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.