What is 'Space'? : Dialogue: Comtemporary Theory in Architecture

Parametricism and Virtuality

Parametricism is claimed by Patrik Schumacher, in "A New Global Style for Architecture and Urbanism" that "Parametricism is the great new style after modernism". In fact, when looking at some of the newest designs in the society, it's seemed to be that way. One of the reason that made parametricism the style of today is perhaps also due to the new technologies we've developed in the past decade which really enable the possibility of creating such complex and elaborate forms. The idea behind the concept of Parametricism is that on every site there's  a field, a field is equivalent to the forces existing in the space, such forces are such as the environmental forces, the social, the economics and more. These forces or this fields are then taken into a consideration when it comes to the designing phrase. Hence, there's this idea of creating an architecture which is specifically "tailored" to a specific site.

 This trend of subjectivity is also, a trend that our world is moving towards. The Fordism and the mass market  world is over. It is replaced by a world of subjectivity, where the consumers are supplied with products that are specifically "designed" for the individualistic need of each person, this proved to also be successful as subjectivity is related to our human nature, which is unique and specific to each of us. This can also be seen from the micro-specific advertisement that had been built into our devices such as during our google searches on our iphones  - where the results shown in each phones would be different according to what we've been searching on the phones previously, thus, in a way, even the search results had been tailored to be more specific to us as a user.

However, back to architecture, even though parametricism is all about the "maximal emphasis on conspicuous differntiation and the visual amplification of differentiating logics" as quoted by Patrik Schumacher, there's a truth that is in a way that's quite contrary, it's that in reality; parametricism itself is very controlled. In the order to construct buildings that possessed this "fluid" dynamic forces, that also "flow" together as supposed as a single form, "sharing a language with its neighbor" . There's the need for very precise calculation and precise pieces for the construction. since these fluid forms are actually very "articulated" in nature and thus to achieve such articulation and  complexity - the pieces o the building are also needed to be built very precisely, which, in many cases, there're often some errors when these elaborate forms are put into reality. Thus, the concept of "Virtuality" is also related to Parametricism in my view.

Since it's a matter of fact that many of Zaha's works are not built in real life despite the advanced technology that we've developed and some of her works that were built into real buildings, in many cases don't work just as well as planned, such as the Guangzhou Opera House which has a leakage problem.  This is due to the very complicated construction process and the need for a high level of preciseness. When looking at the actual parametric architecture in real life, many tend to does not live up to the models and the rendering pictures that the architect promised.  These renderings are a type of "virtual reality" in which it has the quality of being "real but not actual, ideal but not abstract" as quoted by Marcel Proust, Definition of The Virtual. Real but not actual refers to something "real" but doesn't have to be physical such as reflection and in this case the renderings.

Another example of Virtuality is the well known computer game, Sims; where the player is able to create and live in his / her virtual world, where there're costumes and even "music" that have references to our real world thus in a sense, the sims  is a "real" but not actual world, it possesses virtual reflection of ideal and values. In addition, even the idea of a utopia could also be linked to the theory of virtuality since it is also real in a way, but not actual. Hence, in some of the parametric architectures, there're still some essence of virtuality, where the models and renderings (which are the virtual reality) represent the architecture better  than the real buildings themselves. At the end, my understanding of Parametric forms is that it required "perfection" / "perfect order", which in a way, is very difficult to create in reality, since people are not perfect. This sense of "perfect order" is also presented in the ideology of the Utopia --- which links to the theory of Virtuality, where it's "real but not actual". Thus, the fact that Parametricism also represent the concept of controlled aesthetics in the order to create this "perfect order" in the real world, is link to the concept of Virtuality as in many cases, the models and renderings, which are a type of "virtual reality" ended up representing the architecture better than the actual buildings.

To Talk of Many Things...

When we think about ourselves as the human race, what really differentiate us from the other species are the "things" that had made up our society. Looking back beyond the prehistoric time, the "threshold" that defined us as "human" is when the apes discovered the use of a tool - that tool is a "Thing" in which we have used to build civilization, creating cultures and eventually it's the "things" that is responsible for our arrival as a species today. why are things so important? as mentioned, "things" although unanimated, played an important role in shaping our behavior and our society. The simplest thing like the hinge on a door actually made a lot of difference in terms of how we interact with a space. In this case if there's no such thing as a door hinge, it would take a lot of effort, energy and time to firstly, destroy a wall in the order to get inside, then rebuilt it to closed it - all of these "humans" use to perform the same task of getting into a room and closed the opening is replaced by this non-human "thing", a door hinge. In a way, a hinge contains the essence of those humans needed to do this "operation". Thus, in another way, these "thing" in our life is actually part of who we are, we are so accustomed to these "thing" that many times it has been embedded into our nature, this relationship between human beings and non-human "things" played such a large part in our life that when this relationship is broken, as in the case of the Israeli troops "walking through wall", the relationship between the wall and human has been broken - the wall is unable to perform its "function" as a "thing" that would protect us from the danger outside no longer, thus, humans loose the trust in the "thing" and its why this theory was so successful in creating trauma.

Besides from responsible for our humanistic progression, the "things" in many cases also define who we are and how we are seen by others, in a way, it's almost as if these "things" are heterotopias where it would allows us to have a better understanding. The things can also define  how we perceive others as well from their interaction with the things and how that interaction, relates to us. Vice versa, our interaction with the things also indicate how others will perceive us as well. Moreover, in some cases, it's the non human "things" that can determine our human action / interaction, such as uniform, students wearing uniforms and lecturers do not - this uniform - a "thing" automatically suggests a hierarchy in which we, humans tend to follow.

The interesting role of the "things" in our life is highlighted in the film "objectified" where it took us through some of the "behind the scene" production, seeing how  each "thing"/product were designed and manufactured. One of the main thing I saw is that there're a vast amount of time / thoughts being put into the production of these "things" that sometimes, it may seem so small and unnoticeable but actually responsible for making our life much easier such as a handle of a scissors for instance. One of the most successful "things" right now is the Apple products and the main thing I got from seeing Apple's design process is that they tried to make their product as related to the users and users friendly as much as possible. In fact I feel that the reason behind the success of Apple product might even come from the fact that they understand the relationship that these non-human things have with us and that these "things" actually shaped the way we behave and shaped the society in which we're living in.

System & Deep planning architecture...

