Heidegger presented his concept of being-in-the-world implying a man-made environment. He presented the concept that man lives in a fourfold environment consisting of the earth, the sky, the divinities which are the gods and mortals which are men who dwell in this earth. The passage in his essay "The origin of the work of art" strongly suggests that a building, in his case, a temple, a holy place, portrays absolutely nothing. It merely stands there in the 'rock-cleft valley'. The temple encloses the figure of a god, and by concealing, it allows the temple to stand out. The presence of the god is in itself 'the extension and delimitation of a precinct as a holy precinct'. Heidegger strongly believed that places of worship such as temples are built in specific places where the chosen place has a hidden meaning revealed by the temple itself. A building according to Heidegger is a work of art and as a work of art, the building "preserves truth". Hence the temple does not add to the landscape that is already there, but instead brings out the land and causes it to emerge as what it truly is. Simply put, Heidegger believed that a land in itself is unable to present itself as a work of art. However, if a building is built on that piece of land, it does not add to the landscape but causes the land to show its true form as a work of art.
In his later writings Heidegger offers interpretation of a fourfold of earth, sky, mortals and divinity. We may feel bewilderment as we're used to thinking of the world in terms of physical, social or cultural structures. Heidegger speaks of these fourfold to remind us that our world consists of concretized objects or things, rather than the abstraction of science. Heidegger describes the earth as the building bearer, the sky as the sun's path and seasons of the year as well as where clouds drift about, the divinities as the beckoning messengers of the gods and the mortals as human beings. He adds that each of these four is what it is because it mirrors the others. Heidegger constantly talks about this fourfold existance, talking about man's stay between earth and sky. He understood that "things" are manifestation of the fourfold, saying 'things visit mortals with a world'. This simply means that every 'thing' has a world of its own to bring to us, something for us to study and learn about. One of the meaningful lines Heidegger wrote about is how a bridge gathers the earth as landscape around the stream, where it does not simply connect, but it makes a place come into presence, where the banks appear only when the bridge crosses the stream. Simply put, we won't see the stream banks as they are until the bridge comes into play. There is truth in Heidegger's writing, where we will not be able to see a place for what it truly is until some a built form appears.
Heidegger also spoke about language as the original art. This was before he arrived at the concept of fourfold existence. However the concept was already there. Nature itself also gathers the fourfold, and asks for interpretations. This happens in poetry, language. Language plays an artistic role in the naming of things. By naming things, it brings beings to word and to appearance. Things are recognized for what they are when they are named. He states that the names "keep" them, and a world is opened up. Language keeps the world, but is also used to say a world. Language is defined as the "House of Being".
Put simply, Heidegger believed that every "thing" has its "thingness" or rather, a kind of soul to the said object, and that the same thing can be applied to the landscape and architecture. In this sense, we are more familiar with the term "genius loci" which is the "soul" of a place where Heidegger used the Greek temple as the example.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Critique on the article "The Concept Of Place"
The Concept of Place
The author presents us with a case saying that the concept of "place" has recently been given much attention by those who discuss problems of urban design and architecture. However, this concept of "place" is no longer meaningfully described in our lives today, having given up the human environment of stable places such as houses, cities and countries in exchange for a more mobile living. Technology plays a part in depriving us of physical contact with others as well, along with modern means of transportation allowing most of us to move about, making it even harder to truly communicate. Although this mobile living is accepted by some, many remain skeptical as to whether or not it will help or 'destroy' us. The study of Lynch implies that the lack of direct human contact may produce psychic disturbances and mental disorder. I strongly agree with the author's views especially when he added that 'when place is abolished, we simultaneously demolish architecture'. Architecture is a defined space, hence it obeys the site requirements and takes its context into consideration. If place is abolished, architecture loses its sense of site, and a mobile home would probably not feel like much of a home if it were to be somewhere else instead of say, 'home'. I answer the author's ending question with, we need to have an imageable and architecturally articulated place. Mobility is something people may want to work towards or even desire, but i feel that the architecture of a building is just as important as the architecture of the site. If we were to put our house anywhere else rather than where it is now, it would no longer be called a 'home'.
