Chora 4: Intervals in the Philosophy of Architecture

353 Pages·2004·5.954 MB·English

by  Alberto Perez-Gomez, Stephen Parcell

chora:Intervals in the Philosophy of Architecture
Managing Editor: Alberto Pérez-Gómez
Volume 1(1994)
Edited by Alberto Pérez-Gómez and Stephen Parcell
Volume 2(1996)
Edited by Alberto Pérez-Gómez and Stephen Parcell
Volume 3(1999)
Edited by Alberto Pérez-Gómez and Stephen Parcell
Volume 4(2004)
Edited by Alberto Pérez-Gómez and Stephen Parcell

Chora 4: Intervals in the Philosophy of Architecture
Intervals in the Philosophy of Architecture
C H O R A
v o l u m e f o u r
Edited by Alberto Pérez-Gómez and Stephen Parcell
McGill-Queen’s University Press
Montreal & Kingston •London •Ithaca
choraisapublication of the History and Theory of Architecture
graduate program at McGill University, Montreal, Canada.
managing editor
Alberto Pérez-Gómez
editors
Alberto Pérez-Gómez, McGill University
Stephen Parcell, Dalhousie University
advisory board
Ricardo L. Castro, McGill University
Jose dos Santos Cabral Filho, Universidade Federal De Minas Gerais
Dirk de Meyer, Ghent University
Marco Frascari, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Donald Kunze,Pennsylvania State University
Phyllis Lambert, Canadian Centre for Architecture
David Michael Levin, Northwestern University
Katsuhiko Muramoto, Pennsylvania State University
Juhani Pallasmaa,University of Helsinki
Stephen Parcell, Dalhousie University
Louise Pelletier, McGill University
secretarial assistant
Kathleen Innes-Prévost
Susie Spurdens
For author information and submission of articles please contact
http://www.mcgill.ca/arch/theory/index.htm
©McGill-Queen’s University Press 2004
isbn 0-7735-2503-3(cloth)
isbn 0-7735-2504-1(paper)
Legal deposit fourth quarter 2004
Bibliothèque nationale du Québec
Printed on acid-free paper in Canada
Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data
Chora: intervals in the philosophy of architecture
Vol. 1(1994)-
issn1198-449x
isbn 0-7735-2503-3(issue 4,bound)
isbn 0-7735-2504-1(issue 4,pbk.)
1.Architecture - Philosophy - Periodicals. 1.McGill University.
Historyand Theoryof Architecture Graduate Program
na1.c46 720’.1 c94-900762-5
Typeset in Sabon 10/13by David LeBlanc, Montreal
Contents
Preface ix
1 Lewis Carroll, A Man out of Joint: The Anonymous
Architect Of Euclid’s Retreat
Caroline Dionne 1
2 The Breath on the Mirror: Notes on Ruskin’s Theory
of the Grotesque
Mark Dorrian 25
3 Alberti at Sea
Michael Emerson 49
4 The Rediscovery of the Hinterland
Marc Glaudemans 83
5 The Colosseum: The Cosmic Geometry
of a Spectaculum
George L. Hersey 103
6 On the Renaissance Studioli of Federico da Montefeltro
and the Architecture of Memory
Robert Kirkbride 127
7 Architecture, Mysticism and Myth: Modern Symbolism
in the Writing of William Richard Lethaby
Joanna Merwood 177
8 Gordon Matta-Clark’s Circling the Circle of the
Caribbean Orange
Michel Moussette 197
Contents
9 Geometry of Terror: Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window
Juhani Pallasmaa 211
10 The Glass Architecture of Fra Luca Pacioli
Alberto Pérez-Gómez 245
11 Simplex Sigillum Veri: The Exemplary Life of an Architect
David Theodore 287
12 Ranelagh Gardens and the Recombinatory Utopia of Masquerade
Dorian Yurchuk 313
About the Authors 339
viii
Preface
this fourth volume of chora continues a tradition of excel-
lence in open, interdisciplinary research into architecture. While the
basic editorial interests and questions remain unchanged, a shifting
emphasis reflects the concerns of a new generation of architects and
scholars. The chora series has sought to articulate alternatives to a
facile formalism in contemporary architecture, while rejecting nostalgic
or reactionary solutions. The question of how to act responsibly in
architecture remains paramount. In the first years of the new millenni-
um, however, this question must take account of our increasingly more
powerful electronic tools for formal innovation. Computers are now
able to generate new forms that are totally “other” from our tradition-
al orthogonal building practices. This can lead to projects and buildings
