Sacrifice

 Architecture is the sacrifice of Time

Words and Architecture

After an architect is done talking, the building stands in mute silence in its materiality in a metric space. All we have are materials with their geometry and dimensions. Words do not attach themselves to buildings unless you affix them as signs on a building. We project words onto buildings with our imagination and vagaries in a futile attempt to make something stick. Words cannot stick to buildings with any integrity. Each one affixes their own words to the buildings they encounter in their own way. So the semantic world of buildings is always changing and has to be negotiated each time. Let us dwell in buildings in their silence with no words to bother us in perceiving them in a pure state.

Metaphysics in Architecture

The fundamental problem of any discussion of Metaphysics is the definition of the subject matter. The generally understood definition of Metaphysics is that it is a branch of Philosophy that is concerned with the fundamental nature of the universe in which we find ourselves. It acquired its name from the collection of works of Aristotle that came after one of his major works called Physics. So, in one sense, Metaphysics is something that comes after Physics. This can be construed that after all the considerations of Physics are exhausted, the realm into which your discourse moves, is Metaphysics. In another sense, the word “meta” means something beyond, or something deeper, than the suffix it is attached to, such as in the term, meta-cognition. When we talk about Metaphysics in Architecture, we should articulate whether we are talking about something beyond the physical existence of the works of Architecture, or the fundamental nature that lies behind the works of Architecture.

Architecture has always been a quest for the conquest of matter by the creations of the mind for the creation of spaces and places to inhabit. The question naturally arises whether the fundamental nature of Architecture is mind, or is it just a collection of matter? Philosophers such as Henri Bergson have postulated that there is a life force, the élan vital, that courses through matter trying to obtain from it what it can. This fuses the matter with vitalism. This complicates the discussion of whether the fundamental entity is matter, or the élan vital. In biological entities that are living, it is conceivable that both these entities are needed for the organism to exist. In the case of an inert construction like a building, the building can exist as a configuration of matter alone. However, this inert construction embodies an idea, or a set of ideas, that can be argued is its fundamental nature. Architecture has been called the constructed counterform of homecoming by the architect Aldo van Eyck. In this definition, the counterform is the fundamental nature of the work of Architecture.

Why are architects constantly seeking something beyond their physical creations to establish meanings for what they have created? The seeking of the “meta” implies that the physical creation of the work of Architecture, which is a composition of building materials configured into a structure, is incomplete and needs something outside itself to justify its existence. The foundation for seeking the “meta” lies in the notion that matter must be infused with spirit in order to give it human significance. Until matter has been transformed in this way, by the infusion of spirit, it does not belong to the human realm but the realm of Nature. This notion implies that the human realm is somehow alien to the realm of Nature, even though humans are part of that realm. In order to appropriate matter into the human realm, the creations of the mind must be infused into the matter using energy. When matter is made to conform to an idea and energy is expended in the transformation by a human being, the human being appropriates the matter into the human realm.

Another aspect of the study of Metaphysics is Ontology. Ontology is concerned with being. Anything that exists, whether it is material or immaterial, is being. Architecture is a complex being that combines in its realization both the material and the immaterial. It exists as an embodiment of the immaterial in the material. Consider this scenario. An architect conceives of the form of a rectangular beam and then proceeds to “realize” that form in a natural building material such as wood. The wood initially exists as a tree. Tools are invented to cut the tree and make the tree conform to the form of the rectangular beam. This has a serendipitous byproduct in that the tools can now be used to shape other forms that the architect did not conceive of initially. In one process, the architect proceeds from an abstract “essence” to a particular entity and gives it existence. In the serendipitous byproduct, the architect proceeds by using a tool to create an “essence” from existing matter. This ontological journey, in both directions, from essence to existence, and from existence to essence, reveals the unique Metaphysics that Architecture embodies.

When you pose the question, what is the fundamental nature of a work of Architecture, the answer can be that it is an idea, or it is a configuration of matter. It is mind-stuff or just matter. If you begin by considering that Architecture is a configuration of matter that points to something beyond itself, which can be the creation of the mind, you imply that it has a meta-existence. What you are trying to establish when you discuss the Metaphysics of Architecture is twofold. The first is that you are trying to establish the fundamental nature of Architecture, whether it is a creation of the mind or it is the transformation of matter. The fact that you can transform matter in silence, using your senses and your hands, or tools you have fashioned with your hands, shows that the mind can be precluded from this fundamental nature. The second is that Architecture always refers to something beyond its physical existence, it always has a meta-existence that often gives meaning to the work of Architecture. In the twofold discussion, you bring to focus the fact that a work of Architecture is an embodiment of both mind and matter. Architecture gives an ontological presence to both of them. Whether the creations of the mind transform the matter, or whether the matter instantiates the creations of the mind, both exist in the being of Architecture.

