular relevance to our program and approach.

venice against the sea, john keahey.: this one is out of print but there are a lot of used copies on amazon, paperback and hardcover. try also abebooks and barnes and noble

venice, the tourist maze, davis and marvin: new on amazon, used on abebooks

a good, readable history of venice (as well as the more academic frederic lane already reccomended) is

venice: biography of a city, christopher hibbert (out of print): abebooks and amazon

Mapping Ideas Abound...

Denis Cosgrove's deconstructions of mapping and maps offer a refreshing and challenging perspective on a topic that is so subtly ubiquitous yet ephemeral. To me, his critical lens on authorship, power, culture and intention in mapping do two things: One, he shatters the idea of objectivity in mapping, and deconstructs the embedded, inherent power structures that mapping requires, stating that "the map as an inescapably classificatory device...selection is aesthetic and moral as much as it is oppressive and exclusionary."(Cosgrove 11). However, in doing so, he inaugurates the ubiquitous power that mapping wields, professing its true power. "Mappings inaugurate as well as trace poetics of space." (Cosgrove 17)

Some of the most interesting parts of his essay:

"Maps are thus intensely familiar, naturalized, but not natural..."

"authorship-once critical to, yet obscured within, its final product, the map itself." (Cosgrove 7)

"the map as a determined cultural outcome...an element of of material culture." (Cosgrove 9)

"Kinetic Cartography"
This term made me think of mapping processes....like google earth, or GIS, where information is layered over time, attempting to defy the dishonest stasis inherent in traditional mapping.

This also made me think of the time-lapse portraits by artists posted online in video format. Such as this one:



This provocative essay brought to mind SO many ideas about how we record and communicate ideas and space. One artist that came to mind is Francesca Berrini. She appropriates map pieces to collage into her own maps, utilizing the traditional map aesthetic which we so blindly trust, while creating her own virtual landscapes which only exist in her mind. Her appropriation of data that we know to be "true" to create something the is 'imaginary' is a powerful act. You can find her work here:
http://www.viveza.com/artist_portfolio.asp?artistid=10


As I get back to work in the laser lab, I can think of one last quote from Cosgrove.
"Mapping begets further mappings."

I found exclusive architecture vocabulary picked from everyday fascinating. First time I read james corner essay on map I was confused as ever about the words such as mapping, field, extracts, plotting or layering. These terms that I would use in everyday life in very different applications than what he proposes in architecture. This time I read it again it made more sense and kind of made a full cycle in my struggle to decide what is mapping and what is not. What would be tracing vs. mapping. The process of mapping is reproductive, generative, its about relationship of different components or elements in order to create new findings. Its carefully edited information, elements or extracts in order to explore new information which would help us design. It does not have a beginning nor an end. It continuous, perhaps in cycle and part of other relationships. I could not help to notice the huge different between where james corner and denis cosgrove over the term map. Cosgrove, is more appreciative of vast varieties of maps, representational or analytical. Where corner dismisses representational maps as merely tracings but cosgrove indicates maps in history has had different economical and political intentions and current rethinking of mappings has to do with changing techniques of seeing and making. I appreciate the four different types of mapping that corner mentions but I am not really satisfy with his examples of which has come up with.

Rereading Corner’s essay I felt much more connected to the mapping operations he presents through our study of Venice and its surrounding lagoon.
I was again fascinated by what Corner describes as ‘drift’ and am temped to conduct a derive in Venice to acquaint my self with the city when we arrive. The question is, how does one conduct a derive in the most touristed city in the world? Has every nook and cranny already been discovered by the masses? How would a derive of a city made of canals differ from the derive Debord conducted in Paris? In other words, how does one drift through a city where there are so many barriers?
In addition, Corner’s essay sparked my curiosity about mapping Venice through layering. Although layering may not be the most effective method of representation for our site model, it seems as though it has a lot of potential in capturing the layered character of the region. From the layers of history to layers of sediment creating ‘the fish’, it seems only appropriate to approach the mapping of Venice in a similar way.
Mostly what I took from these essays is the open-ended nature of our task. That we are not to trace, and in mapping Venice we may not find a secret nook undiscovered by tourists, but perhaps a deeper understanding of a city and its design.

To me, the mapping connects different kinds of information. According to intentions of the author, it is represented in different graphic ways. Not only conveying information but it has to represent the potentiality and possibility. After my second time reading Corner’s article, I realized more what he tried to illuminate. Applying to our project of Venice, it makes me try to think things beyond the information I've already gained. Further, it is important for me to think the the way I want to demonstrate my cognition about the map and represent the potentiality of the site. Keep the map objective and open. In addition, Cosgrove said, "To map is in one way or another to take the measure of a world, and more than merely take it, to figure the measure so taken in such a way that it may be communicated between people, places or times.”I would like to use creative ways to explore things beyond our understandings and try to communicate to the readers.

homeless heat map

I think that Ceara makes a good point in relating the permeability of meaning that both Cosgrove and Corner attribute to mapping in their essays to the stickiness that we return to often in our conceptualizing of Venice. This stickiness also extends, I think, beyond the vacillating boundaries between sea and land, and into the intersection of the cultural/historical/built environmental forces at work in shaping the perception of Venice as a city that exists as an imagined space (perhaps something of what Calvino gets at in his retellings). I think that mapping Venice rhizomatically in both its imagined cultural context and very real environmental milieu might be quite fruitful in this light.