The word "system" is introduced to us a while ago, often to increase the awareness of its importance and hopefully influenced us to how we adapted the idea to increase our performance in different aspects. We viewed system as being well-organized, well-established, anything with a certain form of system insisted "order" and  act as a structure that usually help the place to survive and outshine the others that don't. Nevertheless, many things around us have their own systems which is unique to the region, this system is the structure of the place, it creates the place and it's what made the place unique in itself. As architects, we looked at "places" differently than others, to view the place for its physicality is common but to understand a specific place requires the understanding of the "system" of that place.

 System of the place could be linked to many aspects such as social and environmental. In a way, understanding the "system" of the place is a crucial point in "deep planning" architecture, where not only the holistic quality of the site is taken under consideration prior to the designing stage but the architects would look at the ecological aspect of the site and uses that as an influences or concept of the building. Thus from my point of view, deep planning will helps create a more of an "empty form" architecture as the form of the building would come from its context in terms of its surroundings etc. , hence, its ability to survive over time as it has a better understanding of not just the physical aspects of the place but also a more ecological way of understanding which means that it is much deeper in context. To my surprise I actually think that many of the successful buildings today are somewhat relate to this concept of "system" and "deep planning" and similarly the trend of new architecture projects today also shifted to be more site-related and somewhat with an influenced from the ecological aspect of the site.

One example that I could think of is the project called "Geotube; Vertical salt deposit" by Faulders studio in the text "On Farming" as a text about how to use new architecture to improve our farming industry. I'm interested in this concept of farming because in itself, lies a many systems - the system of operation and production as well as the need to understand the environments and the ecology of the area of the farm as well. Thus when combined with architecture, many of this aspects will influenced the design which is a lot more interesting personally. Geotube is a project proposing a new way to create salt farm that would take up less space and allows multiple programs to be held in the area. The interesting aspect of this project is that it is very site-related and that it required the deep planning and an understanding of the ecological aspect of the site to come up with this architecture. located in Dubai, where the salinity level in the sea is higher than many other places, salt are traditionally collected horizontally and the space has no other uses. The proposal is to build a tower with an external mesh facade, being nearby to the shore, the sea water would then be pumped to the tower and releases down the mesh facade. With the unique extreme dry climate of the area, the water would evaporate fairly quickly, leaving the salt which can be collected on the mesh, by doing this, it is a quicker method to produce salt and required a lot lesser space. The way that the salt can be collected is also a lot easier and the tower could be used for other program as well. Thus, to me, this seems to be a very creative yet possible project which displays how the "system" and "deep planning" could be combined to the project to create a unique architecture that goes beyond the normal aesthetics and functions of but also reached out to being a part of the already established "system" of the place and being a part of its ecology.

The site took advantage of its placement by being nearby to the shore.

The combing functions of a salt farm with a tower.

Diagram explaning the system of puming the sea water then sprayed the water onto the mesh facade.

The salt deposit on the mesh overtime.

The Hungergames

The concept of Utopia, Heterotopias and Dystopia has been introduced to us from the very beginning as seen in the bible, the ideal Utopia is the Eden Garden - where there's no pain and suffering and every species live together in co-existence. However, the word Utopia poses two underlining meaning - first is the obvious meaning of "good place" while the second meaning "no place" - or a place that does not actually exists, nevertheless, it allows us to understand ourselves better. A contemporary example of this concept can be seen in the Hungergames, a famous novel which has been put into films, The two main settings the capital and the districts are vastly different in terms of the way they operate yet, there are subtly related and we can see this more importantly in the annual Hungergames, where participants from different districts dual to the death for the entertainment of the rich in the capital. To the workers in the districts, where life is about making money to live by each day and working for the capital - the idea of the capital is almost like Utopia, it is grand with people who don't need to worry about anything walking around in glamorous clothes and riding in fancy rides - the luxurious lifestyle seems alluring yet untouchable by the workers in the districts except for that this seemingly Utopia is in fact, real and the way to actually experience it is to become a participants in the brutal Hungergames and that is what Katniss Everdeen, a girl from district 12, got to experience.

For Katniss, she got to experience the capital in the form of a Heterotopias, where it is touchable and real, yet it is representing and reflecting the vast difference that the capital has in relation to her hometown, district 12.Infact, through the Hungergames, where the game is broadcasted to the workers in the districts - it becomes a heterotopias for them - as in their world - it exists and with this existence it emphasis the harsh reality of living in the district. In a simpler word - the capital is the heterotopias of the districts where the image of people living in luxury , not having to work hard or worry about anything reflects the harsh reality and the struggles of lives in the districts. Katniss got to experienced this heterotopias first handed, but more importantly she also realizes that underneath of the glitters and luxury of the capital lies a world which is so twisted and cruel, as if the capital is not real, such place could be describe as being almost like a Dystopia.

 A dystopia is a "bad place" of non existence which is sort of what the capital in the Hungergames is to us, in reality. The capital is a bad imagination of our world in the future where people will be separated by classes and that the rich would be powerful to the point of death of the poor or the insignificants are viewed as a source of entertainment. In fact, there is similarity between the culture of the capital in the film with our society that made it even more so a good example of a dystopia that display the bad vision of the future of our world, In the past we have the gladiators in the Roman time, where death would be viewed as a source of entertainment for the rich and the display of violence is counted as a heroic act, and thus, today we would like to think that we've moved beyond that act, which is viewed as cruel and inhumane, however, the film reminded us that humankinds are still filled with this dark desire and this influenced a dystopian view of the capital in our mind since it made us realize that there's actually a possibility that the "capital" could become our future.

To sun up the concept of utopia, heterotopias and dystopia can be seen in the "capital" in the "Hungergames" where, from the character's point of view, the capital is real and hence, it is a heterotopias which helps the witness able to reflect on themselves and understand themselves better, meanwhile to us in the real world, the capital is sort of like a dystopia which is waiting to come true as we see some possibilities as it depicts what would the world be if justice and kindness is overtaken by greed and selfishness. the capital being something unreal yet, it warns us about our future and made us more aware of who we are, making it, an example of a dystopia. 

The capital (Capitol) in the Hungergames seems grand and luxurious at a glance it appears to be like a Utopia for us the viewers but for the character, its a Heterotopias that helps emphasizes the vast difference between it and the districts. Also, as it turns out - we later realize that the capital is more like a Dystopia - a bad imagination of our society in the future....



The district seems almost like its from another film - in fact, the character Katniss Everdeen will get to experience this vast difference when she visitted the capital which in return - made her more aware of the condition in her district



The ideology of "Place" in Architecture...

