Why is it that contemporary novels, poems, movies, plays, dance, even popular music, can often address, insightfully, the profound questions of being human and yet contemporary architecture, for the most part, is utterly incapable of doing so?
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One of the most significant difference between architecture and the other listed art forms for me is one of intent. Novels, plays, dances, and the like are meant to be vehicles to tell a story and present ideas. Architecture, however, is required to serve a primary function that is not storytelling. A bank building can evoke emotion and be culturally challenging, but foremost it needs to be a place where financial offices can conduct business. Notable buildings that do address philosophical questions tend to be built for uses that themselves pose questions about humanity. Buildings such as museums, churches, and monuments fit this concept. Obvious examples would be Libeskind's Jewish Museum or Ando's Church of the Light. Contemplating architecture whose primary focus is on creating a social statement makes me wonder what the difference is between architecture and large-scale sculpture.
ReplyDeleteNovels, poems, movies, plays, dance, and yes even popular music are all forms of expression who's sole role is to communicate a creative idea to an audience. They also share a common ancestor of story telling. Creative Architecture however has evolved from purpose built structures, which rather than communicating the ennui of being human, were meant to keep the rain off. Shakespeare may have asked the ultimate question concerning the human condition “To be, or not to be”, but you'll notice that way before Hamlet starts blathering on Bill sets the scene by writing “A room in the castle”. It's much easier to be philosophical when your dry and warm. Rather than a story relating the human condition, architecture is something more, maybe it is, when not contorted into art by well meaning but misguided architects, the human condition.
ReplyDeleteCreative arts like theater performance, poems, and movies are able to address the question of being human in the contemporary setting. They are made public and meant to be consumed by the culture of today. The relevance of these creative works is within a short time frame. For instance, to understand human existence through the song lyrics of the 60’s, you have to either lived through that period or know the social background of the time to interpret the lyrics. Architecture, in my view, is built for the future time. Architects are responsible for making the space relevant for today’s use but also anticipate the usefulness of the space 20 or even 50 years from now. With the a cyber space being ever more dominant form of social networking, songs and movies can comment on it with great relevance while that response is hard for architecture to take on and find its appropriateness in the future. Fundamentally, I think architecture is addressing the question of being human, but in a more basic and essential level, such as the need for a protected place from the natural elements to dwell.
ReplyDeleteAt first glance I was tempted to think... yea why is it that it is so hard for architecture to respond to the question of "being human". But as I thought through the list of examples that are very apt at addressing being human I was drawn to the similarities of the examples. Novels are written about characters its author uses the life stories of its characters to evoke emotions in the reader. In poetry, poets are able to manipulate words in order to describe emotions felt and thus impart those emotions to us using the one of the two most common forms of communication, written speech. Movies, plays and music all transfer feelings, thoughts and ideas into this most common form of communication. We are all used to hearing and reading words and are therefore more able to understand the language used and the feeling behind the language, we have an emotional connection to the words we read and listen to based on our past experiences. Dance uses a different form to express the matter of being human and that is less common when we think of communication but very important all the same and that is nonverbal communication. The ideas communicated through dance are evoked first through the tone and style of the music and the person dancing and portraying their emotion though the movement of their body and face. Architecture does not share the luxury of being able to use oral, written or nonverbal cues to help the observer understand the meaning or feeling behind a structure. Architects take human needs and concrete limits of materials and space and try to mesh them into a structure that provides both function and form. I would dare to say that architecture is more able to evoke the being of nature and the movement of the land and wind, the light of the sky and the spirit of the environment within which it is contained. I would say buildings address the question of being human in the way in which the people interact in the building and the emotion it evokes to the onlooker whether that be cold and uninviting, or open and warm.. As architects we are limited to concrete resources and limits of the reality of what can be safely constructed. I do think that architecture does address being human in the way in answers the needs and desires of the people in the community at the time but its language is not as easily understood or as obvious to the observer.
ReplyDeleteAs we all know that architecture is not just a pure form of the arts. It’s more or less of practical way to connect the architect’s artistic dream with the reality. There’s not a single architecture that can be built without necessary technical support. Not even to mention that no one can run the infinity budget to implement an aesthetically perfect mirage that an able architect can dream of. In other word, there are lots of constraints that an architect has to face.
ReplyDeleteBut, it does not mean that contemporary architecture cannot address being human totally. Poems, novels, music and movies can and may touch each and every soul on earth in a magic, mysterious way by using the likely common language. Whereas being called “Still Music”, as a distinct gesture arise from the surroundings, architecture expresses the same itself in the similar way as dance in which dancers use their bodies to convey the expression to the audience. For example, the desire for the higher and better construction as the symbolism of our time drove us to build Sears Tower, Taiwan’s 101, The Burj Dubai. In my humble opinion, they all extend our humanity and imagination on how high we can build and what we could do to pass down to the future generations.