Further what I found most compelling in both Cosgrove and Corners work is their suggesting that the efficacy of mapping lies in its referencing of the power inherent in the perceived objective status granted to the mapping logos. The idea, as I read it, that this fetishization could be used to overturn the very power structures that gave rise to the illusion of objectivity is one that has vast potential. Most of us sat through “An Inconvenient Truth” this morning and can attest to the seductive power that a well-illustrated map can have in conveying an argument/dogma. At the same time we are seeing potential globally disastrous scenarios mapped out, we are told that the powers that be are not currently interested in changing the situation. This stands a particularly relevant (if not immediate) example of using the tools that once reproduced power into tools that subvert it.

Certainly mapping as it is given in these readings is presented as an open-ended enterprise, but what occurred to me as lacking the discussion is how mapping might be conveyed in a more universally sensory realm. A possible example, and one that I am not wholly familiar with, is what Herzog and de Meuron did with their creation of scents that evoked various materials. I can see an argument being created using a sequence of scents mapped in such a way as to convey a possible set of ideas, and one that was necessarily open/permeable in that the associations made by those who experienced the scents would be different.

In Cosgrove's introduction to the book, and in Corner's article, time jumps out at me as an important relationship to the act of mapping. Just the pile of maps we have of Venice in the studio speak to how apparent time is in their creation. Someone could put the maps in chronological order relatively easily. Each map speaks of the time in which it was created. Many build on information that already exists in previous versions. Both writers refer to finding new relationships in mapping, Corner more specifically in his breakdown of his various answers to a new way to map that more deeply explores relationships outside the purely physical. But I think time presents a more complex problem to consider. It is physical, yet it is rarely mapped as a physical presence, outside perhaps series of things shown to be progressively different. I am wondering then about the possibilities of creating new ways to generate maps that account for time. Must it necessarily be linear? Richard Long's Seven Day Circle of Ground, and the 'drift' ideas Corner presents break time barriers; I'd like to do more of that.

It’s hard for me to believe that before I read Corner’s essay for the first time I had never consciously questioned the indisputable absoluteness and neutrality of maps (tracings) as tools for navigating city streets, foreign cities, and backwoods hikes. I had never intellectually engaged with the obvious, that maps are made from a series of conscious choices and omissions by the map maker, and that the same piece of land can be mapped in almost inexhaustible ways and reveal something different every time. For me, then, it has been incredibly interesting and useful to begin to engage with mapping as a subjective and creative process.

With this in mind, the exploration of Venice that we are now undertaking as a class, with the aid of a thorough GIS dataset of the region, seems overwhelmed with possibilities. I very much look forward to engaging with the issues presented by Cosgrove and Corner as well as the opportunities presented by this data while exploring Venice in more depth. I’m hard pressed to imagine a region of the world more widely known and studied than Venice yet, as Corner says of mapping: “its agency lies in neither reproduction nor imposition but rather in uncovering realities previously unseen or unimagined, even across seemingly exhausted grounds. Thus, mapping unfolds potential; it remakes territory over and over again…”

It is interesting to think about some of the issues introduced by Cosgrove in light of our current investigation of Venice. On the one hand, the conventional use of mapping as a tool capable of “social efficacy and disruptions,” as well as definition of socio-territorial entities becomes pertinent as we examine the set boundaries of Venice both as an island as well as a mainland city, both of which with rather arbitrary delineations. With the consideration of Venice as a coastal city, Cosgrove directly addresses some of the concerns that we must consider in our representation of the region. As Cosgrove asserts, “an implicit claim of mapping has conventionally been to represent spatial stability, at times to act as a tool in achieving it.” He continues: “all coasts [are] in fact zones rather than lines—the unstable space between high and low water in tidal zones.” In our discussions of Venice, his point has become clear. Mapping and defining a continually shifting boundary—or coastline—poses a problem; and the question is raised as to whether we want to impose spatial stability on an inherently unstable system. In turn, this dilemma exemplifies the “questions of representation and reality” that Cosgrove identifies and which we now face as we choose which information to present and with what graphic language in which to do so. Luckily, these questions allow for a stimulating exercise as we seek to utilize mapping in its most generative capacity.

Mappings

These two readings really got me thinking about the process of selecting and editing information in an effort to creating a mapping. I spent a good deal of my childhood tromping through the woods with my surveyor dad, holding a prism in "key" points in order to create a mapping of a particular area of land. To think now of the responsibility that was put in my hands; finding the toe and break of a hill, balancing the prism precisely on a point at the boundry corner and estimating the height to a tenth of an inch of a stonewall. The selection of those points becomes the starting point of a mapping process. The process of then translating the three dimensions of the land into a two dimensional drawing then has another version of selection and editing. This mapping then goes on to be used to fight property ownership battles, create a deed, or to aid in a design process.

This made me think of my experience in architecture firms where we use civil engineers drawings, usually without question, to create a three dimensional intervention in a three dimensional world, but represented in two dimensions. It seems that the process of mapping once it is put in the hands of the designer is totally dependent on the decisions already made by someone else, thereby making the selecting and editing process completely dependent on the measurements and decisions made by someone you may never have met, or in my case by some kid who was more worried about keeping the mosquitos off than putting a prism in the proper place.

see also here> and here for the competition competiors to below.

all the models, btw, were made in 6 days.

plastic manhattan

http://www.flickr.com/photos/54112970@N00/sets/72157594483012847/

adam yarinsky of ARO (with whom I taught a laser-cutter based studio at U.Va,) just sent this link to a large, hypothetical model of Manhattan recently built by thier office.

test post.

a test post of the class blog. you need a google account to contribute, presumably not a huge chore.
url for the blog only is 200b.blogspot.com