The meaning of "place" in the architectural concept is far beyond the generic meaning of "location". Place, in this case, is also link to the atmosphere of the area and thus has a more constructed social quality. Place has a memory that is tied to it and hence there is also an essence of the particular  place in the space as well.  Thus, from this, "Place" is more complicated in a way how they responded to humans. Moreover, "spatial practices" can helped defined the "place" from the space that "The earth, the sky, the people and the divine (transcendent), All are brought together in dwelling. Dwelling takes a place by sparing and preserving - letting things be and become" , a street is a street when there's an action of walking filling in the space, hence, the character of a space could became recognized as a "place" from the action/activities that is going on inside. Furthermore, the ideal concept of place is that there is an essence of surrendering to the surrounding context of the space - which will in a way, helped it to survive for longer, as it surrendered to the environment, in other word, it blends in, allowing it to morph with the context of the landscape.

Since the concept of "place" expressed this unavoidable link between the man-made structure with the existing natural landscape - the "memory" of the space , "places" are very connective in general. Thus it would be ideal to give some examples of an architect whom, many admired so much and how his creations expressed this theme of "place" through connectivity. Frank Lloyd Wright was the architect that always bear the thought about the relationship between his buildings and the existing landscapes. The Uzonian Home, started with the concept of building a home with less expense and building cost. Hence, as a result, he used this strategy that all of the materials and labor were to be from within the range of 5 miles - while this method obviously helps to reduce the building an labor cost - it also enables the building to capture the essence of the space around it, for instance, the materials are the same from the nearby trees. Another good example is the magnificent "Falling Water " where Wright brought the outside in, through the use of materials and textures, to the point that he mentioned that he wants "People to step inside and put on their hats". Eventually, it is fair to say that Falling water  captured the essence of the water fall, and thus , becoming a "place" of its own. Moreover, the ever -so famous Wright's style of the prairies is inspired by the horizontal nature, long span area of open glass.

Accordingly, it is the context, the people and the activities inside the space, which could be almost immediately identified as being specific to a "place" - it created the ideology of where things "take place" and thus, this technique is often used in films to illustrate or create a more vivid image of how the "place" would be like. One clear example is the film "Powaqqatsi" where it's more like a collection of series of sceneries being filmed with some details that are more specific to the "place", for example in many scene , we cannot determine  exactly where it is in the world when the film only portray the landscape, we needed clues such as the people and their activities in the order for the film to "take place" in that particular place. In other word, the activities of the people inside the film helped us determined the space, once determined and realized the hidden essence of the space, that space potentially developed into a place.

In summary, place is different from location and space is that "place", architecturally speaking contain the "essence" of the particular place and that could be done in several ways  through different processes. Also, a place or the essence of a place could also be defined from the spatial practices such as the activities of the people in the space as seen in the film "Powaqqatsi".

The Return of The Erotic

The ideology of erotic sounds quite familiar to us, since we've experienced and experimented on this concept for the entire term last term in design studio, but now, we're introduced to the erotic once again, in a different light, in the world of theory. "Erotic is not the excess of pleasure but the pleasure of excess" is a term used by Colletti to describe the nature of erotic in the book, "Ornamental Pornamentation" and surprisingly, many theories that we've learnt can also be linked to the idea of erotic in their own way. Firstly, to define exactly what is "erotic" is a difficult task, as erotic's aim to "stimulate" and "impact" us, however, we as individuals response differently to different things - however, as a general rule, most of us should be able to be "affected" by a "phenomena" that erotic created.  One of the most clear descriptions of the theory of the erotic is that erotic delivers the "sublime". The sublime expressed the idea of a "delightful horror", a sort of feeling that is similar to as if you came back from death - that moment of awe and delightfulness would create a vivid, perhaps exuberance experience. Notice the usage of the word, "experiences" - like how many other theories linked together, the erotic also linked to the idea of how we perceive the world around us, about our perception and the level of "erotic" depends on our personal choice and how some particular phenomena can create an array of different effects that speaks to us the most.

One of the newest example of the concept of erotic we were given is the film "Fight Club", underneath the outer layer of the fights and violence. the concept of the film can be linked to the theory of erotic with ease. The story is about a man who was bored with his boring mundane life, working his life as a "recall specialist" - to the point that it has became so predictable, that he felt that he is living in hypereality where he is longing to "feel" the emotions, to "taste" the essence of being "alive". Hence, he tried several ways, from faking to be a cancer victims and attended cancer meetings in the hope of tasting the raw emotions of people, experiencing the so-called "sublime" moment of the cancer patients - however he realized that all he could do was to be an "observer", he still couldn't reach the feeling of "being alive"  until he entered into the realm of "Fight Club" where the ideology of this secret club was basically a place for working-class people to fight - releasing their stress and in return, feeling alive. Nevertheless, the story escalated into the peak when even fighting in an enclosed club is too predictable and thus, starting a fight with total strangers  would be the only moment where the idea "sublime" is being recreated as with the concept that "if you haven't started a fight ,you haven't really live", hence you could see the linkage of the theory of erotic  and the essence of being "alive" - that delight fullness  and contentment  which were a key that tie the idea of the sublime with the theory of erotic and accordingly; the film. To explain more, it's like that Fight club is a place that could create those sublime moments - the moment where you fight with all your might and survived to live life - that is the moment of the sublime, which is where, according to the theory, when the readers experienced and unforgettable experience that stimulated their senses and challenge their understanding of erotic. Thus, the theory of erotic linked to many other theories that we've study earlier since "erotic" plays directly to our reactions and responses - which relates to our perceptions and how we interpret phenomena , how we take in these "effects" - how we are moved / provoke by a particular aesthetics such as textures etc. All of these can be considered as belonging in the realm of erotic. The erotic is ambiguous  yet inviting, it is mysterious yet it engages with the audience in the order to maximize the phenomena being created for the maximum effect on the observers. Nevertheless, one conclusive "label" that we could use to label such broad and ambiguous ideology of erotic is the "sublime".

The Theory of the Aesthetics.

