Critical Architecture

"If we look at cinema, music, and art in general, we need to understand, go beyond and combine
our ideas with others, even if the latter belong to different ways of working."

(Piranesi’s drawing contains several different memories,  a. the real memory of roman ruins,
b. the imaginary memory of Piranesi’s imagination, c. the memory of buildings that still exist
and d. the memory of the buildings moved by Piranesi.)

- The critical interpretation of Piranesi’s architecture becomes a founding element of his design method,
in which interpretation and comment blend in a single creative act capable of reinventing the rules of
his own work.

- The attempt to oppose current practice and accepted rules, trying to change the conditions imposed
by space and time.

- To transport architecture out of the sphere of the useful or the meaningful.

- form is still a vehicle for meaning.

Eisenman as Piranesi

Inspired by Piranesian Architecture critical act, Eisneman uses it not only as a starting point, but also a
figurative analogy based on Piranesi's method of conceiving his architecture.

Piranesi – Perspective, Eisenman – Computer, mockups, and 3D models.

Both in search for an appropriate instrument to control their taste for superimposition and the reinterpretation
of memory, the endless assembly of multiple varnishing points and the breakdown of the means of expression
and lines into an infinity of moving segments. Both are searching for the compactness of dissolving forms.
 

Method through project.

physical, diagrammatic and computer models.
(with a Church for the Year2000 as example)

Diagrammatic Models

E.g. The underlying scheme of two parallel bars and void compressed between them.
The church is based on two parallel premises: the first is the relationship between proximity and distance implicit
in the concept of pilgrimage and in the idea of communication media.

The second, is the new relationship between man, God and nature. Symbolizes in the nature form.

The condition of “in-between” which is typical of the liquid crystal also provides an opportunity for bonding with the site
in a less arbitrary fashion.

Scientific and mathematical diagrams. He studies fractals, chaos theory, catastrophe theory, DNA, Leibnizian atoms, the behaviors
of liquid crystals. This knowledge and their principles guide the deformation and development of spaces.
 

Computerized Models
 
 

Physical Models

A visual aid to all formal hypotheses.
It marks the start of the cognitive-perspective act and the figurative-operative intervention.
 

A trend or experiments achieved in architecture using electronic techniques.

Transformation capabilities of the computer-
Translation, atomization, logicisation, and metaphorisation.

1. Functional Diagrams
2. Interpretation of Context
3. Superimposition
4. Deformation
5. Twisting
6. Superimposition
7. Shift
 

“the system of comments about comments will create a new world.”

With visuals and inspiring quotes, the book successfully ties in a couple of issues to ponder on.  The book
gives an awesome insight of how computer is used as a new mode of design. It is not about a presentation and
mass production tool that have been used by most firms and students, but a vehicle for creative concepts as
demonstrated by Eisenman.

"detach from the eye from the mind"

The idea of perception. In conventional drawing, the person behind the paper works with one perceived viewpoint. In
a 3D screen, a perspective vision no longer exists; you draw in an arbitrary space without any scale. And each lines
flow in space and there are trillions of viewpoints to look at the model. To Eisenman, perception of vision is a tool to
design in an electronic paradigm.

Although, Eisenman diagrams are idiosyncratic, they demonstrate a certain principle and idea which is correlated.
By looking at architecture from a critical perspective, it creates opportunities for other fields of discipline to fuse in.
In fact, his diagrams could never be done and visionalize without the computer. His principles of form translation,
really pushes its design, and using scientific and mathematical models like the crystals create a new dimension of
spaces and form.