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Existential Space
Piaget states that "an object, is a system of perceptual images endowed with a constant spatial form throughout its sequential displacements and constituting an item which can be isolated in the causal series unfolding in time.". This simply means that man is able to construct an image of a structured world, in which existential space (which is the notion of space) forms an integral part. Each of our concept of 'space' is abstract. It consists of universal relations such as 'outside', 'inside', 'under', 'over', 'before' and 'behind', along with more specific geometrical structures. Gestalt psychology describes abstract "principles of organization" rather than the structures of concrete existential space. Hence, an existential space need not be something visible or concrete, it has to be something a person is familiar with, or rather, a point of departure. When the center of our immediate space coincide with the center of existential space, we feel 'at home'. If anything else, we are 'away' in the sense of 'elsewhere' or 'lost'. Existential space is defined by particular actions in particular places. When an action takes place, the place where the action takes place becomes meaningful.
I must say that this article requires further review as I feel I'm not getting the full message. However, in relation to the previous article on concept of place, I feel that this is in relation with what was presented by the author in said article. The existential space consists of a place created by someone in familiarity, as in something familiar as the so called 'departure point', often his/her own home. Hence mobility becomes an issue where a person may be at the point of being 'elsewhere' or 'lost' in their very own homes.
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Architectural Space
Architectural space would describe the concrete structure or space that man lives in. And if it does not permit the development of a satisfactory existential space, man himself has to modify the environment. We open and close windows and doors, move pieces of furniture, but we can only have minimal influence on the more general system of places which comprises our personal space. The task of the architect is then to 'concretize' a more or less common existential space. And as always, the genius loci of a place comes into play. The architectural space is simply to define the inside and outside of a place, in which a person truly dwells. The American architect Robert Venturi enhances the importance a wall gives by allowing it to curve. The concave surface gathers and creates space like "a parabolic mirror". Existential space is hierarchical and comprises of different zones, while architecture concretizes this. Architects like Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe understood this concept and divided space-defining elements from the load bearing elements.
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Conclusion
I would agree that architectural space may comprise of mobile elements, but in totality it cannot be mobile. This is because the mobility would make the development of existential spaces impossible. As we familiarize ourselves with routines and things in repetition, a mobile world where these things are forgotten would only serve to impede human development. Piaget states that a mobile world would limit man where he could only be liberated with an image of a structured and relatively stable world, with it, his ability to understand and feel. In addition, a sort of spiritual emptiness would manifest, a feeling described by perhaps the lack of a place of belonging. The concept of place is defined through existential space, and following it, architectural space which would give a person a feeling of belonging, a structured and stable world. The contribution of each individual to the totality consists in the articulation of the place to which he belongs. Human identity indeed does depend on the possibility of concretizing existential space. Only then can we truly feel that it is a place we belong.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Film Review - Minority Report
The film takes place in Washington D.C., in the year 2054 A.D., far off into the future where the unimaginable is possible. The story revolves around a department called Precrime. The concept of this department is to stop crime before it happens with the aid of 3 genetically altered humans called 'Pre-Cogs' who are able to 'see' and divulge information on a crime before it is committed with pinpoint accuracy. It is then up to the officers in the department to study the visions of the Pre-Cogs and stop the murder from happening. The department of
Precrime is lead by Chief John Anderton (played by Tom Cruise) who, after losing his son six years ago, have put his life and trust into this system, solely to prevent others from suffering the loss he felt when he lost his son. The system is put in place, and it was perfect. Murders were eliminated and statistics show a 90% drop in homicide cases in the past 6 years. However it in itself, raised a contradiction.
Can anyone be accused of murder before the act is even committed?
This caused an agent from the United States Department of Justice, Danny Witwer, to evaluate the system and whether or not the country should expand Pre-Crime internationally.