Most of us here, in design school, are familiar with the term "aesthetics" as the appearances of things and unavoidably, many of our decisions on a daily life is based upon this concept of aesthetics, we are drawn, attracted to the things that are aesthetically pleasing to us. The common term; "beauty is in the eyes of the beholders " is widely used, and the concept behinds it is quite clear, that aesthetics, or "taste" is a personal, subjective manner. However, when we looked deeper into this concept, the question of it being totally subjective is questionable, since, our taste is mostly influenced and defined by our upbringings and societies, hence can we really called it subjective when we are actually talking in the manner of such "trends"? Thus, society adds values to a particular aesthetic, in which most people tends to conform and adapted that into their own taste hence, the subjective manner of "personal taste" is not really personal at all, in fact, the same aesthetics value is probably shared with others in almost a universal scale.

Furthermore, the simulation of choice on each individual can also be coercion, which is the choice that comes from rules such as uniforms while hegemony, is a choice that is made freely. Generally, people will tends to lead toward hegemony choices since it allows us to think that we are expressing ourselves through this chosen aesthetics, while really, in many cases, that chosen aesthetic, is a shared ideas of the society in which we live in, in other word, through this, we are still in a way, conforming to a particular trend of a society. Interestingly, aesthetics is what most of us used to express, whether it's a particular idea or statement, about ourselves; Modernism or the international style is famous in most post-colonial countries such as Singapore, since it represents newness while does not imply on any messages. The International Style is universal in terms that it could be used in any context, any nations, acting like a blank canvas, its main feature is its function. Also, there's an essence of newness, something totally inventive that came along with the birth of modernism, this unique quality is perhaps, what the post-colonial nations found to be worth celebrating. Thus, the aesthetics of modernism buildings represent freedom from the past, its independence and its success in the architectural world is what many post-colonial countries are striving for, in my opinion.

 Another reason why I think that we're drawn to the aesthetic of modernism architectures is that there's an originality to it. even though, modernism existed long ago, its aesthetics "survives" to today and is stilled regarded as desirable. In a way, the aesthetic of modern building is so flexible that it does not only allow for the style to be use "internationally" (hence, the so called "international style") but other than the places, it is also very flexible in terms of time as the aesthetics is still often use and counted as "fashionable" today. So what makes good aesthetics? from my point of view, I feel that there's no such ideal aesthetics, there're only a particular aesthetics that one's prefer, however,  this liking can differ from societies to societies as well as different time periods as well. since the desirable aesthetics are actually values that society had chosen in which we are influenced by, the concept of aesthetics was never actually totally subjective in the manner that our preference had to be inspired from somewhere, where this same values is shared. Hence the reason why, aesthetics is subjective yet universal at the same time.

The Profane and how do you "play" with the idea of Architecture...

The act of profane is to make away the God, made the thing which was once sacred, available to a common man, it is to make things which are once untouchable into something ordinary. In fact, many things in society are the results of a some kind of profanity, most games that we played derived from old rituals which was once sacred but people had stopped believing in them and thus they manifested into something else, that are available to everyone.

Profanity can also be describe as such perception of a particular subject, takes Andy Warhol, the father of pop art for example, he  was the one who profane idealistic perception of art in the old days and through pop art, gave birth to what we defined as art today. Warhol brought art down to the ordinary, the old perception of art being sophisticated and high-class is disrupted by the use of the ordinary subjects in his painting such as the Campbell soup can and the Barbie dolls. Hence, ordinary people can now relate to art and thus, the perception of art is now changed and touchable by the ordinary. Moreover Warhol does not challenge the old sacred perception of art through the art but also the way he produces art, he erased the old concept of art being time consuming, precious and valuable into mass-produced and fast through screen printing, thus, now anyone can own an art piece. Today, we see many similar things in the art world which was the result from the first movement that Warhol did years ago, sculptures today are no longer carefully carved marble with incredible details but comes in a wider range of everyday material from bottles to vacuum cleaners. However, it is interesting to mention that even though the modern subjects of art is now more ordinary, art itself is still held high, a piece of sculpture today can be nothing more than a rusty vacuum cleaner and still sells at a price that would be out of reach for ordinary, working citizens.

However, when it comes to Architecture it can be different, the question of whether sacred architecture should be "play" with or should we "profane" the sacred architecture can be quite hard to answer. I believed that everything have two sides and to have one answer for this is unfair. Firstly, yes, architecture could be profane, and we see many successful examples in Western society. Rem Koolhas was one architect who played with sacred Architecture, for instance, his building teases the nearby Mies' building with the similar idea of glass facade only to pissed Mies off when it is bright orange. Also his addition to the old architecture building was also a kind of profane, where he took the traditional European style building and flipped it, turn it inside out to achieve a totally new creation when a dome is only seen from in the inside and the exterior is super modern. Thus, in this case, Koolhas played with the idea of the sacred classical dome, where traditionally, no one's would came nearby to it, and brought it down so close to the inhabitant s of his new building and thought this, he had achieved newness, a new form, which was derived from the old. Hence, as we can see, playing with the idea of the profane can actually be helpful in helping to create newness and uniqueness , this seem like a good thing, but is there a boundary to this, to how far you can profane architecture? One such example of profaned architecture is the Mandarin Oriental Chiangmai, where the hotel was designed to look like a temple or a palace. Even though this can be counted as playing with the sacred architecture, the form generated is pretty much the same, thus, there's not really any newness being created, while at the same time, it received many  critiques, mostly about the appropriateness of using the form of a temple for a hotel. Hence, my honest opinion about  playing with the sacred architecture, profaning it can be successful, if you go beyond just using the physical form to create the new architecture, Koolhas shown a great deal of thinking, playing with the existing context to create newness, unlike what we can see in the Mandarin Oriental Chiangmai, where the form of the temple has just been taken but replaced with a new function, in a way, there was actually nothing "new" being created here, the temple has no connection to the hotel, instead they remained two separated elements, the form and the function.

Another question is that should be play with this idea of the profane, my answer is that it depends on the context, in Thailand, people feel strongly about religions, thus, you shouldn't really touch that if you want to stay out of trouble, however, in many cases, it is worthy to try playing with this idea, only that the outcome should contained a certain depth that it creates "newness" that is worthy of that profaned sacred architecture.

touching the untouchable god of modern architecture, Mies van der Rohe, Rem Koolhas playfully plays with the context and teases Mies by taking his famous steel and glass structure and painted them bright orange. Mies face screened on to the glass facade of the restroom was a nice touch, all together, even if Koolhas had taken Mies' as an influence, he had made the final result "new"and "unique" yet playful.

The Mandarin Oriental Chiang mai also sort of play with the the idea of the profane, by taking the sacred form of a Lanna temple and turned it into a hotel. With many negative critiques about the appropriateness, the final outcome is not "newness" in any means, the two elements, despite being mixed together into one building remianed separated, one as a external form and one as the function.

