2001 Bachelor of Architecture
On

I think architecture is in crisis. After losing the unity it enjoyed only a few decades ago, architecture is haphazardly looking for something to cling to. Early postmodern attempts looked for solace in preexisting forms in a kind of theater of memory. Today, the range of trends and movements are as varied as the disciplines to which architecture has attached itself in search for its lost legitimacy. Together with the usual suspects (philosophy, history, etc.), architecture is associating itself with emerging trends such as media, shopping, computers, and the internet.

I felt that at this time of uncertainty architecture should look inward and reassess its basic values rather than to look for a reason outside itself. This must be a time of analysis and introspection, of a rethinking of the basic principles of architecture. This decision also seemed appropriate for a novice apprentice hoping to develop his own views on architecture.

With this path already delineated, research began with one of the earliest sources of architectural meaning: number. And while such a source was utilized widely in antiquity, mathematics and proportioning systems both as science and myth continue to be an ever-present element in contemporary discourse.

However, the manner in which proportion is used today is completely different to that described by Leon Battista Alberti and Andrea Palladio. Through the evolution of science and the subsequent demystification of the divine qualities of proportion, this pseudoscience turned myth retreated into the depths of built form. Ironically, it is this architecture of refuted principles that became the basis for all architecture and architectural criticism in the Western world.

Furthermore, readings of this architecture have never been particularly accurate. Rudolf Wittkower and Colin Rowe both make assumptions and produce conclusions regarding proportion and precedent only to have contemporary scholarship criticize (and also at times praise) their work. Yet, this same contemporary scholarship finds itself unable to provide a unifying argument for key concepts at the very heart of what architecture is.

Architects have tried many times though. Granted, manifestos claiming to hold the answers to these questions turn out to be mostly in the wrong. Even in school, students are many times reminded not to “reinvent the wheel.” (Maybe it is not exactly reinventing the wheel. But in the very least it is about understanding the wheel in the same way its inventor did.)

How? I ask then . . . is an architect supposed to be able to create? How is one supposed to be critical without a framework from which to start? (It does not mean anything to criticize a project for not being functional without an almost philosophical understanding of the role of function in architecture. If architecture must be functional to be so, then it is a contradiction to criticize architecture for not being functional. In that case it could only be criticized for not being architecture.)

It is with this basic problem that I wish to introduce this project. Part history, part philosophy, part manifesto, part naivety; it serves dually selfish purposes. First, it makes it mandatory to put down some ideas on paper thus exposing their flaws to criticism and subsequent amendment. And second, it serves as a marker; as a reference point to look back at and evaluate the development (if any) of a person’s search for meaning in architecture.

Impact of the Award

Putting together the proposal and portfolio forced me to put five years of somewhat episodic architectural education into context. It was probably the first time where I looked back at my own work and thought of its direction, where I wanted to go, and where it all fit in the world.

For the interview, I had been pursuing a criticism of essays by Colin Rowe and Greg Lynn on the relationship between history, geometry, and technology, so I figured I would talk about that. As we waited for our turn, I learned that Lynn would be one of the jurors (not good). So, I kind of winged the interview and all I really remember is talking about my memories of growing up in Lima with city dogs barking at odd hours of the night.

Traveling was powerful beyond visiting the research sites; it gave you space to think. The entire first month in Japan, I did not come across any English speakers. I essentially didn’t talk to anyone for four weeks. It is amazing the places your brain will go by itself if you give it time.

Looking back at the research proposal; it was very academic. But the true lessons of travel surprised me by their physicality. Walking to the sites . . . around them . . . is it uphill? Feeling the noise (barking dogs?), the traffic, the smells, the heat of the sun. How do people behave around the site? How do users and passersby differ?

The fellowship taught me about scale, context, composition, balance, and how buildings become part of the fabric of communities across geographies and centuries. This is something that informs what I do in teaching and practice every day.

France, Greece, and Italy

Japan