There seems to exist a delicate balance between contextual associations and meaning and our aesthetic (albeit biased) judgement. It is unfair to assume that if your design intentions are incongruent with a reviewers interpretations then your project is basically rendered impotent. It is also unfair to assume negligence on their part or vice-a-versa. Of course, it is stunning when a design projects its meaning through built work. Naturally, some of our projects are saturated with metaphors, abstract material associations and programatic ideas. We have, to some extent successfully engineered an experience; however, this experience is associative. Each design will have multiple meanings and associations, which is great. And i think we have to be cautious about how we explain/design for the sake of the programatic experience.
If we over-explain (or over-design) our work with facile manipulations of spatial and thematic metaphors, then we risk alienating the reviewer/visitor. So, should the design speak for itself, or should we speak for the design? Do we speak through the design? If the latter, are we at risk of conspicuously designing our abstractions and metaphors so that everyone will "get it"...using a heavy hand to literally guide the reviewer/visitor through our design rationale. If this is true, are we diminishing the freedom of association and meaning through such didactic design methodologies? Should a reviewer have the freedom to understand an architectural space on their own terms, unburdened by over-explanation? Am i making any sense?
Sometimes i feel like i'm shamelessly pandering to the critics....but maybe this is good a thing. The most successful designers and architects have mastered the art of verbal communication. You basically have an arsenal of design monikers that ignite a response from a reviewer. Forgive my cynicism: things that are flat become "planar", windows are "fenestration"; buildings basically become boats for meaning. "Temporality of spatial experience," "demonstrable/tangible registration of programatic effect," "narrative," didactic," "palimpsest" *i'm waiting for this one.* We use these allegories to convey a message and personify our design (or maybe gesture towards our intent *bad!*) Maybe we use them to garner support, or maybe we use them to cloak our insecurities.
Whatever the case, we use them, and maybe we shouldn't. And these are just to inflate our processes and methodologies. Visit the WTC site and you'll basically drown in the literal, physical metaphors: Freedom Tower, Wedge of Light, 1776...it's everywhere....So, where is the freedom of association here? i'm not allowed to translate that space because it's been translated for me. I have no choice but to recognize and register (!) that space as it is intended. Yet, stripped of its labels, what does it become? Simply another office development that might as well be located in the UAE, not the USA?....i'm not sure.
so, i guess what i'm trying to say (and poorly) is that words matter; choose them wisely.
3 comments:
God damn, that was well said!
Quick responses:
1). Verbal communication is key be to becoming a successful ________. Architect fits in that very snugly. I guess maybe the point of a review is to communicate - to convey information, intent, impression, and concept. Verbal communication is key to that process. Pandering to a reviewer isn't really pandering - it's DESIGNING, in a way; it's designing for an audience, and it's something that we all have to learn how to do, or risk creating for no one but ourselves.
2). I @#$%ing love your point about words. I think words are key to everything; they ARE meaning, they are how we think and construct our understanding of the world. That's why learning another language is so fascinating; it's also why learning the language of architecture is so fascinating.
And, I totally agree with you about the vocabulary; I don't really know what to think about it. I mean, I knew that it was that way, and to some point all professions have their own discrete set of terms. Architecture, however, is a profession that aspires to impact EVERYONE - so why do we barricade ourselves behind a wall of language that's half art-school, half bloviation?
That said, it'll probably turn out that in the end the words become useful, and we start using them too.
Bah.
you guys are funny. but so am i bc i am sitting in my room on a friday night reading your banter for FUN.
i agree that the words we use are important bc they are the extensions of our ideas and intent, which can change the nature or quality of an architectural work. for example, someone can design a simple white box and it could just be a lame, white box. but what if someone designed a simple white box and labeled it as a critique of the museum, does that make it a stronger work? and what is it if you designed a white box without any intent and other people read into the irony, criticism, ingenuity? if we are acting on an intuition but don't have the capacity to articulate the ideas to enrich our work, are we being ignorant, or does that intuition still have value? i am very curious to find out (over the next 3 years), to what degree our concepts, intents, and readings affect the object that we create.
It is to our advantage and our detriment, the power that words hold in our presentations. A project that is lacking can hold itself up with well chosen words and phrases, appearing more valid than another project that is not well verbalized. But I think this is only true to an extent. When it comes down to it, the project must speak for itself and hold merit through its spaces, and cannot be saved by mere words. Which is why I enjoy the silent crits. We should keep trying those, because they will force us to design with more intent, in our concepts, models and layouts.
Also I think I already dropped 'palimpsest' shamelessly. Damn.
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