Contemporary arts allow us to live vicariously through an imaginative world of thought, one by which most rarely arrive within. Novels, poems, movies, plays, and dances creates a provocative world of representation by which humans want to believe it is possible to become their reality at some point, even if they never make it to this point. Architecture, on the other hand is the contemporary setting which does not always seem to provide an insightful view into what it is to be human, yet our environment by which we live is mainly represented through build spaces, Architectural spaces. It is my belief that people in general are not conditioned to understand the space which surrounds them, in turn leaving a void where architecture does not tend proposes insightful views on what it is to be human.
ReplyDeleteyou know I don't think other contemporary arts are that great at representing this human condition either. Maybe by shear volume these other arts are able to hit that target more times but relatively so. we all live in a tainted culture where the people with the greatest amount of influence are not preaching values of what it is to be human, they are exploited for what is exactly opposite of what humanity is. I think we need to place ourselves in a setting that combines the best of what we collectively know and understand as a culture and combine that with previous examples that speak to you and I as individuals. whether it is Michelangelo's David and the perceived perfection of the human body or a Banksy graffiti piece that pokes fun in a serious way of our political and social struggles..... What inspires you to do something special?
ReplyDeleteTo tell about human life there are different Medias that can be used to be insightful. As we have learned in studio, different materials speak out in different tones and sounds, it’s the same thing in the liberal arts; plays, novels, poems, and movies they each have their own form of strength in language. Speaking through architecture is a very complex language form that has been lost through history. I see it as a form of dialect, for example in Mexico there were over 300 different forms of dialects, to this date there are less then 10. One of the causes for this dilemma is the fusing of culture. When the cultural fusing occurs there are cultural traditions that are lost, due to the new experiences the new cultures are bringing into the fold. I find architecture to be the hardest form of art for being insightful about human life due to its misconnections throughout history. I feel architecture has lost the greatest historical connection out of all the liberal art due to the cultural fusing that occurred after the automobile and the technological era.
ReplyDeleteBeing human is to be able to be fully aware of our existence of the present time, have memories of our past, and be able to reference it to the future.
ReplyDeleteArchitecture evokes complex feelings and emotions that cannot simply be interpreted through the use of language or narrative. Architecture requires the person to physically inhabit the space in order to experience it. The experience of architecture requires both our body and mind; it captures us in ways that cannot be easily expressed through the use of language or even reinterpreted for others.
In contrast, contemporary novels, poems, movies, plays, dance, and popular music can address the questions of being human because of the ways they are structured; we can easily recognize the starting point and the end point. The language they use to express their humanity is less complex or can be dissected and be understood most of the time. We perceive them through our senses; the texts written in novels, the lyrics we listen to through music, the forms, gestures, and emotions performed through movies, plays, and dance, etc. With our perception and knowledge we can then reinterpret them with our body and mind. The symbolic systems of contemporary arts provide us with a sense of groundedness and rootedness that makes us human.
I agree with a lot of what Ivan is saying about the way in which architecture has the power to evoke emotion. Architecture's connection to the larger questions of being human takes on a more of an intuitive feeling about a place by utilizing light, texture, cadence, and the like. Also, objects made by hand have a special energy about them, reflecting the energy put into their making. This sensation is compelling in connecting us to the larger whole.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure that contemporary architecture is any more capable or incapable of provoking these profound questions of being human as any other art form. Perhaps the amount of perceived "architecture" is at the root of this misconception, but we need to refine and sift through the buildings that make an effort to become meaningful space versus the buildings that are simply shelter or function. In other words, a sculpture, and painting, poetry, plays, etc.; all (or most all) of these forms are created with the intent to be an art form and have the direct intention of provoking and interacting with the observer, while "architecture" is often boiled down to a casual backdrop intended to merely serve as shelter and function.
ReplyDeleteIn the events where architecture does, in fact, have the intention of provoking the body and mind of the user, we can find such contemporary works that are successful just as often as we can find historical examples. The difficulty with architecture however, is that one single piece becomes lost in a sea of meaningless, monotonous structures, to the point where most of our culture becomes numb and disregards any built structure as merely functional space. We find the beauty, the profound, the existential buildings often begin to emerge with the passage of time as the meaningless structures get uprooted and replaced. It would be premature to posit that contemporary architecture is unable to provoke these deeper questions of what it means to be human. It may also be impossible for contemporary architecture to really mean anything profound for our culture until we can displace ourselves from this era, look back, and truly gather the breadth of architecture to understand the nuances and diversity within and between the iconic buildings of this time. Architecture requires this distinction to understand its meaning because it engages our body and mind as a collective built environment, rather than the often temporal meanings of one song, one painting, or one poem.
I want to address the relationship between human scale relative to the art produced by the artist. And, the collaboration needed to create a particular form of art.
ReplyDeleteA poem can be conceived and created by one person and folded on a piece of paper living on the artist's pocket. The generation of music doesn't need to be negotiated with many others in order to exist. I have observed people embracing attentive preparation or express great excitement while witnessing or creating a play, a dance or even listening to "their music". The more rooted the art in a particular community, the stronger the connection and... the stronger the ritual. The relationship between art, community (and often tradition) unifies humans.