Things then started to heat up when the chief of Pre-Crime himself is seen as the perpetrator of a murder in the Pre-Cog's vision. John was supposed to murder a man named Leo Crow in less than 36 hours but was convinced he is set up because he doesn't even know the victim. After escaping from the very colleagues he used to work with, he made his way to the residence of Dr. Iris Hineman, whose research laid the groundwork for the Precrime program. It was explained that the three Pre-Cogs do not always agree on the visions of the future, hence the one that deviates the most from the others is ignored, this report is called the minority report, causing John to search for his minority report, if it exists.
However, as the entire city is filled with identity scanners which makes John easier to locate, he is forced to undergo surgery by a shady doctor to replace his eyes with new ones. After which John managed to narrowly avoid capture as the surgery was successful. He holds on to his own pair of eyes and managed to get in the Precrime office and removes Agatha from the chamber and takes her to a friend of his, who manages to extract the images of the murder John is about to commit. John then tracks down Crow to his apartment to find out who set him up or why he would kill a man he didn't even know. Agatha insists that he had a choice and he could leave and forget about the whole thing but John went ahead anyway. He then found pictures of several children on Crow's bed, among them were pictures of Crow and his son whom he lost 6 years ago, Sean.
Just then, Crow walks in the room and John assaults him, trying to get a confession from him. Crow then reveals that the photographs were fakes and that if John killed him as seen in the vision, Crow's family would have a cash payoff but he didn't know who it was that set it up. After a struggle, Crow manages to pull the trigger of the gun that was still in John's hand, effectively causing the Pre-Cog's vision to become a reality. The audience is often led to think that John was set up by Witwer, who was trying to find flaws in the system but this changed when the murder of a woman named Ann Lively resurfaced and Witwer was killed by Burgess for investigating it.
Later on, John was seen in his ex-wife, Lara's house with Agatha, discussing the murder of Ann Lively and was caught by Precrime officers who took him by surprise. Burgess then meets with Lara to comfort her and accidentally revealed a fact about Lively's murder that he shouldn't have known, causing Lara to think that he committed the murder himself. Lara then proceeds to free John from the holding area and he interrupted the event in Burgess' honor by playing a video of the Pre-Cog's vision of the murder of Ann Lively, causing Burgess to panic and sneak out of the room. The Pre-Cog then had a vision of the murder of John Anderton, which was perpetrated by none other than Lamar Burgess.
John then told Burgess he had 2 options. To kill John and prove that the system works at the cost of a life sentence, or don't kill him and prove that the system is indeed flawed. Burgess then decides to take his own life instead. In the ending scene, the Precrime office is seen to be abandoned, indicating that people had lost hope in the system. The three Pre-Cogs are then seen living normal lives in a remote location in peace.
Steven Spielberg had assembled a group of sixteen future experts three years before this movie was made. In this movie, the director's vision of the future can be seen. Simple technological advancements to complex ones can be seen, vertical transportation that doubles as a personal transport can be seen several times in the movie, to display the director's very own vision of how the future should be.
However i find this movie to be rather unimpressive and i would say that this is definitely much less than what Steven Spielberg can do. The progression of the story is dreadfully slow and while the director aims to build up climax by slowly revealing important plots in the movie, i feel that it is not very well done as it is very difficult to understand anything that is going on up till near the end of the movie. Perhaps in his vision of how the future could or should be, the director strayed off the course.
Do not be mistaken, this movie has its impressive points. The very idea of stopping crime before it happens is extremely well thought up, although it raises contradictions of its own. The future, as seen in the movie, is quite commonly seen in most movies, consisting of a world where most things are controllable by machines, but in Minority report, it is rather impressively done. Cars are not flying as most futuristic movies tend to portray, however they travel on a set track and doubles as vertical transportation. 3D videos are also seen as possible in this director's future. Instead of using only one video camera to play a video, several video cams are seen projecting the image in a 3D form using holographic technology. The part i find the most impressive is the ability to transfer files from one screen onto another using a portable film which only looks like a thin sheet of glass.
The technology itself fits seamlessly into the story, reinforcing the director's idea of a future where crime should not exist. It creates an environment where the officers in the Precrime department has sufficient technological advancements to identify the perpetrator, yet it does not make it too easy for them and cause the film to become predictable and boring. Overall, the future portrayed in the movie is extremely well thought of, although i can't quite say the same for the movie itself.
