Architectural Writing

Dena Baker

Can the built environment cure the epidemic of longing? In Rem Koolhaas's essay, “The Generic City”, he illustrates ideas that dance around answering this question. Koolhaas begins by emphasizing the concept of identity—and how the hybrid of two energies creates a unique narrative that is different from the narrative of each actant on his or her own.1 Identity is subject to a list of factors that define it, such as context, properties, and history.2 Identity also needs a strong stance, “identity centralizes, it insists on an essence, a point.”3 Koolhaas then conjured up imagery of a circle with a center to describe the exercise of identity and relate it to the built environment of “The City”4. Just as identity shifts from one thing to another, so do city centers—fabricated by some axis of contemporary identity.5 The trend of shifting identity in cities has gone from spacious and personal to dense and capital. We, the inhabitants, are closer in distance and further in spirit. 

Koolhaus spends much effort towards illustrating the ideals and practices of The Generic City. Among them is that The Generic City is able to gain much of its effect from its cookie-cutter blueprint of imagery, “it becomes transparent, like a logo,” this to me seems to be referencing typology6. Typology can be helpful—this idea is referenced in Learning From Las Vegas, a book by Denise Scott Brown, Robert Venturi, and Steven Izenour. A loose idea I can glean from both Koolhaas, Scott Brown, Venturi and Izenour is that typology tells us there is a right and wrong way to do urban planning. Typology in urban planning can be helpful for curating an experience and improving circulation within the built environment.7 The imagery of the built environment is always running in a similar vein. As an experiencer—an actant who experiences things—I know firsthand that imagery, when coupled with certain emotions, can create a disillusioning and isolating experience that falls just short of permanent. The “trance of almost unnoticeable aesthetic experiences” Koolhaas mentions, and the examples he provides such as the neat juxtaposition of office windows in high rise city buildings, offering a neat array of fluorescent squares—such imagery, when converged with an inhabitant who is feeling the emotion of longing, for instance, is likely to create a lonely experience for the actant8. Two important concepts arise here: 1) nothing—no architecture, type, Generic City, or imagery is able to escape the projections of the actant. 2) Identity is bound to an additional factor—but which comes first? The built environment or the mind? The Generic City or need? Or is the Generic City so easily bound to our projections because it so expertly subscribes to blankness—in that way, it is ironically a blank projection screen—and fails to influence us as much as we influence it. Maybe blankness possesses no advantages. The blank city is a split from the city that prioritizes community. Architectural efforts such as the city square are built in place in order to establish this community. Maybe that is a good place to start looking for a solution for longing.  

Narrative is always unfolding, whether on text or screen or real life, a subconscious narrative is ever-occuring in the space of the built environment. I define narrative here as an extended series of moments experienced by people who make up the human experience. Narrative in the built environment requires two main components to occur: firstly, an understanding of how the built world is only as real as we perceive it to be, as well as an understanding that architecture is an active participant in a semiotic process in which architecture is the sender of messages and we, inhabitants, observers and actants, are the receivers of messages. The second component is an understanding that the built environment gains a strong visual, haptic, and formal power from typology. These two components- typology and the semiotic nature of our understanding of the built environment come together to create a narrative greater than the sum of its parts. This narrative is significant because it is universal and therefore wildly personal, hopefully cultivating empathy within inhabitants.

To claim that the world, and more specifically, the built environment, is only as real as we perceive it to be, I will begin by taking a quantum physics-oriented approach. In the book, You are the Universe, by Dr. Deepak Chopra and Dr. Menas C. Kafatos, they explain that we are the “creator[s] of reality”.1 We define our reality based on what we perceive—and what continues to exist beyond our perception is merely irrelevant. They use the example of a fire truck siren to explain this—the sound of the siren begins quietly, becomes louder as the fire truck approaches, then fades away again. To the observer, the siren’s volume has gone down and up and down again, while the observer dually knows the volume of the siren has not actually changed, it just sounds like it has. This explains how our senses are “unreliable” and they define reality for us all the time.2 This concept finds its roots in Albert Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. We can sum up Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity by understanding that reality is different depending on the position of the observer; and Chopra and Kafatos explain it concisely through Einstein’s eyes, “Einstein could see in his mind’s eye that objects would not appear to travel at the same speed to someone riding a beam of light and to someone standing on another moving object.”.3 Human experience defines everything.4 This is where we can understand that we are always projecting onto reality—meaning we are also always projecting onto the built environment that we perceive.5