of complex and novel shape that may be oblivious to their cultural con-
text, intended programs, historical roots, ethical imperatives, and the
experiencing body.
In recent years we have witnessed an accentuation of gnostic tenden-
cies with respect to history. This suggests that what we have made has
nothing to teach us, particularly if it is older than the Second World War,
and that only rational models or an introspective pseudonaturalism
could be a legitimate (instrumental) methodology for design. Perhaps
arising from desperation due to difficulties encountered in practice, this
historical gnosticism has become almost fanatic. Even in arguments put
forward under the guise of critical theory, one senses a disturbing
myopia that disregards the historical origin of issues that supposedly
have surfaced only recently. Yet only history in its broad sense – as the
“shifting essence” of architecture, within the larger context of our inher-
ited spiritual and philosophical tradition – can help us distinguish
between significant innovation and fashionable novelty.
The essays in this volume are driven by a genuine desire to seek archi-
tectural alternatives to simplistic models based on concepts of aesthetics,
technology, or sociology. Their refreshing readings of our tradition
acknowledge both the continuity of our philosophical and cultural land-
scape and the differences encountered in diverse spaces and times. In the
ix
Preface
absence of a living architectural tradition, these “stories for the future”
reveal possibilities in places that are often ignored by conventional his-
toriography and science. While avoiding the dangerous delusions of
absolute, transparent truth represented by a single master narrative, they
recognize the need for histories to guide ethical action in architecture.
The growing impact of the internet and other light-based media con-
tinues to create problems for architecture. Society remains suspicious of
the importance of lived space, with its uncanny weaving of spatiality,
temporality, and light. Light, like space and time before it, may soon
become a commodity; even its absolute speed has now been successfully
modified. Nevertheless, chora,as a crossing of the human and the more-
than-human worlds, remains the space of human communication, of
communion, of Eros and dreams: the space of architecture. Architecture
affects us deeply, despite our predilection for the screen of our Power-
Book, and not surprisingly, mental pathologies are on the increase.
The architect’s work issues from the personal imagination, and an
appropriate mode of discourse is needed to prevent this work from
becoming a simplistic formal play or an irresponsible will to power.
chora continues to pursue a reconciliatory architecture that respects
cultural differences, acknowledges the globalization of technological cul-
ture, and points to a referent other than itself. As in previous volumes,
these eleven essays explore concrete historical topics within a critical
framework that suggests possibilities for action. This selection includes
Marc Glaudemans’s original speculation on the nature of urban space,
beyond a dualistic concept of nature versus culture or bounded versus
unbounded. Exploring the relationship between the Greek choraand the
hinterland of modern (seventeenth-century) Amsterdam, Glaudemans’s
conclusions areprovocative in our age of megalopolis. In a topic related
to the crucial theatrical dimension of chora (prominent in the first vol-
ume of this series), George Hersey also addresses the origins of our tra-
dition. In his interesting study of the Roman Colosseum he articulates
the importance of a cosmic geometry in the place for spectaculum in
Rome. Echoing Hersey’s concerns in the eighteenth century, Dorian
Yurchuk’s analysis of Ranelagh Gardens examines the theatricality asso-
ciated with architectural meaning during the early modern period. This
detailed case study demonstrates the cultural relevance of spaces for
play-acting, which are often disregarded in our quest for the “tectonic”
aspects of architectural precedents.
x