I do feel that this movie has an impact on design, as it portrays the unlimited possibilities we have at hand, where it can be said that it is only our imagination itself that is limited. The movie invites us to open up our mind to accept what people would say is impossible to do.
People ask why. I ask, why NOT?
It invites us into the world created by the director and share his visions for the future. We may or may not agree with his point of view but we are free to choose how we want to create the future, we just need to stop thinking and create a better future.
Where in architecture, we work to create a better future, one space at a time
Reference
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181689/
Precrime is lead by Chief John Anderton (played by Tom Cruise) who, after losing his son six years ago, have put his life and trust into this system, solely to prevent others from suffering the loss he felt when he lost his son. The system is put in place, and it was perfect. Murders were eliminated and statistics show a 90% drop in homicide cases in the past 6 years. However it in itself, raised a contradiction.
Can anyone be accused of murder before the act is even committed?
This caused an agent from the United States Department of Justice, Danny Witwer, to evaluate the system and whether or not the country should expand Pre-Crime internationally.
Things then started to heat up when the chief of Pre-Crime himself is seen as the perpetrator of a murder in the Pre-Cog's vision. John was supposed to murder a man named Leo Crow in less than 36 hours but was convinced he is set up because he doesn't even know the victim. After escaping from the very colleagues he used to work with, he made his way to the residence of Dr. Iris Hineman, whose research laid the groundwork for the Precrime program. It was explained that the three Pre-Cogs do not always agree on the visions of the future, hence the one that deviates the most from the others is ignored, this report is called the minority report, causing John to search for his minority report, if it exists.
However, as the entire city is filled with identity scanners which makes John easier to locate, he is forced to undergo surgery by a shady doctor to replace his eyes with new ones. After which John managed to narrowly avoid capture as the surgery was successful. He holds on to his own pair of eyes and managed to get in the Precrime office and removes Agatha from the chamber and takes her to a friend of his, who manages to extract the images of the murder John is about to commit. John then tracks down Crow to his apartment to find out who set him up or why he would kill a man he didn't even know. Agatha insists that he had a choice and he could leave and forget about the whole thing but John went ahead anyway. He then found pictures of several children on Crow's bed, among them were pictures of Crow and his son whom he lost 6 years ago, Sean.
Just then, Crow walks in the room and John assaults him, trying to get a confession from him. Crow then reveals that the photographs were fakes and that if John killed him as seen in the vision, Crow's family would have a cash payoff but he didn't know who it was that set it up. After a struggle, Crow manages to pull the trigger of the gun that was still in John's hand, effectively causing the Pre-Cog's vision to become a reality. The audience is often led to think that John was set up by Witwer, who was trying to find flaws in the system but this changed when the murder of a woman named Ann Lively resurfaced and Witwer was killed by Burgess for investigating it.
Later on, John was seen in his ex-wife, Lara's house with Agatha, discussing the murder of Ann Lively and was caught by Precrime officers who took him by surprise. Burgess then meets with Lara to comfort her and accidentally revealed a fact about Lively's murder that he shouldn't have known, causing Lara to think that he committed the murder himself. Lara then proceeds to free John from the holding area and he interrupted the event in Burgess' honor by playing a video of the Pre-Cog's vision of the murder of Ann Lively, causing Burgess to panic and sneak out of the room. The Pre-Cog then had a vision of the murder of John Anderton, which was perpetrated by none other than Lamar Burgess.
John then told Burgess he had 2 options. To kill John and prove that the system works at the cost of a life sentence, or don't kill him and prove that the system is indeed flawed. Burgess then decides to take his own life instead. In the ending scene, the Precrime office is seen to be abandoned, indicating that people had lost hope in the system. The three Pre-Cogs are then seen living normal lives in a remote location in peace.
Steven Spielberg had assembled a group of sixteen future experts three years before this movie was made. In this movie, the director's vision of the future can be seen. Simple technological advancements to complex ones can be seen, vertical transportation that doubles as a personal transport can be seen several times in the movie, to display the director's very own vision of how the future should be.