This is how we can begin to understand that reality beyond our perception is not real. The unseen is not entirely independent of us but rather unaffected by our projections. Quantum theory proves this through a phenomenon the Observer Effect, which argues that the difference between the perceived and unperceived is a matter of waves versus particles. If a photon or electron is unobserved, it is a wave—and waves provide nowhere for photons to land. The observed photon or electron, however, does not behave like a wave, but rather like a particle—this lends the photon a location, charge, and momentum.6 On an atomic level, this is how reality that we do not perceive is unaffected by our projections.

Lastly, Chopra and Deepak bring to light that we are involved in a constant and perpetual dialogue between ourselves and our built environment. They describe this as what is “in here” inside our brain as never passive to what is going on “out there”.7 They use an example of one gazing around a room and seeing a mouse in a corner to prove this—while the gaze seems passive to one's external environment because it does not alter the room, it is not passive at all, because seeing the mouse is likely to trigger a response “in here” within the human brain.8 This example proves how we are constantly involved in a narrative within our built environment that requires both us and it to occur.

While design decisions in the built environment have the potential to create universal narratives for inhabitants, the built environment is ultimately subject to projections from inhabitants. Typology is subject to our projections always. The built environment poses as a blank screen for our fantasies to play out. This is not split from the notion that architecture is always a sender of messages and we are the receivers. It is beneficial to look at this argument through the lens of semiotics in order to understand how there is always a subconscious narrative occurring in space in the built environment. In the book, How to Read a Film, by film critic James Monaco, he uses semiotics to describe the viewer/film relationship and I believe a similar approach can be taken here to describe the inhabitant/ built environment relationship. In language systems there are always two parts, a signifier and a signified.9 Monaco argues, however, that in film, a visual medium, the signifier and signified merge into one.10 I believe the same goes for visual factors of the built environment. The signifier and signified are one in architecture and they send messages that the inhabitant receives. A fundamental understanding of this process of communication is necessary for understanding how the projections of the inhabitant and the built environment come together to create narrative. Monaco brings up a point regarding the halfway point both signifier and signified must meet at, “The reader of a page invents the image, the reader of a film does not, yet both readers must work to interpret the signs they perceive in order to complete the process of intellection.”.11 One must understand that just as film and viewer both put in work in order to grant existence to the film’s narrative, the sender and receiver in architecture must also both put in work to grant existence to a narrative. This will be useful later for understanding the work that typology does alongside the work of the observer in order to create a narrative that could not exist without either.

In Jonathan Crary’s book Techniques of the Observer: On Vision and Modernity in the Nineteenth Century, he discusses the relationship between the observer and the observed to also make the point that the observed only exists to the extent that the observer agrees with. He identifies the relationship between the observer and observed, and notes, like the lens of semiotics mentioned earlier, that there are two necessary participants in the act of vision. He then notes how the process of vision is tied to the viewer—who is a “product” of their historical context as well as the “site” of subjectivity, “Vision and its effects are always inseparable from the possibilities of an observing subject who is both the historical product and the site of certain practices, techniques, institutions and procedures of subjectification.”.12 This means that the observed is influenced by the observer’s projections. This echoes both my points earlier that one, reality is as real as we perceive it to be and two, nothing we perceive can escape our projections. An additional point Crary makes regarding the observed being unable to escape the projections of the observer is that the observer is influenced by culture and history. Since the observer is influenced, this then influences the observed, “Though obviously one who sees, an observer is more importantly one who sees within a prescribed set of possibilities, one who is embedded in a system of conventions and limitations.”.13 Crary mentions this “prescribed set of possibilities” as inescapable, just as inhabitants' projections are inescapable for typology and what they view in the built environment.

