I
love architecture more than I love my wife.
Shhhh. Don’t ever let my wife know about it or I’ll be sleeping on
the sofa for the Nth time and forever, to the agonizing company of our kissing-sucking maniac residents called “pesteng lamok.” Of course I was just kidding.
But what does architecture mean to you? How much do [...]
I
love architecture more than I love my wife.
Shhhh. Don’t ever let my wife know about it or I’ll be sleeping on
the sofa for the Nth time and forever, to the agonizing company of our kissing-sucking maniac residents called “pesteng lamok.” Of course I was just kidding.
But what does architecture mean to you? How much do you love
architecture? Emotions are non-quantifiable therefore it is difficult to explain the extent of its actual value. Like love and hate, passion and rage, we can only calculate the extent of their effects. And by “effect” means after or while an action was done or is being done. We can measure emotion only by calculating, more or less, the action’s implications.
Vincent Van Gough, the great painter, was never called great while he was on his canvases doing his paintings, which were never called “masterpieces” while he was yet alive. The people around him never noticed the extent of his emotions exerted on his paintings until he committed suicide. Only at a later time after his death did they realize how much he wanted to cope up with his frustrations by setting them free into creating a different world through the scribbling of his fingers. His art is now called “finger painting.”
Architecture is also an art. But unlike any other art, architecture is the “mother art”. The others, like painting and sculpture, are created as the resemblance of Man or as visual representations or interpretations of Man. They are something like the impressions of the expressions of Man and or His environment. In the case of Van Gough, his work was the representation of his own world through his own eyes. Such is painting, sculpture, music, poetry and literature.
Architecture however is not meant like Man. It is meant for Man. It
does not imitate Man for his glory or downfall. It provides for Him a literal “world” through his glory or downfall. It provides for Him a resting place. It provides for Him an activity place. It provides for Him an entertainment arena, a sanctuary, a protective covering from the forces of nature. This world that is architecture
is what we call shelter. Simply put, architecture is Human Shelter.
“…Architecture does what no other art can do:All other art forms recreate some portion of the world - a single human figure, or a two-dimensional scene on a canvas.
Only architecture can create a total environment, one that literally surrounds the viewer.
Architecture creates a man-made, idealized world - an environment created by the architect to fit the kind of life he sees as proper to man.
Architecture conveys a view of man indirectly, not by projecting an image of man himself [as sculpture, painting and literature do] but by projecting a proper environment for man to live in.”
–Sherri Tracinski -The Intellectual Activist, April 1998
For its entirety, architecture must serve to satisfy Man’s needs. This burden – or the love of it – becomes the responsibility of the
Architect. How he creates a world of shelter for his clients will determine the extent of his love for architecture. His work will be the measuring tool for his emotions, his feelings toward architecture.
“An architect is creating, not merely an object, but a whole universe for us to inhabit.”
-Arch. Claude Megson
Shall I create a functionally perfect house or shall I intend it to mesmerize the passersby? Shall I disregard the two (function and beauty) and make it to last a hundred years for the next generations to talk about? We were often taught that form must follow function. But Vitruvius, declaring architecture as a package deal, seems to have known better. And so did Frank Lloyd Wright.
“firmitatis.utilitatis. venustatis.” (commodity. firmness. delight)
-Marcus Vitruvius Pollio
-Frank Lloyd Wright 1908
Space planning is very important. It is the spaces within that determine the functionality of the “shelter”. Design now applies to the manipulation of the solid entities that define the spaces (i.e. walls and ceilings). It is through these manipulations that we are able to beautify our shelter. But beautification doesn’t mean just adding up ornaments. Its beauty must define the spaces. Each solid entity must serve its own purpose of defining the spaces within otherwise it will just become an add-on, a mole (the male’s nipples? I really haven’t quite figured out what they are for). Ok fine, mole is enough.
“If there is no meaning then you’re just yanking.”
–Arch. Claude Megson
For the love of architecture, let me not be a mere designer.
For the love of architecture, let me not be a mere builder.
For the love of architecture, let me not be a mere planner.
For the love of architecture, let me pour my heart out into it.
For the love of architecture, let me be an ARCHITECT.
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Thanks for writing this.