Empty Space vs. Empty form..

The concept of "Empty Space" and "Empty form" is not the case of something that is quite clean cut. In themselves lie ambiguity and thus, explaining the ideas let alone expressing the ideas can largely depends on the individuals and the personal understanding of each person. Personally from my understanding, "Empty form" is harder to create than "Empty space", what is considered an "Empty space" is not always necessary an "Empty form".

 "Empty space" is talking more about the physicality of a particular space, as when it is seen as empty, like an abandoned building as no one inhabits it, In the order for a space to be an "Empty space" it can be seen that there's an absence of people, nevertheless, this absence is present  because an empty space has a defined "function" which in a way, "restrict" the building from being more "flexible" for other possible usage, hence, when the space is too restrictive, it can fail to survive through social or even environmental changes unlike other buildings that are more adaptive, which in a way, closer in being an "Empty form".

 One example of a building that is an empty space but not yet an empty form is "The Crown Hall" by Mies van der Rohe, The Crown Hall was designed with an intention in being an "empty form" which actually communicates multiple functions and being highly adaptive to many uses and it was well on the way in becoming an empty form as it has no previous "sign" that would tie it to a particular usage. However, as it turned out today, The Crown Hall is more or less and "Empty space" as even though the physicality of the actual space inside allows for a number of possible activities, the fact that it is so restrictive in that you can't touch the glass surface or else they'll have to replace the whole frame due to the stain you'll make or you can't stick anything on the wall except for a special kind of tape that will not ruin the surface. Hence, due to these restrictions, despite the hall, not having the "designated function" in its ultra simple form which represents the utmost flexibility and being very adaptable, this absence in the visual sign which the users would use to define the function of the space is one of the good qualities that an empty form should have. Nevertheless, due to the materiality and finishing of The Crown Hall, it limits the users from doing all those possible activities in their minds and thus, resulting in the building becoming only an "empty space" and at the same time, it can be said, a new sign is imprinted on to it, as a place for architectural students. 

 However, an empty building which is considered as an "Empty space" could becomes an "Empty form".  It can be argued whether we can create an "Empty form" or not since "Empty forms" will be determined through the usage of the space by the inhabitants. As architects, we can try to design spaces that allow itself to be used as an "Empty form", that space would have multiples interpretations and uses by the users that the physicality of it would not be the factor that defines its possible functions. In other words, if human recognizes the "sign" of each function through a kind of "physical representation" or "symbol" then an Empty form would ideally, has no "sign" that would tied it to a particular function or the signs existed would not be related to the actual functions of the space, this absence of a still, restrictive visual sign would  gives the freedom for the users to invent the new functions for the space. hence, Empty form is, in a way unpredictable in terms of how people would interact or use the space, thus, "newness" can be created through an "Empty form".

An example of  a successful empty form is the "Memorial to the Murdered Jews" by Peter Eisenman, as it's clear that despite the rather heavy concept, through the design which implies no "visual sign" that would link to the idea of death too obviously, multiple responses can be seen from the people interacting with the space, which is what Eisenman wanted. The space is so flexible and adaptive that it can house a wide range of activities and that the "visual signs" that defines its concept or functions is absence or too varied to be capture in a single shot, like a blurry photograph, the object is moved too fast and at times appeared "invisible", that is what an Empty form is, based on my understanding.

The Crown Hall has no "visual sign" that would determines its usage.

However, its many restrictions and rules prevent it from being an "Empty Form".

The Memorail to the Murdered Jews has no obvious visual signs that tied it to
 a function,thus, the users are left with the freedom to create their owns.

As a result, multiple reactions are created; walking on the blocks, sitting or even, fashion shooting

The simulation, the hypereality and “Borat”..

 Talking about the film, “Borat”, most people would somewhat heard of its name before, the film is known amongst the crowd as being funny and to some extends, outrageous. Yes, we all know that Borat is hilarious, but what actually made us laugh so much? Underneath the neon green bikini and the funny accent, the core of the humor actually lied within the way the Borat interacts with his surroundings. The way he response to the world, is different as that he is different from us; his view of the world is ought to be different…. But is he really? Well, as we may guess, Borat is a character played by the actor Sacha Boron Cohen, Borat is a news reporter from Kazakhstan, trying to make a documentary of the United States. What made the film hilarious is to see Borat’s reaction to such common thing in the American modern life, since Borat is from Kazakhstan; all of his perceptions and understanding are based from his cultural background. Well, we entirely believe in this character when actually Borat doesn’t resemble much of the real Kazakhstan and the people at all, the whole “tradition” and the image of Borat’s Kazakhstan has been created entirely in this film, hence why the country’s response was furious. However, as the audience, we couldn’t care less about the fact that the image being portrayed as a developing, nuclear filled, polluted nation is actually pure creation because for us, it seems too real. With every details during the scene, we linked this image of Borat’s Kazakhstan with images of the developing part of eastern Europe and Russia and hence, due to the fact that not much people actually know Kazakhstan prior to the release of the film, we believe in the image being shown, honestly, I actually believed that the scene in Kazakhstan was real, while in fact, as I realized later, the villagers, the chickens and donkeys were all staged. Hence, this firstly introduced us to the idea of simulation, where the idea of “pretending” goes beyond just wearing a mask but actually being the character, having the real symptoms, as a result, a simulation is much more effective into making people really believe in it.

Borat and his version of Kazakhstan

Moreover, as we believed in the recreational Kazakhstan, the character of Borat is much more real to us, in fact, just like the country, Borat himself is a simulation. Hence, there were moments during the film where it appeared to be real, despite the fact that some parts were more likely to be staged, we would still believe in it, since the characters and even the settings were simulations. As a result, Borat was successful in being funny as it was able to transform itself, from a film to a “documentary” through the realistic details in the scenes and in the characters. Thus when we entirely believe in the character of Borat as a real person, everything he did had much more impact as we feel that it was so truthful and original. Hence, that is why, personally I think Borat is funny, the fact that it was able to exaggerated some humorous with the innocence and honesty of the character as he seems so real.

Actual Kazakhs wearing their traditional costume
- can you see any relation to what’s portrayed in Borat?