The second component of the foundation of my argument is an understanding that the built environment on its own gains a strong visual, haptic and formal power from typology. I am borrowing writer Nili Portugali’s definition of typology from her book, The Act of Creation and the Spirit of a Place: A Holistic Phenomenological Approach to Architecture. She has another name for it—pattern—but the concept remains relevant. Portugali claims that all architectural elements, such as arcades and walkways possess a “superstructure” that speaks a language all observers understand.14 Every corridor you have ever walked down, you and all your peers are able to agree that it is a corridor, every single time. The “superstructure” of every corridor is what tells us it is a corridor. Take an example as simple as a room—every room you have ever been in—you are able to identify it is a room because of distinct, consistent built elements that make up said room. The same goes for every corridor, arcade, and walkway. Typology has its power in the distinct and consistent language it speaks. This is where we can understand the specific impact and extent of the role of typology and design decisions in the built environment. Architects can never comprehensively fabricate a message, feeling, or narrative for inhabitants. Does typology contain narrative-influencing elements or subtle nudges that design is modestly capable of? Is design capable of authoring the human narrative or is it an un-personified bystander? My take is that typology possesses its own unshakable power, however, is not comprehensive enough to reach far enough to create narrative for us but can meet us halfway. Our projections run the length of the other half—they need a screen, intangible or tangible, to operate on—and typology serves this purpose. We, the inhabitants, observers, or actants, are always working in tandem with typology to create the narrative that subconsciously operates in the built environment.

Jumping off the argument that narrative requires the work done by both typology and projections of inhabitants, it is useful to reference Rem Koolhaas as he makes a very valuable point regarding the “convergence” of two actants in his book, The Generic City. At its most basic, his argument concerns identity. He poses the question—how pure can identity be after convergence? One must lose something to converge with another—but he acknowledges that this “loss” is not loss at all, and that “homogenization” is beneficial, “Convergence is only possible at the price of shedding identity. That is usually seen as a loss. But at the scale at which it occurs, it must mean something...what are the advantages of blankness? What if... homogenization were an intentional process?”.15 My argument does not concern identity, but the concept Koolhaas alludes to here is significant. We can simplify it down to this: the combination of two is greater than the sum of its parts—therefore the combination of typology and projections of the actant create a narrative that is greater than the sum of its parts. I could also argue that both the built environment and human projection lose something when they converge—the built environment loses the intentional message of the architect, and our projections trade their original direction for another.

The significance of this narrative is universality. The soul of the inhabitant in architecture undergoes something incredibly personal and universal. This long conversation about typology merging with perception of reality to create narrative needs an example. Bernard Tschumi touches upon a morbid yet very real example of narrative in architecture in his book Violence of Architecture. Tschumi begins by personifying architecture and highlighting its bond with inhabitants; he claims that architectural space and human action are linked, “actions qualify spaces as much as spaces qualify actions, space and action are inseparable,”.16 He then notes on the constant dialogue between architecture and inhabitants, “architecture is only an organism engaged in constant intercourse with its users,”.17 Tschumi then makes a point that hits closer to the possibility of narrative occurring in space by emphasizing the simple and undeniable presence of the inhabitant, “Each door implies the movement of someone crossing its frame... Each architectural space implies (and desires) the intruding presence that will inhabit it.”.18 He then unfolds this stance further by suggesting that if bodies “violate” space, space can commit the same unto bodies. The bully can back you into a corner, and the corner will remain indifferent. Tschumi is arguing that architecture, despite its typological power, is indifferent to the narrative. The walls of your bedroom cannot help you. It is important to note that the built environment and narrative do not engage in a cause-and-effect relationship; Tschumi knows this, “Spaces are qualified by actions as just as actions are qualified by spaces. One does not trigger the other; they exist independently. Only when they intersect do they affect one another.”.19 Once again, proving that the combination of these two elements, the built environment and projections of the actant, create a narrative greater than the sum of its parts.

