Download complexity and contradiction in architecture and more Summaries Architecture in PDF only on Docsity!
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Complexity and Contradiction in
Architecture
Robert Venturi
A.Sivaraman , First year-M.ARCH General ,HINDUSTAN UNIVERSITY, Chennai.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
ARCHITECTURAL CRITICISM
Introduction
- This article begins by exploring the nature of the relationship between the interior and exterior design of a building.
Traditionally, contrast between these two dimensions was practiced but was replaced by the idea of continuity and flow
between the inside and outside in the 20th century. As the article demonstrates, the evolution between these trends was
marked by numerous opinions and perspectives on the purpose of the exterior and interior of a building.
- An old school of thought was that the interior of a building worked to enclose space and so should be separated by the
outside. Of course, this notion ignored the importance of location and context surrounding the building, which was of
equal importance. After all, if architecture is the orientation and organization of space then the community too is a space
within which the building sits.
- The article also explores the contrast between the interior and exterior designs of a building by way of examples. Some
designs show contrast in the top and bottom of the building rather than interior and exterior and other examples show
different design ways in which the distinction between the interior and exterior can be made.
- Some exterior designs like large domes, outer linings, and pillars are signs of protection or power, and a few examples
were of contradictory interior spaces. I found it interesting when the author said that contradictory interior spaces does
not go against the idea of continuity asserted by modern architecture – it really does all point to purpose and
interpretation.
- One point the author mentioned was that designing from both the inside and the outside means that the wall becomes
the point of change and contact between the two works and it is at this intersection or meeting where architecture takes
place.
- At the same time, architecture requires a balancing of our vision, that it not be too specific or too general and this requires
considering all factors at play – the context, location, and purpose of the building overall and each component. It is
without a doubt that each plays an equally important role because while the interior must induce a particular sentiment or
mood and purpose, the exterior must withstand and open out to the personality of the city and into the ambience of the
building.
1.Nonstraight Forward Architecture : A Gentle Manifesto
I like complexity and contradiction in architecture. I like elements which are hybrid rather than "pure",
compromising rather than "clean",
distorted rather than "straightforward", ambiguous rather than "articulated", perverse as well as
impersonal, boring as well as "interesting", conventional rather than "designed", accommodating rather than
excluding, redundant rather than simple, vestigial as well as innovating, inconsistent and equivocal rather
than direct and clear. I am for messy vitality over obvious unity, richness of meaning rather than clarity of
meaning; for the implicit function as well as the explicit function. More is not less.
2.Complexity And Contradiction Vs. Simplification Or Picturesqueness
In orthodox Modern architects' attempt to break with tradition and start all over again, they idealized the primitive and elementary at
the expense of the diverse and the sophisticated. In their role as reformers, they puritanically advocated the separation and exclusion
of elements, rather than the inclusion of various requirements and their juxtapositions. Modern architects with few exceptions
eschewed ambiguity.
August Heckscher:"...amid simplicity and order rationalism is born, but rationalism proves inadequate in any period of upheaval.
Then equilibrium must be created out of opposites. Such inner peace as men gain must represent a tension among contradictions and
uncertainties.
" Paul Rudolph:"All problems can never be solved...indeed it is a characteristic of the twentieth century that architects are highly
selective in determining which problems they want to solve. Mies, for instance, makes wonderful buildings only because he ignores
many aspects of a building. If he solved more problems, his buildings would be far less potent."
Forced simplicity results in oversimplification. Aesthetic simplicity which is a satisfaction to the mind derives, when valid and
profound, from inner complexity. When complexity disappears, blandness replaces simplicity.
Ambiguity and tension are easily found in complex and contradictory architecture. Architecture is form and substance - - abstract
and concrete and its meaning derives from its interior characteristics and its particular context.
- An architectural element is perceived as form and structure, texture and material. These oscillating relationships, complex and
contradictory, are the source of the ambiguity and tension characteristic to the medium of architecture.
- The conjunction "or" with a question mark can usually describe ambiguous relationships.
3.Ambiguity
is it a square plan or not?