The city of Aktau, Kazakhstan

Another aspect of Borat that made it funny was the fact that, in many times, the funny parts were quite unexpected, despite the mundane, ordinary situations, Borat’s responses often came to us as a surprise, as we are so used to the modern culture that we didn’t expect such reactions from the character. Thus, we laughed at his way of thinking and his reactions to American culture, as we never thought of such responses before. To add more, those funny-moments are often situations where we all could relates to, combined with such well simulation by the character, the whole scene or even the whole film was able to make us believe that it was real.

To sum up, Borat might not be the most successful film, it has its own issues just like any other films but when looking at the humorous aspect, we have to admit that it had done a reasonably good job and I think that the main reason that we find the film funny is not because of the obvious things on the surface but more or so the reality and the believability of the film. Borat himself wouldn’t be as funny if he lacks that “truthfulness” and “honesty” which pushed him beyond the boundary of just “acting” to becoming a kind of a “simulation”, and that simulation is what created more impact on us, as it blurred the deceptive boundary of acting, which as a result, made us believe and relates to the film even more.  

Semiotics and the process of Translation

The architectural “signs”…. And signs in general…

What are signs?, this seemingly simple word that symbolizes a symbols in which used for representing a particular object seems physically easy to understand, yet, in the world of architectural theory, the notion of signs actually raises a lot of questions and strangely relates to many ways, we humans interact with the surroundings. Firstly, “signs are always referring to something seemingly real”, hence, the signs for a dog would be different from the actual dog and that “dog” would also be different when interpreted by different people based on their personal experiences.  Also, each signs have different effects on us that link to our personal judgments and emotions, for instance, when the first caveman discovered the first “shelter”, or as we know, the cave, he relates this unknown space with shelter, safety and warmth, thus, this is passed on to others, and the “cave” became a “sign” that relates to shelter and feeling of comfort. Moreover, the signs that each of us perceived today is actually interpretation of someone’s else understanding, and with that, we will also create our own image and understanding. Signs can be categorizes into three groups; icon – a sign that looks similar for what it stands for, eg. The Buddha sculpture. Symbols – a sign that doesn’t necessary look like what it stands for, but is understand from our society and experiences such as the Christian Cross. Lastly, the Index sign – it communicates to us through being a part of a process that we can imagine such as a bullet through a wall would communicates gun fired. Interestingly, we can see some artists and architects applying the theory of the sign into their building; in one of Mies building in Chicago, he uses the steel truss to stick onto the façade of his tower, not as a structural aid but as a kind of a “sign” that referring to the steel that is hidden underneath the concrete due to Chicago’s fire law. Thus, I see this as a way that Mies expresses himself and declared his signature to the world despite these trusses not having any function at all.  

From the class discussion, I feel that signs are so often used that we are often forgotten the simple truth that the signs and the objects are actually two different things, this is proved when we claimed that the image of a pipe is a “pipe” while the truth is that “it is not a pipe, but a painting f a pipe”. However, some signs are used to the extend of becoming its own “object” rather than the object that it is representing, a sign of a house is so widely used to the point that, most of us would recognize the simple “pentagon” in representing a “house”, in one way, I feel that this is the success of the sign, yet, because of this fact, designers are trying to “de-signs” their works, to de-sign is to removing the sign, which are quite common, making the outcome more unique and “new”. MURDV, is one of the well known architectural company that actually play with the theory of the signs quite well as they uses the process of “translation” to play with the new composition and create “newness” without entirely loosing the essence of the “sign”. Thus, the process used to arrive at this new form actually has logical reasons, through using the translation of form, it create a new transformed form that can be used which would deconstruct the common / generic semiotic and hopefully create a new “sign” of its own.

Overall, I was quite impressed with this session and the topic of “sign” as I think that it relates to most of us de-signers. Also, it sparks a controversial idea that if what we’re learning is also an “interpretation”, “the sign” of the ajarn, then is there anypoint in reading the texts themselves? As seen in the Phaedrus text that, rather than reading the book, Socrates suggests that he would rather “hear” it, this implies that the “interpretation” is more interesting, and valuable than the book itself. However, as I came into realization, because of this very fact that everything, every “signs” today are interpretation from someone’s else, to get to the core, we must de-sign those signs, and the only way to do this, is to try to go back to the original and try to interpret it by our understanding. Once we have our own interpretation, we can use the process of “translation” to transform, to deconstruct the object, which hopefully, will lead to the arrival of the new, unique de-sign. 

Phenomenology and the studio project

The concept of Phenomenology in our sculpture pavilion project.

Phenomenology  in simpler  word is the study of essences, such essences  are actually responsible for giving us the "effect" that we can often feel when we enter a space or a setting.  Such effect mentioned in the previous reading was the sublime, which translated into a concept of a "delightful horror", such as the joy from surviving from a near-death experience for instance. The interesting aspect of the similar idea of phenomenology can be seen in the work of the architect; Alexander Brodsky's ice pavilion, where he uses the existing surrounding to his advantage by creating the walls of the building from the frozen water of the lake in which the pavilion was located on. This made his pavilion much more interesting as he had "surrendered" to the surrounding while most building tried to withstand the natural forces. As a result his ice pavilion has many appearances as the ice on the wall keep on melting according to the weather and the amount of heat dissipated from the bodies of the customers, thus, not only that Brodsky has found a way for his building  to exist in harmony with the environment, he also added an ever-changing facades and an ephemeral quality which, overall, gives us even more impact.