Why is it important to have a collective understanding of the ever-present, unwavering, universally personal narrative we undergo in the built environment? Collective understanding of personal universality can result in empathy. Empathy is useful and beneficial, for example, on three different scales: the urban, the institutional, and the home. All three of those realms are areas influenced by the built environment, legal matters, urban planning, and institutional policy. All three could benefit from a widespread scent of empathy among inhabitants. On an urban scale, empathy could mean a nicer day for the unhoused. On an institutional scale, empathy could prevent sexual harassment in the workforce. On a residential scale, empathy could prevent domestic violence.

An understanding of basic rhetorical strategies: logos, ethos and pathos, can help one understand why narrative is essential for cultivating empathy. In the study of rhetoric, an effective theory of persuasion is the Elaboration Likelihood Model. This method of persuasion recognizes the one you are trying to convince as a target. The ELM gains its power from recognizing that a target needs both appeals to emotion and logic in order to be convinced.20 This is one of the most effective and common methods of persuasion practiced by rhetoricians.21 One must also understand that appeals to emotion are made through several cues, however the most common is telling stories.22 This is where narrative gains its effectivity and power for catalyzing empathy.

In conclusion, empathy is a goal in several built environments on several different scales, the urban, the institutional, and residential. If inhabitants recognize that they are collectively undergoing a universal personal narrative, that equals a higher chance that empathy will be cultivated. Empathy in these environments can prevent oppression. Narrative is always occurring in the built environment and requires the union of two main components to occur: typology and projections of the inhabitants. Typology gains its power from being distinct and consistent but is not comprehensive enough to create narrative on its own—it needs the projections of the actants for the rest of this process. The projections of the actants are significant in the second half of this process of creation of narrative because the world is as real as we perceive it to be, according to quantum physics.

Dena Baker

Beatriz Colomina in War on Architecture: E.1027, is talking about the tension between violence performed upon architecture and Le Corbusier’s attempt to occupy architecture more meaningfully. Her goal is to turn Corbusier’s method on its head by naming it for what it is—colonization—while also acknowledging some of Corbusier’s intent. I found her point about Le Corbusier’s photograph fetish and the deficiencies of a photograph through quoting Victor Burgin to be interesting, “We know we see a two-dimensional surface; we believe we look through it into three-dimensional space, we cannot do both at the same time—there is a coming and going between knowledge and belief.” (29). This to me seems to imply yearning. The same yearning one feels when, for instance, watching films—being exposed to an image awakens yearning from the soul but does not satisfy such yearning for the experience. We see the image, but we are never really there. And architecture is composed of images, so perhaps Corbusier’s colonization of architecture is an attempt to offset this yearning. It is not, however, an excuse for “colonizing” and defacing Eileen Gray’s design (28).  

Luis E. Carranza’s in Le Corbusier and the Problems of Representation was about the male gaze being a main perpetrator in the politics of women being seen, or rather looked at (70). It reminds me of a quote by Margaret Atwood in her book The Robber Bride about the unavoidable presence of male fantasies, “Even pretending you aren't catering to male fantasies is a male fantasy: pretending you're unseen, pretending you have a life of your own, that you can wash your feet and comb your hair unconscious of the ever-present watcher peering through the keyhole, peering through the keyhole in your own head, if nowhere else. You are a woman with a man inside watching a woman.” It’s appropriate that she mentions the “keyhole” in one’s own head, as if the male gaze can transcend the boundaries of the intangible and unseen and can create architecture to invade wherever it travels. 

Architecture and design can influence the degree to which people feel seen. Being seen means being acknowledged; acknowledgement of the values of different religious, ethnic, and age groups, as well as the values and rights of different genders. In accordance with Colomina’s and Carranza’s discussion, I will ponder the values of two groups—what values does the male gaze operate under? What values do the woman and her body operate under? 

According to the points made by Carranza, the male gaze operates under values of control, “...the act of seeing objectifies the person observed by subjecting him or her to a curious and controlling gaze.” (71). In addition, according to Colomina’s thoughts on Le Corbusier’s photograph fetish, I could argue that the male gaze also operates under the value of yearning. Yearning for what? I am unable to name what this is without specifically reading Le Corbusier's mind, but his actions remain the same—he defaced a woman architect’s design. If I had to guess, I would say he was yearning for an experience. As for the values a woman and her body operate under, I will name yearning for an experience as one. As well as the yearning to feel seen, as mentioned earlier, most groups of people have.  