The size of Vanbrugh's fore- pavilions at Grimsthorpe
in relation to the back pavilions is ambiguous from a distance: are they near or far, big or small?
The ornamental cove in the Casino di Pio IV in the Vatican is perverse:
is it more wall or more vault? Vanbrugh's fore-pavilions at Grimsthorpe
Villa Savoye The Casino di Pio IV ,Vatican
Lutyens' facade at Nashdorn
- The calculated ambiguity of expression is based on the confusion of experience as reflected in the architectural program. This
promotes richness of meaning over clarity of meaning. As Empson admits, there is good and bad ambiguity "... [ambiguity]
may be used to convict a poet of holding muddled opinions rather than to praise the complexity of the order of his mind."
Nevertheless, according to Stanley Edgar Hyman, Empson sees ambiguity as "collecting precisely at the points of greatest
poetic effectiveness, and finds it breeding a quality he calls 'tension' which we might phrase as the poetic impact itself."
- These ideas apply equally well to architecture
3.AMBIGUITY
Luigi Moretti's Apartment in Rome,
Bernini's pilasters on the Palazzo di Propaganda Fide : are they positive pilasters or negative panel divisions?
are they one building with a split or two buildings joined?
Palazzo di Propaganda Fide
The central dip in Lutyens' facade at Nashdorn facilitates skylighting: is the resultant duality resolved or not?
4. Contradictory Levels: The Phenomenon Of "Both-and" In Architecture
Le Corbusier's Shodhan House
is simple outside yet complex inside
entrance gallery at Middleton Park --is directional space, yet it terminates at a blank wall;
is closed yet open-a cube, precisely closed by its corners, yet randomly opened on its surfaces;
Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye
Sir Edwin Lutyens
Middleton Park
"BOTH-AND" " relation of the part to the whole "
Examples
The brise-soleils in the Unite &Habitation in Marseilles are structure and porches as well as sunscreens. bearing wall and frame at once.
Le Corbusier's d'Habitation
Andrea Palladio palazzo valmarana
Pantheon rome
The relieving arches in the Pantheon , in this case not originally part of the visual expression, similarly generate a wall structurally double- functioning
5.CONTRADICTORY LEVELS CONTINUED: THE DOUBLE-FUNCTIONING ELEMENT
- The “double-functioning” element and "both-and“ are related, but there is a distinction: the double-functioning element
pertains more to the particulars of use and structure, while both-and refers more to the relation of the part to the whole. Both-
and emphasizes double meanings over double-functions.
6.Accommodation And The Limitations Of Order: The Conventional Element
60.Montepulciano-Hauptplatz-Palazzo-Tarugi
An historical example will perhaps help to illustrate this relation of order and
exception. The applique of arches and pilasters on the Palazzo Tarugi (60)
maintains itself against the sudden impositions of "whimsical" windows
and asymmetrical voids. The exaggerated order, and therefore exaggerated unity,
along with certain characteristics of scale, are what make the monumentality in
the Italian palazzo.
In engineering it is the bridge (61) that vividly expresses the play of exaggeratedly
pure order against circumstantial inconsistencies. The direct, geometric order of the
upper structure, derived from the sole, simple function of conveying vehicles on an
even span, strongly contrasts with the exceptional accommodation of the structural
order below, which through distortion-the expedient device of elongated or
shortened piers– accommodates the bridge to the uneven terrain of the ravine.
61.Care and giannelli, poggettone and pecora vecchia, austostrda del sole, ologna- Florence section
7.Contradiction Adapted
Contradiction can be adapted by accommodating and compromising elements, or it can also be adapted by using
contrasting superimposed or adjacent elements. Contradiction adapted is tolerant and pliable, while contradiction
juxtaposed is unbending. Kahn, "It is the role of design to adjust to the circumstantial."
Besides circumstantial distortion, there are other techniques of adaptation. The expedient device is an element
in all anonymous architecture that is dependent on strong conventional order, used to adjust the order to
circumstances which are contradictory to it. Is there not a similar validity to the vitality of Times Square in which the
jarring inconsistencies of buildings and billboards are contained within the consistent order of the space itself? One
thing is clear--cities, like architecture, are complex and contradictory.
