From Models to Drawings CRITIQUES: Critical Studies in Architectural Humanities A project of the Architectural Humanities Research Association Series Editor: Jonathan Hale (University of Nottingham) Editorial Board: Sarah Chaplin (Kingston University) Mark Dorrian (University of Edinburgh) Murray Fraser (University of Westminster) Hilde Heynen (Catholic University of Leuven) Andrew Leach (University of Queensland) Thomas Mical (Carleton University) Jane Rendell (University College London) Adam Sharr (Cardiff University) Igea Troiani (Oxford Brookes University) This original series of edited books contains selected papers from the AHRA Annual International Conferences. Each year the event has its own thematic focus while sharing an interest in new and emerging critical research in the areas of architectural history, theory, culture, design and urbanism. Volume 1: Critical Architecture Edited by: Jane Rendell, Jonathan Hill, Murray Fraser and Mark Dorrian Volume 2: From Models to Drawings: Imagination and Representation in Architecture Edited by: Marco Frascari, Jonathan Hale and Bradley Starkey Volume 3: The Politics of Making Edited by: Mark Swenarton, Igea Troiani and Helena Webster AHRA provides an inclusive and comprehensive support network for humanities researchers in architecture across the UK and beyond. It promotes, supports, develops and disseminates high-quality research in all areas of architectural humanities. www.ahra-architecture.org.uk From Models to Drawings Imagination and representation in architecture Edited by Marco Frascari, Jonathan Hale and Bradley Starkey First published 2007 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2007 Selection and editorial matter, Marco Frascari, Jonathan Hale and Bradley Starkey; individual chapters, the contributors Typeset in Univers by Wearset Ltd, Boldon, Tyne and Wear Printed and bound in Great Britain by The Cromwell Press, Trowbridge, Wiltshire All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Every effort has been made to contact and acknowledge copyright owners, but the author and publishers would be pleased to have any errors or omissions brought to their attention so that corrections may be published at a later printing. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Frascari, Marco. From models to drawings : imagination and representation in architecture / Marco Frascari, Jonathan Hale, and Bradley Starkey. p. cm. – (Critiques, critical studies in architectural humanities) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-415-43113-2 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Architectural drawing. 2. Architectural design. I. Hale, Jonathan. II. Starkey, Bradley. III. Title. NA2700.F727 2007 720.22–dc22 2007012601 ISBN10: 0–415–43113–1 (hbk) ISBN13: 978–0–415–43113–2 (hbk) Contents Illustration credits viii List of contributorsx Acknowledgements xvii Introduction: models and drawings – the invisible nature of architecture Marco Frascari 1 Historical perspectives 9 Questions of representation: the poetic origin of architecture Alberto Pérez-Gómez 11 A reflection on paper and its virtues within the material and invisible factures of architecture Marco Frascari 23 Imagination and architectural representations Nader El-Bizri 34 Drawing Adam’s navel: the problem of disegno as creative tension between the visible and knowledgeable Raymond Quek 43 Drawn to scale: the imaginative inhabitation of architectural drawings Paul Emmons 64 The cultural context of design and the corporeal dynamism of drawing as the foundations for the imagination of construction Qi Zhu 79 Architecture’s twinned body: building and drawing Federica Goffi 88 v Contents Translucent and fluid: Piranesi’s impossible plan Teresa Stoppani 99 Contemplating the unfinished Nicholas Temple and Soumyen Bandyopadhyay 109 Le Corbusier’s spirals: figural planning and technique in architectural design Antony Moulis 120 Emergent realities 127 Forms in the dark: nature, waste and digital imitation Richard Coyne 129 Concealment, delay and topology in the creation of wondrous drawing Donald Kunze 137 A digital renaissance: reconnecting architectural representation and cinematic visual effects Mathanraj Ratinam 146 Drawing air: the visual culture of bio-political imaging David Gissen 159 ‘Higher’ being and ‘higher’ drawing: Claude Bragdon’s ‘fourth dimension’ and the use of computer technology in design Christina Malathouni 168 Critical dimensions 179 Seeing time/writing place Jane Rendell 183 Marks in space: thinking about drawing