The male gaze can and has implemented its values in architecture. One way I can name is the partitioning of the mosque. A number of modern mosques feature an architecturally informed partition between men and women worshippers. Misogyny is to blame for this, rather than the values of the religion of Islam. Among the earliest mosques ever built during the days of the revelation of Islam, the Prophet Muhammad’s Mosque in Medina, Saudi Arabia, had no partitions. The mosque was one big open room in which groups of men and women prayed with no architecturally implemented barriers between them. This is Islamic tradition. Many modern mosques, however, do feature architecturally implemented barriers between men and women, and oftentimes the women's “section” of the mosque is much smaller or doesn’t even exist. This is an example of the male gaze practicing its values of control and objectification. Additionally, it is an example of the woman’s body not feeling seen—seen rather as a sexualized body than as an individual with values. The yearning of a woman and her body to feel seen and participate in an experience occurs in the partitioned mosque. The woman is not colonizing the mosque, she is praying in it. The male gaze, however, does colonize the mosque by transcending architecture, tradition, and the values of women and their bodies by implementing a partition where there never was one. Not unlike Le Corbusier’s colonization of Gray’s house.  

In Genius Loci Towards a Phenomenology of Architecture, author Christian Norberg-Schulz explains that there can be two different approaches to understanding place: functional and qualitative. Both the functional approach to place and the qualitative approach to place have cons—they create an impasse. The functional approach to place connects actions to their environments and argues that architecture is specific to what is happening in it. This strips a place of its identity and its sense of “here” and leaves one no space to describe place in qualitative terms. A qualitative approach to place makes one lose the ability to describe place by “means of analytic scientific concepts,” this means one loses the ability to be objective (8). Phenomenology is a way out of this cycle. According to an online journal, phenomenology is the “the study of an individual’s lived experience of the world” (Neubauer, Witkop, and Varpio 1).  

The harmony between understanding a place qualitatively and functionally being a more experience-based approach reminds me of a practice in psychological trauma healing in which doctors inform victims of abuse that their experiences and their feelings about experiences, whether accurate or not, are still real. I understand phenomenology in architectural discourse to be about validating and emphasizing the experience of inhabitants.  

Some of Robert Venturi’s points in Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture are relevant when considering the validity of the inhabitant’s experience in architecture. Venturi makes a point that complexity and contradiction in architecture, rather than incoherence and arbitrariness, are preferable. He names a person’s experience in architecture as ambiguous and rich, which to me implies that the human experience is uncontrollable, and in direct juxtaposition with architecture—architecture is the attempt to control the human experience (16). So when we juxtapose the architectural attempt to control people versus the ambiguous, uncontrollable nature of the human experience, an ironic narrative arises here. Architects are unable to extensively reach into the minds of its inhabitants and control whatever narrative takes place in there, but they can certainly try. It is worth examining the study of semantics here, in that in a cycle of communication, there are two players: the sender and the receiver. In this example, the image is the sender and the inhabitant is the receiver. Architecture is composed of images. Images are also bound to their cultural connotations, for example, one must consider than an image of a red rose in America might mean something different that a rose in Hungary (Red roses symbolize romance in American culture while they are traditionally gifted at funerals in Hungarian culture). Just as the human experience is uncontrollable, the cultural connotations attached to the images we witness every day are also outside the jurisdiction of control. Architecture is not immune to this. Architects may have a certain goal in mind when designing a project but are endlessly bound by the connotations various architectural elements, such as materiality, light and form. They are even more uncontrollable due to Venturi’s points on complexity, i.e. how modern architecture features hybrid elements rather than straightforward ones (16). This strikes me as meaning that a building has many elements that combine to become something bigger than the sum of its parts. It can be valuable to examine this part-to-whole relationship because it influences human perception, experience, and narrative even further in massively nuanced and uncontrollable ways.