8. Contradiction juxtaposed
If "contradiction adapted" corresponds to the kid glove treatment, "contradiction juxtaposed" involves
the shock treatment. Juxtaposed directions create rhythmic complexities and contradictions. Super
adjacency is inclusive rather than exclusive, relating contrasting and otherwise irreconcilable elements,
containing opposites within a whole.
It can accommodate the valid non sequitur, and allow a multiplicity of levels of meaning, since it involves
changing contexts--seeing familiar things in an unfamiliar way and unexpected points of view. It is in contrast
to the perpendicular interpenetration of space and form characteristic of the work of Wright. Super
adjacency can exist between distant elements.
Superimpositions change as one moves in space. Super adjacency can also occur where the superimposed
elements actually touch instead of being related only visually. A vivid tension evolves from all these
juxtaposed contradictions. Some city planners, however, are now more prone to question the glibness of
orthodox zoning and to allow violent proximities in their planning, at least in theory, than are architects
within their buildings.
8. Contradiction juxtaposed
Le Corbusier supplies a rare modern example of juxtaposed
contradictions in the Millowners' Building in Ahmedabad (90).
From the important approach from the south, the repetitive
pattern of the brise-soleil invokes rhythms which are violently
broken by the entrance void, the ramp, and the stairs. These latter
elements, consisting of varying diagonals, create violent
adjacencies from the side and violent super adjacencies from the
front, in relation to the rectangular static floor divisions within
the boxlike form.
The juxtapositions of diagonals and perpendiculars also
create contradictory directions: the meeting of the ramp
and stairs is only slightly softened by the exceptionally
large void and by the modified rhythm of the elements at
that part of the facade.
But these contradictions in the visual experience are even richer
when you move closer and penetrate the building. The
adjacencies and super adjacencies of contrasting scales,
directions, and functions can make it seem like a miniature
example of Kahn's viaduct architecture
9. THE INSIDE AND THE OUTSIDE
Residual space in between dominant spaces with varying degrees of openness can occur at the scale of the city and
is a characteristic of the fora and other complexes of late Roman urban planning. Residual space that is open might be
called "open poche". The poche in the walls of Roman and Baroque architecture are alternative means of
accommodating an inside different from the outside. Aldo van Eych, "Architecture should be conceived as a configuration
of intermediary places clearly defined." This implies a break away from the contemporary concept of spatial continuity
and the tendency to erase every articulation between spaces, i.e., between outside and inside, between one space and
another. Instead the transition must be articulated by means of defined in-between places which induce simultaneous
awareness of what is significant on either side.
Residual space is seldom economic. It is leftover, inflected toward something more important beyond itself.
Contradictory interior space does not admit Modern architecture's requirement of a unity and continuity of all
spaces. Nor do layers in depth, especially with contrapuntal juxtapositions, satisfy its requirements of economic and
unequivocal relationships of forms and materials. And crowded intricacy within a rigid boundary contradicts the modern
tenet which says that a building grows from the inside out. Contrast and even conflict between exterior and interior
forces exist outside architecture as well. Since the inside is different from th outside, the wall--the point of change--
becomes an architectural event. Architecture occurs at the meeting of interior and exterior forces of use and space. By
recognizing the difference between the inside and the outside, architecture opens the door once again to an urbanistic
point of view.
9. THE INSIDE AND THE OUTSIDE
Aalto's dormitory at M.I.T. (205) is exceptional. The curving
front along ;he river and its fenestration and materials
contrast with the rectangularity and other characteristics of
the rear: exterior as well as interior forces of use and space
and structure vary back and front. And the P.S.F.S. building,
which is a tower, has four different sides because it recognizes
its specific urban setting: party walls, street facades backs,
fronts and corner.
Here the freestanding building becomes a fragment of a
greater exterior spatial whole, but the typical freestanding
building of Modern architecture, except for some surface
treatment and screens, which act to de-emphasize the spatial
enclosure or to recognize orientation differences, seldom
changes front and back for exterior spatial reasons. To the
eighteenth century, also, this was a conventional idea.