However i find this movie to be rather unimpressive and i would say that this is definitely much less than what Steven Spielberg can do. The progression of the story is dreadfully slow and while the director aims to build up climax by slowly revealing important plots in the movie, i feel that it is not very well done as it is very difficult to understand anything that is going on up till near the end of the movie. Perhaps in his vision of how the future could or should be, the director strayed off the course.
Do not be mistaken, this movie has its impressive points. The very idea of stopping crime before it happens is extremely well thought up, although it raises contradictions of its own. The future, as seen in the movie, is quite commonly seen in most movies, consisting of a world where most things are controllable by machines, but in Minority report, it is rather impressively done. Cars are not flying as most futuristic movies tend to portray, however they travel on a set track and doubles as vertical transportation. 3D videos are also seen as possible in this director's future. Instead of using only one video camera to play a video, several video cams are seen projecting the image in a 3D form using holographic technology. The part i find the most impressive is the ability to transfer files from one screen onto another using a portable film which only looks like a thin sheet of glass.
The technology itself fits seamlessly into the story, reinforcing the director's idea of a future where crime should not exist. It creates an environment where the officers in the Precrime department has sufficient technological advancements to identify the perpetrator, yet it does not make it too easy for them and cause the film to become predictable and boring. Overall, the future portrayed in the movie is extremely well thought of, although i can't quite say the same for the movie itself.
I do feel that this movie has an impact on design, as it portrays the unlimited possibilities we have at hand, where it can be said that it is only our imagination itself that is limited. The movie invites us to open up our mind to accept what people would say is impossible to do.
People ask why. I ask, why NOT?
It invites us into the world created by the director and share his visions for the future. We may or may not agree with his point of view but we are free to choose how we want to create the future, we just need to stop thinking and create a better future.
Where in architecture, we work to create a better future, one space at a time
Reference
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0181689/
Monday, June 14, 2010
My Story
Childhood moments that lead to architecture?
In all honesty, it's quite hard to find a single childhood moment that could lead up to this career path. However, since as long ago as i can remember, i have always been interested in sketching as well as very basic model building, either with Lego or wooden blocks. Truthfully i don't think any of those lead me to this field but as i look back, i feel that there's nothing else that suits my interests except this field.
Why did you choose your field?
At first i was at a loss as to where to go after A-levels. However my school had this 'Vocations Week' where they invite speakers from several job scopes to talk about what they do. There was this architect who came to speak, i think he was an interior designer, who talked about his work and what he does. And let's just say he caught my attention. But this did not lead to my choice just yet. At first i was leaning towards engineering, as i had quite a strong interest in physics and maths (although my grades said otherwise). Until i took a walk around the education fair that i stumbled upon UCSI's very own school of architecture. Basically i selected this field because it incorporates sciences, arts and mathematics in quite a unique way, and i for one, do like a challenge.
The best and worst experiences studying architecture.
The best parts studying architecture is the ability to broaden horizons and to look at things in an entirely different way, often things you come to take for granted can perhaps be seen as something deep and meaningful if time is taken to look at it from another perspective. This along with the people i meet throughout the course of my studies here. I do feel that they each have a certain uniqueness to themselves, quite unlike the people you see in other (extremely dull and boring) courses.
As for the worst parts, (ugh, where do i begin) the assignments feel like a long walk through a long dark tunnel where the light is always just right out of your grasp, or at least that's how i feel most of the time. While i admit the assignments are not the most pleasant part of the experience, (if i were to overlook the fact that we hardly get any sleep at all most of the time, the ludicrous demands of some of the lecturers, as well as the amount of coffee that tends to exceed our own blood level during the final few weeks of the semester) i find architecture to be quite an enriching experience, ultimately teaching us to do more than anyone else can, see in more ways than anyone else can as well as solve problems in more effective ways, or, better than anyone else can.
Analyze yourself - best and worst part habits throughout your studies.
I would go on about all sorts of good habits i probably think i have, but it says to be honest so... i don't think i have any good habits to talk about here, or maybe i just haven't found any yet.