Judith Mottram 193 Drawing lines of confrontation Catherine Hamel 201 Weather architecture, weather drawing Jonathan Hill 209 Drawing on light Sam Ridgway 219 Post-secular architecture: material, intellectual, spiritual models Bradley Starkey 231 Specifying materials: language, matter and the conspiracy of muteness Katie Lloyd Thomas 242 vi Contents Architecture as image–space–text Betty Nigianni 253 Acts of imagination and reflection in architectural design Peg Rawes 261 In the corner of perception: spatial experience in distraction Katja Grillner 270 Index 285 vii Illustration credits Julieta Aguilera 172 Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, Ohio 54 Sam Antonio 149 Biblioteca Hertziana 49, 53 A. Chung, Drawing Boundaries: Architectural Images in Qing China, Honolulu, University of Hawaii Press, 2004, p. 10 (left) 83 Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, University of Rochester Library, NY 169 Leonard Digges, A Geometrical Practical Treatize named Pantomentria, divided into three books: Longimetra, Planimetra and Stereometria (London, 1591), p.13 66 S.Y.J. Edgerton, The Heritage of Giotto’s Geometry, Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1993 (right, middle) 84 The Fabbrica di San Pietro in the Vatican 90 © FLC/ADAGP, Paris and DACS, London 2007 120, 124 Ghent University, Special Collections 106 Paul Grundy 184, 186 Penelope Haralambidou 275 Mark Harden, Artchive 58 Robert Hooke, Micrographia, or some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies made by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries Thereupon (London, 1655), Plate II 69 Huntington Library, San Marino, CA 55, 56 Arie Kaufman, SBU 160, 164 R. Kearney, The Wake of Imagination: Ideas of Creativity in Western Culture, London, Hutchinson, 1988 (left) 81 Jie Li (1035–1110) Ying Zao Fa Shi Tu Shuo in Liang, Sicheng Quan Ji. Beijing, Beijing JianZhu Gongye Chu Ban She, 2001 (right) 83 viii Illustration credits A. Ramelli (1588). Le Diverse et Artificiose Machine. Paris, Gregg International Publishers Limited England, 1970 (left) 84 Sala dei Cento Giorni, Palazzo della Cancelleria, Rome 95 Viviani Collection, Palazzo Ducale, Urbino 52 J. Wiley and Sons 162 Frederick Willson, Theoretical and Practical Graphics, an Educational Course on the Theory and Practical Applications of Descriptive Geometry and Mechanical Drawing (New York, 1898), Fig. 10 73 Edward Worsop, A Discoverie of Sundrie errours and faults daily committed by Landemeaters, ignorant of Arithmetike and Geometrie written Dialoguewise (London, 1582) 67 J. Xun, Xie Gei Da Jia de Zhong Guo Mei Shu Shi, Beijing, San Lian Chu Ban She, 1993 (right) 81 ix Contributors Soumyen Bandyopadhyay is Senior Lecturer in Architecture at Liverpool University where he is Director of Studies for the MArch programme and director of India in the World Research Centre. Since 1983 he has been in architectural and urban design practice in Oman and India. He heads an AHRC-funded study of the Rock Garden in Chandigarh, on which he has recently published a book (Liverpool University Press 2007). Richard Coyne is based in Architecture and is Head of the Graduate School in the School of Arts, Culture and Environment at the University of Edinburgh. He researches in the areas of computer-aided design, digital media and design theory. He is the author of three books on the implications of information technology and design with MIT Press, and is co-author of a recent book with Adrian Snodgrass, Interpretation in Architecture: Design as a Way of Thinking (Routledge, 2006). He currently heads a research project on the relationship between voice and public space and a research cluster on Non-Space, both funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. Nader El-Bizri is a Research Associate at The Institute of Ismaili Studies (London), a Chercheur Associé at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (Paris). He lectures at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge, and he previously held a lectureship in architecture at the Univer- sity of Nottingham, and taught at Harvard University and the American University of Beirut. His research focuses on architectural humanities, phenom- enology and history of science. He is the author of The Phenomenological Quest between Avicenna and Heidegger (Binghamton, 2000), and has pub- lished numerous philosophy articles. Paul Emmons is an Associate Professor at the Washington-Alexandria Architecture Center of Virginia Tech, where he coordinates the PhD programme