The creation of architecture involves different processes and demands the participation of individuals with a wide range of skills. Yet, contemporary architecture is in its majority a non-participatory process. The surface in which we insert architecture is loaded with complex regulations and agendas. Contemporary human access to modify space and provide for our shelter has become a luxury that very few can experience.
It might be that contemporary novels, poems, movies, plays, dance and music, can address the profound questions of being human because people can actually build a relationship with that particular art form. It might be that some humans hungry for connection without direction latch on to what is most accessible to them without possessing the ability to discern or exercise critical thinking.
..."The best among them were not entirely free from the temptation of voluntary degradation, of breaking down the barriers of hierarchy, of immersion in that shallow mud of companionship, of easy intimacy, of dirty intermingling"... Bruno Schulz "The Street of Crocodiles"
Contemporary novels, poems, movies and music are strongly influenced by the past. The stories we have been told, the beats that incline us to dance are all rudimentarily imbedded within us because they evoke the senses. These activities reflect conditions of the past that have been transformed and adjusted continuously up until the present. Contemporary architecture does represent our state of being. It speaks of our contemporary values and ethics such as sustainability. In the last century there have been dramatic changes on how we as humans approach architecture. A shift from the international style to the arts and craft movement profoundly reflects an evolving cognition for a more humanistic environment that is inspiring, sensible and tactile. More recently we are designing not for a range of positivist numerically values temperatures, but for a human comfort zone. Our realizations of the integrated design approach seems to be evolving just as the architect's role is also changing and being reevaluated. Our humane concern for stewardship is one of our most contemporary set of ethics. I find that contemporary architecture is responding to this notion and physically working towards this goal of sustainability much more than any contemporary song or dance.
ReplyDeleteArchitecture does not speak through words, but emotions. Various other forms of media, by their nature, quickly express positions and emotions relating to a smaller context than architecture tends to deal with. The question of being human is immediately informed by present happenings in and around those whose perception is in question. Architecture informs the long term. When I am old and frail, reflecting on my life, I will have forgotten the lyrics to the song I identified so strongly with during my senior year of high school, but I will still remember the brick facade of my grandparents apartment building, and the heat radiating from the wood burning stove in the living room of my childhood home. Architecture speaks through experience(s), one or many. It is the stage, the designed and constructed setting for other activities to further inform our perception of this reality.
ReplyDeleteThe narrative-
ReplyDeleteOne could say that architecture has lost the ability to tell a really good story; grand stories, as told by the likes of Tennessee Williams, Barishnikov, Fellini, or if you may Lady Gaga. Just as language created Architecture, naming created making, a deprivation of language or its' decay can manifest itself in the decay of the architectural narrative. Architecture is a field without formula, lacking in Plot, something key to Poetry, Fiction, Dance, Film, etc. Exposition leads to conflict, rising action, climax, falling action then finally resolution. How many of us experience these moments in Architecture? When architecture is created solely to serve a function or as an aesthetic inquiry into material capabilities where can the soul of architecture find its’ manifestation?
Through the narratives of Movies, Music and Writing, the author and the storyteller bring the human into a constant. The human is most of the time the main focus and brought very much to the foreground. We watch movies or read books that stimulate our imagination in order to feel like our dream and goals are attainable. Anything can happen while you are swept away by a story line that catches your imagination or brings the subject matter near and dear to you. These forms of art personalize and tailor to each and every individual that sits down in that comfy chair to either watch a movie or dive into the lines of text before them. Architecture in many ways can evoke these similar emotions and imagination, but it is not just out there written in bold or acted out for a literal translation. It is much more of an exploration over time that allows architecture to express its everyday interaction with the human being. It manifests its self through its uses of space and the everyday interaction. It may not speak to being human as much as Writing, Movies and Music, but it starts a greater conversation with human interaction that all those other forms of art give away right from the start.
ReplyDeleteI think that "good" contemporary architecture does address the human condition in the most primall way. How do we define what it is to be human? I would propose that our interaction with our suroundings is what defines us as humans. Like animals, we can react to our sensations of the objects and places we interact with, but beyond that, we have the ability to rationalize and categorize those spaces. INndoing so, they become personal an enrich us as humans. With enough of these experiences, they begin to define us as individuals.
ReplyDeleteArchitecture no longer performs the work of these other listed art forms because we've (as a society) stopped funding it. For developers there is a point of diminishing returns, for governments it is a question of "telling the story of the human condition" or employing the bureaucracy in any number of self promoting un-cost effective ways. This has been going on long enough that the people whose story we would look to tell no longer realize that their story is worth telling. Though I think their primal understanding of this exists beneath the surface, and thus the american fawning over european cities. Painters or writers will perform their artwork with or without commission, endlessly with perhaps never reaching an audience. Architects do not develop their own visions, they subject their art to the coffers of "others," who would say "i want this type of building" or "design it like this."
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