Most architects would have to adapt their buildings to the context of the site to some level, in a functional term, however, the concept of "surrendering" to the environment is hardly ever discussed and is a much more conceptual and abstract topic. Thus, we were encourage to further investigate into our pavilion project, where we have to design a pavilion to house 10 sculptures in a given site, my site is located at parc paragon, an empty space that lies in between Siam center and Siam Paragon shopping mall in central Bangkok.  My concept of the journey through the exhibition talks about human's greed and selfishness in contrast to the fact that we are still relying in nature and that we should be able to realize this and start looking into ourselves to find our flaws, as a result, we will eventually learn to care more about others and hopefully become less selfish.  There are many aspect of my pavilion that sort of reminded me of the "sublime" effect, although not entirely, this similar idea could definitely be applied or emphasize in future works for the more "full-on" impact. One of the main features of my design is that the external wall of my pavilion is all louvers, however, they are aligned to follow the curves of the building, which was inspired by the circulation of the pedestrians.  Moreover, these louvers are not open at the same angle, the ones at both ends of the pavilion would opened up to the outside, while moving inward, more into the exhibition, the louvers gradually become closer in the space between each other and also the angle is more enclosed. This effect is thought put to be in accordance to the order of the display sculptures, where the most enclosed space would be for the sculpture that about selfishness, this expressed the nature that we all have this side, but often try to cover and hide it. using the louvers also give the effect of repetition, and at some angle inside, it looks as if the louvers is infinite. Thus, this passively suggest the idea of the sublime that can be adapted or emphasis in future works. Furthermore, as I mentioned before, the louvers are not spaced in a regular spacing, but they become denser and denser. The spacing around the entrances area are large enough for people to walk through , hence this was done on purpose and I didn't want to interrupt the flow of circulation in the area too much but still encourage people to experience the architecture. The idea is that, people would walked through/across the pavilion without much struggle, however, they will arrived in the interior space at a point, which is sort of like a carved out space that is enclosed by the aligned louvers, such encounter would be a little unexpected and thus, this gives a chance for the sculptures to seduce the passerby's attention . Hence, the audience, can choose to venture into the unknown space, so close and connected to the outside, yet through the separation of the thin louvers, became another strange, alluring new space, or of course, they can walked straight out  and get on with their businesses if they choose to. More over despite the organic free form of the pavilion, the form was actually inspired by the way people move across the site. Thus, I see this as a passive attempt to blend in and somewhat, surrendered to the existing environment/condition of the give site. By no means, that I'm confident that I'm doing all of these things for the "impact" or "effect" or the "sublime", nevertheless, this is what I can extracted from my existing pavilion which was designed prior to the time where the concept of "phenomenology" was introduced during the theory class.

Response to Weizman’s lethal theory and the definition of the architecture that we used to know…

We live our lives today without much thought about the way we are reacting to things… we walk on roads, sit on chairs, lean on walls…without much thought at all. These subtle yet natural ways of “reacting” to our “civilized” environment can almost be described as instinctive in our human nature. It is fair to say that it is imprinted in our brains that walls are solid, and thus we hold this fact for our sake of safety, we built walls around us…to protect us from the unexpected outside. I do notice that I (and many others) developed a similar habit of liking to sit next to a wall, beside a solid element, as it feels more secure and less exposed. However, what would happen if our way of “beliefs” had been destroyed. During the class, my instructor, Taylor introduced asked an interesting question of “why are we scared of ghosts?” The answer didn’t lie upon the way they look but much more on the fact that ghosts often do unexpecting, abnormal things as they have the ability to walk through walls, floors and ceilings, hence, they’re inescapable.

Moreover it was ultimately interesting when the Israeli army decided to use the war tactic of “moving through walls” which were derived from the notion of architectural theory when they invade the Palestine town of Nablus. Using the principle of “inverting architecture” by altering the way we instinctively react to architecture. Roads and doors are treated as walls while walls, ceilings and floors were treated as passage way. The Israeli troops “swarmed” through the city, blasting through walls, ceilings and floors into private homes with explosives. After the discussion in class, it was obvious to understand why this “moving through walls” tactic was so successful. The Israeli troops had broken the people’s “trust” in the architecture; Walls is no longer a protection from the outside, floor can no longer separate us from the ground, hence, the people can no longer rely on their common instinct and thus, leaving them feeling insecure in their own home. This leaves the locals traumatized, always afraid to get invaded from all sides, even within their own homes, which they no longer feel secure in. Thus, this means that the people can not run away, they were able to find a single place that they would feel safe, like ghosts, these army are able to travels through solids walls and floors, they had destroyed the architectural rules that were imprinted in our instinct.

The only linkage to Alexander Brodsky’s lecture that I can make was that the theory is somewhat similar to the way the Brodsky chose to create most of his work. My understanding is that, most of Brodsky works derived from older ideas, he didn’t create a whole entire “new” form of architecture but he used the ideas that already existed such as the Japanese tea house and “manipulates” and “modifies” this idea to fit with the new context in the order to make it his own. Thus, the Vodka house he designed has a strong reference to the traditionally Japanese tea houses but here, he added in his own touch and interpretations, but at the end, he still have to admit that the idea started form the Japanese tea houses. Other noticeable things was that Brodsky is more fascinated with older objects that in a way, were not in perfect conditions, many of the pieces that he used in his architecture have flaws which made them unique and at the same time, it adds personalities/characters to his buildings. Thus, to put it simply, the clear link between Brodsky’s work and the “moving through wall theory” theory is similar in the manners that both uses the existing idea as their based but escalated and modified that idea to suit their own unique conditions which was the main thing that made their works successful as it combined the already well-thought idea with the adaptation to the local context.

Traditional Japanese Tea House

Alexander Brodsky’s Vodka Pavilion, interior 

The facade of the Vodka Pavilion

Brodsky’s Vodka Pavilion; an adaptation / manipulated Japanese Tea House
made to works / fits with the new context.

***p.s. Lastly, to all my architectural friends who would see my blog on every Thursday night, I’m glad you find my blog helpful but keep in mind that most of this information is what I’ve interpreted through my own understanding, you are very welcome to discuss the topics etc. with me but please don’t steal a whole sentence... and yes, I know who you are.... lol, cheers

Moving on to a new chapter....

It is incredible to say that I’ve made it through an entire semester of Architectural History with acceptable grade, frankly, I actually quite enjoy the class.. It is fulfilling to be able to come back and see what I’ve went through and in a way quite encouraging for me who have another two years to go. The content of this blog will thus, changed a little, from entirely history of architecture into more of a “Theory study”, hopefully... you will find it interesting, and hope I could at least, shared my experience and my opinions with anyone who happened to tumble upon my blog,

cheers :)

Palm.S

Back where we began, the 19th Century, where it all began.

The interior of Crystal Palace is open and filled with light, quite contrasting to the typical enclosed Victorian house.

Made entirely from steel and glass, The Crystal Palace uses the newest materials and technology of that time.

At last, we’ve made a full u-turn backed to where we began. The 19^th Century plays an important part in our venture into architecture, as it was really, the birth of many technologies and discoveries, which would course the development of architecture into the way that it is nowadays. It would be unacceptable to not mention the industrial revolution when talking about the 19^th century, where the discovery of steam-engine would lead to the rapid growth in machinery, which them results in the fascination of mass-producing idea. People would change their lifestyles from working on the farms out in the country and move into the city to work in factories in urban setting. This is where our idea of the urban city really began.

