145 Architecture
145_Architecture
“You work with stone, with wood, with concrete; you make them into houses and palaces; this is construction. Ingenuity is at work.
But suddenly you touch my heart, you do me good, I am happy, I say: ‘It is beautiful.’ This is architecture. Art is present.”[i]
Psalm 118:22
The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
Roland Barthes who wrote Mythologies in 1972:
“Literature has entered a situation which is difficult, restricted, mortal. It is no longer its ornaments that it is defending, but its skin: I rather fear that the new Neither-Nor criticism is one season behind.”[ii]
This statement is a rebate reverberating around many Architectural practices today. Is neither-nor criticism one season behind? It is one season behind, yet supremacy for the plain and simple from the complex is defined as thus, so, is it the future? It is not clear yet. Neither-nor critical, but the skin (Unornamental). Yet the fashion; and so, it is timely, even minimal, yet a complete criticism of existing, run-down, dilapidated building, so, it is critical of the past. Yet, so agreeable, not critical of itself maybe? There is a fine line, between the resulting simplicity from the complexity of the build. We need it to be simple and serene because it is more beautiful and powerful. However even simpler architecture of a more complex nature could be on the cards for this World? To respond to life’s changing seasons, or is it?
So, do we need critical theory? We need a theory. And it would seem the simpler the better, with the use of 90 degree: angles. But does that just give us a headache? Being so precise? Where does the creativity come in? But the detail. So, we want a minimal box of delighted, simplicity, complex in its making, not complex in its plan.
The Death of the Author, also by Roland Barthes:
“in its entirety is a void process”[iii]
The void of the author means, the artistry of Architecture is the cornerstone. Our architecture must be prepared to die and be reborn as a pared down simple, grid like, lined-up efficient, Swiss-Germanic paradigm, and executed, to a degree of finite expression. Is this the death of Architecture to be an anonymous author? Or the death of form? Or both? But the revolution of the image, which must be minimal and serene to capture light, shade, movement and making. The made item of a box in equable release, means we have won over the client to a new sexiness of tranquil, that allows the timing of new simplistic form over, overly complexing life with shattered dreams. Over-working the volume, and not considering, form, composition, and section.
So, do not express yourself as a personality, but the intellectuality of a new form of personality: because authorship can never be taken away. Therefore, it is seemingly not the death of Architecture, but its re-definition as vitality, in a broken world. And be a part of the new Lymington zeitgeist: a discourse of your subject through the subjugation of sacrifice, by way of simplicity and following the new realm of mathematically complex simplicity.
I am now Atelier AB, ready and available for work, and this is my philosophy above.
Please get in touch, here:
We would love to be a part of your project.
May Literature be the beginning of our success together to get to know each other better, let it be conspicuous, the same, the square: the shape of your life in line with your ideals.
[i] Corbusier, Le, (Translated by Goodman, John), ‘Toward an Architecture’, Frances Lincoln Limited, London, UK, 2008, p.195.
[ii] Barthes, Roland, ‘Mythologies’, Revised Vintage Edition, Vintage, Random House, London, UK, 2009, p.95/96.
[iii] Barthes, Roland, ‘The Death of The Author’, Ubu Web Papers: www.tbook.constantvzw.org/wp-content/death_authorbarthes.pdf, translated by Richard Howrard.
