quare id faciam?

An excerpt

From Alexander Tzonis & Liane Lefaivre, Classical Architecture: The Poetics of Order (previously excerpted here), chap. 2 "Genera: the elements":

Now that the components and steps of subdivision of the genera have been identified, we can turn to the logic through which these components are put together. We proceed from the elementary level of the genera down to their details.
   There are several ways of structuring space, but within the formal system of classifical architecture two paths have traditionally been open: metric patterns and contour motion. The case is once more similar to music and poetry. In music, patterns are generated both by rhythm, the regular alternation of accentuated and nonaccentuated sounds, and by modifications of pitch, the location of the musical sound in the tonal scale. In poetry, patterns are born also out of rhythm, arrangements alternating periodically stressed and unstressed syllables, as well as the contiguity and combinations of speech sounds, so-called phonemes, which create rhyming, alliteration, contrast, and variation.
   In architecture, classical contour patterns arise from the regulated stream of surges, swirls, and whirlpools of solid matter. These small fractions of sequence – the curved ones are referred to as "little waves" or cymatia – make up, more than an assortment, almost a dictionary of appearances. Let us imagine this dictionary listed in the form of two columns of opposed entries. This form of data organization, corresponding to what Jakobson et al. (1952) called "binary oppositions", provides a clear and easy way of looking at and choosing from among contour shape characteristics. Here is the list:

protruding	—	indented
straight	—	curved
convex	—	concave
flat	—	inclined

When we create a classical architectural profile, we pick out certain characteristics from this list and conjoin them. We can maintain the identity of a shape through repetition or by partially changing it through reduction or amplification. Finally, we can alter it by inversion or by inflection.
   These means might seem scarce and simple, but the possibilities that arise from their combination, one might almost say conjugation, are enormous. It is these combinations that classical architects have employed and exploited within the tightest constraints. The most memorable invention of classical architecture – the Doric shaft – is perhaps the most obvious illustration of binary oppositions.
 
 

illustration: architectural theory from the renaissance to the present, p 275, taschen 2003

posted by paul bowman @ 5:00 AM