:Mythical Characters אAllegories of Inhabiting the Hebrew Alphabet Ezekiel Fairbanks 2018 Allegories of Mythical Characters: Inhabiting the Hebrew Alphabet by Ezekiel Fairbanks School of Architecture College of Design, Construction & Planning A thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Architecture Faculty Advisors: Mark McGlothlin Jason Alread University of Florida 2018 Acknowledgments This work would not have been possible without the guidance of my committee. Thank you to my committee chairs, Professor Mark McGlothlin and Director Jason Alread. I am honored to have worked alongside my committee and would like to thank them for offering their time and thoughts. They have provided the most valuable and constructive suggestions to further the development of this research. I wish to acknowledge the help and continuous feedback that my colleague Kristel Bataku gener- ously offered throughout the course of this research. I would like to also thank my family for supporting my decision to pursue such a rigorous but re- warding field. Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 1 Introduction 3 Precedent Studies 4 The Alphabet 9 The Three Groups 32 Translating into Space 37 Revisiting The Three Mothers 42 Approaching the Court 48 Reflections 53 Bibliography 55 Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 2 Introduction Collage Studies The Hebrew Alphabet The intention of this process is to create habitable space within the letters of the Hebrew alphabet by interpreting the alphabet as architecture. The Hebrew language has sacred origins and so the primary method to unpack these letters will be through the lens of the Kabbalah to preserve those sacred logics. Kabbalah is an ancient Jewish tradition of mythical interpretation of the Bible; It at- tempts to explain the air between the divine, eternal and mysterious God, and the finite universe, God’s creation. Kabbalists unpack the Hebrew alphabet letter by letter to reveal mythical allegories hidden within. Through the Hebrew alphabet, all things are created. The letters are subdivided into three categories. The three mothers, the seven doubles, and the twelve simple letters. Of these three groups, the focus will remain on the three mothers. The book will brief- ly explain each letter but the magnifying glass will rest upon the three mothers.These three letters symbolize the primordial elements of all existing things, water, fire, and air. Mem, Shin, and Aleph represent these elements respectively. Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 3 Precedent Studies Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 4 Pablo Picasso Cubism Paintings Artist (1912-1914) Figure 1. Pablo Picasso, Student with a Newspaper, Figure 2. Pablo Picasso, Bottle of Vieux Marc, Glass Figure 3. Pablo Picasso, Still life with violin and fruits Figure 4. Pablo Picasso, Le journal 1912 late 1913–early 1914 and Newspaper, 1913 1912 Picasso was known to use several references to newspapers that he read, but one that reoccurred con- Picasso also used words beyond their social meanings. He began to play with their actual forms and stantly was Le Journal. It never appeared as a whole in any of his works, but rather in fragments. Many of shapes. In one of his paintings, he uses the O in Journal as two things. The first, he uses as the sin- the ambiguous fragments used in cubist work were characterized by the use of the metaphor of a pun. gular letter that it represents in the alphabet, and second as a description of the round quality of the rim of the glass which has isolated the O by obliterating the presence of the J and U with its sloped An example of this in Picasso’s work was his use of the fragmented parts of the word ‘journal’. Le sides. Words in collages can act as a representation rather than a definition. So in a way words can Jour, in French, translates to ‘the day’. Jou, a French word fragment is the root of the verb Jouer also be used as ideograms in collage-making. which means to play. This word association was very appropriate to Picasso’s early work with cubism because of his interplay between different realities. This is where curiosity emerged about how language could serve as symbols in collage-making. 1. Pablo Picasso, Student with a Newspaper, late 1913–early 1914, Metropolitan Museum of Art, https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/500449. 2. Picasso, Bottle of Vieux Marc, Glass and Newspaper, 1913, Georges Pompidou Center, WikiArt. 3. Picasso, Still life with violin and fruits 1912, Philadelphia Museum of Art, WikiArt. 4. Picasso, Le journal 1912, artnet. Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 5 Ben Nicholson Collages + Drawings Architect Figure 5. Ben Nicholson, Telamon Cupboard Sections “A trained collagist requires the act of collage making to be contemplative. He knows that there is uses readymade components.”7 There is a force out of our control when we use collage as a way of something within the soul that longs to come forward, so he engages in collage-making to advance making. It uses found objects which hold a certain energy within. it.”6 In this sentence, Nicholson talks about collage making as a process that requires experience. This suggests that one must reflect after every collage and contemplatively criticize his own process. Collage-making plays a huge role in unpacking the Hebrew language. It allows the juxtapositioning of an architectural language onto the characters so that they can be accessed through the lens of architecture. “Painting and drawing require every mark on the canvas to pass through the fingers of the artist. Collage making, on the other hand, cannot fully control what occurs in the juxtapositions because it 5. Ben Nicholson, Appliance House (Cambridge U.a.: MIT Press, 1990), 45. 6. Nicholson, Appliance House (Cambridge U.a.: MIT Press, 1990), 17 7. Nicholson, Appliance House (Cambridge U.a.: MIT Press, 1990), 19 Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 6 Douglas Darden Dis/continuous genealogies Architectural Designer Ideogram Douglas Darden has a method for making the Oxygen House through the construction of individual ideograms. Through the assembly of these ideograms, he constructs an architectural allegory that derives meaning from the ideograms. He calls this process of layering Dis/continuous Genealogy. Ideograms can take form as language as well, like hieroglyphics for example. It communicates through images and representation rather than audible means. At certain points during the exploration of the alphabet, I view each letter as a sort of ideogram. I adopt Darden’s Dis/continuous Genealogy method by compiling a group of letters together at certain moments; the Hebrew alphabet innately does this. For example, Shin is a composite of three other letters: Zayin, Vav, and Nun. Figure 8. Douglas Darden, Oxygen House 8. “Oxygen House, Douglas Darden,” TheLab-lab, , accessed April 24, 2018, http://www.thelab-lab.com/image-log/2015/1/31/oxygen-house-douglas-darden.html. Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 7 John Hejduk Masks of Medusa Architect “Victims” is the title of the project by John Hejduk. It is an entry for a competition held in Berlin for the construction of a memorial park. This site was locat- ed near the Berlin Wall in a Gestapo headquarter that housed a torture chamber that was used during WWII. John Hejduk has a recurring theme of masques in his projects. These masques are architectural structures that embody a character. I applied this logic to the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Projects that are tied to Hejduk’s “masques” are always related to subjects that are tied to collective and compelling memories which find themselves in a state of abandon. Figure 9. John Hejduk, Victims 9. “John Hejduk Architect Mask Of Medusa,” Mask Of Medusa Pdf Architecture, , accessed April 24, 2018, http://icctrack.com/84op489/. Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 8 The Alphabet Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 9 Aleph Pictograph: Ox head Alphabetical order: 1st Letter Meaning: Power, Authority, Strength Sound: ah, eh Numerical value: 1 The pictograph is of an ox head which represents strength and power from the work performed by the animal. This let- ter also represents a leader. When two oxen are yoked the stronger one leads the less experienced one. Within a clan, the leader or father is yoked to the others as a leader and teacher. Lamed represents authority and a yoke as well so when used together with aleph it means “strong authority” Aleph is the first of all letters because a fable tells us that through aleph’s meekness when asked why he should be the first of all letters he responded in silence and had noth- ing to say. God was impressed with his humility that He de- cided aleph was most deserving to be the “father” of the Hebrew alphabet. God manifests himself as three things throughout the Bible. All of these things he manifests as begin with the aleph. ֵאׁש Fire – Deuteronomy 4:24 אֹור Light – Isaiah 10:17 אהבה Love – 1 John 4:16 א Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 10 Beyt Pictograph: Tent Floorplan Alphabetical order: 2nd Letter Meaning: Family, House, In Sound: B, Bh (v) Numerical value: 2 The Hebrew tents were divided into two sections, men’s and women’s. The entrance was at the front of the men’s section and an entrance from the men’s to the women’s section. A common way to designate a family is to identify the house of that family’s patriarch, for example, “The house of Jacob”. בראשית היה בן אלף The beginning of this phrase begins with the letter Beyt and translates to “In the beginning was the Son of Aleph…” ב Allegories of Mythical Characters Mythical of Allegories 11 Gimel Pictograph: Foot Alphabetical order: 3rd Letter Meaning: Gather, Walk Sound: G Numerical value: 3 The original name for this letter is probably gam, which is the root of gimel.