So the bad habits would have to fill up the rest of the paragraph. I find that i'm lazy and hardly take my work seriously at all, apparently hoping i would breeze past this course, redeem myself in the final year and in the later years. However, after this semester i must say my mindset has been 'corrected'. While i won't say i'm a 100% cured, seeing as i'm only typing this on the eve of the submission date, i will say that i'll try to do a much MUCH better job in this semester and the semesters to come.
What keeps you going?
Quite simply, the need to finish what is started. After all it's too late to give up or change my mind now.
Well, that and i've always been a big dreamer. Wishful thinking perhaps, but i've always dreamt of perhaps changing the world with architecture. Naturally this field has unlimited possibilities.
Through architecture, i feel that it is possible to change the way people think, change the way people eat, change the way people live, all these change towards the betterment of society and humanity, one building at a time. I feel that this way, it is not impossible to change the world to be a better place. And all these can be achieved through architecture, which i feel is more than enough to keep me going until the end.
In all honesty, it's quite hard to find a single childhood moment that could lead up to this career path. However, since as long ago as i can remember, i have always been interested in sketching as well as very basic model building, either with Lego or wooden blocks. Truthfully i don't think any of those lead me to this field but as i look back, i feel that there's nothing else that suits my interests except this field.
Why did you choose your field?
At first i was at a loss as to where to go after A-levels. However my school had this 'Vocations Week' where they invite speakers from several job scopes to talk about what they do. There was this architect who came to speak, i think he was an interior designer, who talked about his work and what he does. And let's just say he caught my attention. But this did not lead to my choice just yet. At first i was leaning towards engineering, as i had quite a strong interest in physics and maths (although my grades said otherwise). Until i took a walk around the education fair that i stumbled upon UCSI's very own school of architecture. Basically i selected this field because it incorporates sciences, arts and mathematics in quite a unique way, and i for one, do like a challenge.
The best and worst experiences studying architecture.
The best parts studying architecture is the ability to broaden horizons and to look at things in an entirely different way, often things you come to take for granted can perhaps be seen as something deep and meaningful if time is taken to look at it from another perspective. This along with the people i meet throughout the course of my studies here. I do feel that they each have a certain uniqueness to themselves, quite unlike the people you see in other (extremely dull and boring) courses.
As for the worst parts, (ugh, where do i begin) the assignments feel like a long walk through a long dark tunnel where the light is always just right out of your grasp, or at least that's how i feel most of the time. While i admit the assignments are not the most pleasant part of the experience, (if i were to overlook the fact that we hardly get any sleep at all most of the time, the ludicrous demands of some of the lecturers, as well as the amount of coffee that tends to exceed our own blood level during the final few weeks of the semester) i find architecture to be quite an enriching experience, ultimately teaching us to do more than anyone else can, see in more ways than anyone else can as well as solve problems in more effective ways, or, better than anyone else can.
Analyze yourself - best and worst part habits throughout your studies.
I would go on about all sorts of good habits i probably think i have, but it says to be honest so... i don't think i have any good habits to talk about here, or maybe i just haven't found any yet.
So the bad habits would have to fill up the rest of the paragraph. I find that i'm lazy and hardly take my work seriously at all, apparently hoping i would breeze past this course, redeem myself in the final year and in the later years. However, after this semester i must say my mindset has been 'corrected'. While i won't say i'm a 100% cured, seeing as i'm only typing this on the eve of the submission date, i will say that i'll try to do a much MUCH better job in this semester and the semesters to come.
What keeps you going?
Quite simply, the need to finish what is started. After all it's too late to give up or change my mind now.
Well, that and i've always been a big dreamer. Wishful thinking perhaps, but i've always dreamt of perhaps changing the world with architecture. Naturally this field has unlimited possibilities.
Through architecture, i feel that it is possible to change the way people think, change the way people eat, change the way people live, all these change towards the betterment of society and humanity, one building at a time. I feel that this way, it is not impossible to change the world to be a better place. And all these can be achieved through architecture, which i feel is more than enough to keep me going until the end.
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