During this time, the society also undergo some changes as well, the higher class were loosing power, not only in their social statuses but also their taste and design. Thus as a reaction, they gave labels to the middle class such as “tasteless”, “taggy” and  “uncultivated”, that’s how we associate with these words nowadays. Architecturally, the discoveries of the 19th century also not only changes to the new materials and building technology but it also introduce new typology of buildings which mainly focuses around the idea of urbanism and mass production.

Steel and glass were considered “new” materials thus, the sudden change from the convectional masonry to steel and class open up not only to the new looks but also the new structures (higher but at the same time, more refine and sleek). Such clear example would be the “Crystal Palace” where the first world expo was held. The interior of the inside is light and open with no solid walls. The main materials used in the construction were glass and steel. Due to its lightness, new forms of architecture were born, which lead to the modern, glass and steel high-rise buildings that we all know today.

Thus, the 19^th century was crucial period to understand as architecturally, due to the development and discoveries of new materials and technologies. It allows for new possibilities and forms to house and answer the newer needs of people who are now all cramped into the urban space. Hence, the start of capitalism.

The Erotics of Baroque Architecture

 After our venture into the Renaissance, where the use of simpler forms and pure geometries such as squares and circles were the principles of creating the perfect architecture for human proportion. Now, moving forward to Baroque where things get a lot more details and complicated. Baroque strikes me as being very ornamented and curvy with overwhelming details to the point that through such experience, it could crate such a dramatic mood and evokes our senses once we are inside. While Renaissance architecture abandoned the secular / religious viewpoint and emphasized more on the logics and proportions, strangely Baroque seems to be the opposite with it featuring sculptures and paintings. It was when religion became powerful once again.

However, Baroque architecture evokes the idea of eroticism for me because of the mystery behind the spiritual beliefs displaying on the decoration of the building, it is also quite ambiguous and therefore, mysterious since it ceases to use the Renaissance’s pure geometries of squares and circles but emphasis on the less pure geometry such as the oval, seen in not only the elevations but also the plan of the buildings. Thus, the oval presented in Baroque architecture can almost be seen as a manipulated circle, a form of a less pure geometry.

We cannot talk about Baroque without the mentioning of the almost overwhelming details of the ornaments, which really fills and defines baroque architecture. Baroque is in fact, characterized by the grand elaboration of detail and space. Architects would take classical motifs and recombined them to create a sense of drama. The use of curves is also quite dominant as seen in Borromini’s S.Carlo alle Quattro Fontane where the façade is articulated with the alternating convex and concave surfaces, this to me, is quite erotic as it is almost an illusion which lures us in to look, wonder and even interact with the building. Similar to the ornamentation as well, since the interior of Baroque is filled with decorations from architectural elements to paintings and sculptures, our vision is bombarded with so many elaborate details that is almost overwhelming, thus, in the order to extract a total experience from such buildings, we have to really look closely, at each part, “examine” each curves and niches in the order to receive the effect which is different to each person. Hence, through this impromptu interaction (visually and physically) while we run our eyes through each of the buildings curves, we, in a way, are interacting with the architecture and thus, the rise of the idea of eroticism.

The alternating curves on the facade of S.Carlo alle Quattro Fontane seems almost like an illusion.

Say goodbye to the pure forms of circles and squares and get ready to be hypnotized by the ambiguity of ovals.

Through the use of less pure geometries which teases us to wonder and the overwhelming elaboration of ornamentation, I think Baroque is a perfect example of erotic architecture, it plays with our eyes and minds, leaving such dramatic moods and effects on the inhabitants yet does it so subtly that eventually, it is us, who would continue engaging in this “man to architecture” interaction.     

Response to the architecture of the Early Renaissance

 The name of the Renaissance period always echoes as the period where art flourished to most people. This isn’t hard to imagine since many great Italian artists such as Michelangelo created his masterpieces during this time. However, when it comes to the architecture, many including me would come up with less vivid ideas, not because that the early Renaissance architecture lacks in making an impression, but because of its simpler form yet still bearing some similarities with the style of the past, it was difficult for me to define and explain the logics behind Renaissance architecture prior to this particular lesson.

The Renaissance period occurred after the crusades had traveled to Eastern Europe, fascinated with the civilization and especially the grand architecture such as Hagia Sofia, they had also brought back ancient texts (Greek and Latin) which was then, printed and distributed through out the bourgeois of the society. In my opinion, the Renaissance period marked the birth of many intellectuals, it was when the first University of the world started, thus it also represented the growth in the intellect area as well as art. Since these unseen secular texts has been distributed, people were getting emphasized on the individual analysis rather than the analysis from medieval scholars, they believed in humanism which was the belief in the capability of human beings, that each individual can excel, along with this emphasis, came the belief in “anthropomorphism” which relates to the geometries derived from the proportions of the human body, hence, the Vitruvius man… From this belief, early Renaissance architectures featured the frequent use of simple geometries such as squares and circles – which are the shapes derived from human proportion according to the Vitruvius Man. Such others examples are the centrally planned churches such as Leon Battista Albeti’s Santa Maria Novella and Basilica di Sant’Andrea, Mantua (1462-1790) where they also exhibited the plan derived from the “sacred cut” (when a square is turned 45 degree and placed upon another unturned one), this again, is derived from the proportion of the human body seen in the Vitruvius Man. The early Renaissance also wanted to bring classical features back into architecture, however, reduced in complexity in the order to make it more temporary, for examples, the Greek orders would be put in, but not as columns but on the facades, in a way, this reminds me of Venturi’s decorated shed theory.

Vituvius man - human proportion in relation with simple geometries.

The plan of a centrally planned church.

Le Corbusier’s Modular Man

Overall, from what I understand, the early Renaissance period was a period of renewal, opening up to the new secular belief and no longer relying entirely upon the religious viewpoint. They were inspired from the great past, prior to the Christian era, way back to the Greek, Roman and Ottoman Empire, thanks for the texts and scripts the crusades brought back. Forms were reduced to simpler, purer geometry and the idea of “anthropomorphism” was put to use, thus, human were started to play a more important role in the creation of architecture. Interestingly, despite the obvious difference in aesthetic, I’ve found this humanism idea of the Renaissance to be applicable with the father of modernism, Le Corbusier in the way that, Le Corbusier also works with human scales and proportion, that he had created a human standard or the “modular man” as a tool for creating architecture. The only slight difference that I think is that the Early Renaissance buildings were designed FROM human proportion, while Le Corbusier was designing FOR human proportion…