In the Heideggarian triad of building, dwelling, and thinking, one can construe the ontological journey to existence as an evolutionary process starting with architectural thinking, which is realized in building, thereby enabling the process of dwelling. Alternatively, one can construe the ontological journey as a teleological process beginning with dwelling as the motive force, which leads to architectural thinking and eventually the building that enables one to dwell. The establishment of the being of the work of Architecture depends on this triad of activities. The fundamental nature of the work of Architecture can then be considered as the motive force of dwelling, which starts architectural thinking into motion with the goal of realizing the architectural thoughts in the material form of buildings in order to dwell. The fundamental debate of whether dwelling is the result of an architectural creation or whether it is the motive force that drives the architectural creation remains.

It is tragic that a work of Architecture must seek the “meta” aspect of its existence in order to achieve its meaning. If the work of Architecture could articulate its fundamental nature in just its material existence, which could have been created in total silence, then the motive force of dwelling could be fulfilled in a material ecology. Can the teleological process driven by a motive force of dwelling negotiate the world of matter directly and realize its goal to dwell? No amount of talking about a material creation can infuse it with anything beyond itself! Architecture should not be a prop or a proxy for verbal thinking. An Architecture of Silence is truly possible that reveals its fundamental nature directly, and thereby its metaphysics. Let us seek this Architecture of Silence!

Ode to La Ribaute (a tribute to Anselm Kiefer)

Will grass grow over my cities?

Will knowledge sprout from lead?

Can anything grow on my books?

When columns tuber the earth,

Will it be as above so below?

Can I turn to ash what books have done to me?

Can I shatter reflections to present a self-forming?

Can I wreck mirrors into a million pieces for a myriad 'me's?

What if stars fell as crystal rain?

Does the molten streak of an underground stream keep the light it catches?

Can concrete come alive in its sinews?

When does material become carnal?

Can I grow concrete in my garden?

When a slow ash falls on grit-gripping canvas,

and I struggle with the fish at hand,

Have I cast death upon you?

©Ganapathy Mahalingam, 2016-2022

Architectural Evolution as a Turing Machine Computation

    Consider this. Just as you have an infinite tape for 'memory' in a Turing machine for recording states, Architecture exists in infinite states. Just as you change the states on the tape of a Turing machine with program instructions, you change the states of Architecture with design interventions. A Turing machine halts when a solution is found that has been specified, or the program instructions call for the process to be halted. In architectural evolution the process is 'halted' perceptually at the end of each design intervention, or when a design solution has been found. The process of architectural evolution progresses as a Turing machine computation, with its constant transformation of architectural states. The crucial part of the evolution is the 'instruction set' that is embedded in the design interventions that specify how to change the architectural states and the intersubjective consensus for when the evolution has to be 'halted' perceptually to achieve the closure of a solution.

A Common World

    One of the most amazing things about OUR existence is the distributed sentience of billions of sentient beings that regulate OUR world...how do these different loci of distributed sentience keep together a coordinated COMMON world...loci of physical vantage points, loci of mental worlds, loci of agency, all need to hold everything together...even that we have a COMMON world is a miracle every moment!

A beautiful book that ponders the billions of sentient vantage points and their reconciliation into an 'objective' world is Thomas Nagel's The View From Nowhere. The diagram that Nagel comes up with is a series of concentric circles, that provide more and more inclusive 'viewpoints' as you move away from a center. The real challenge is to model both the interpenetration of the worlds of sentient beings as well as their inclusivity in each other's perceptions.

The Architectural Zoo

    The zoo was born out of the need for the 'safe spectacle' where wild things were caged apart. What does Architecture cage? Perceptual cages, experiential cages, conceptual cages, all keep the wild things in Architecture in check as 'safe spectacles.' Even our perspectives are views through one-eyed, utopian cages. A short musing will reveal that our spectacles truly rest on our noses. Should Architecture encage (sic) or engage? The architectural zoo of safe spectacles is but a way to tame the wild things in Architecture. Nature and biodiversity have always been realms of the wild. Order, and the seeking of Order, have been our quests in taming the wild. The other zoo, is when we, as seers, are the ones in cages. What is this architectural zoo, when we dwell in it as a caged self? 

A Ruin of Pregnant Bricks

     The painter Anselm Kiefer has painted bricks being sun-dried in the fields of India before they are fired in kilns. These bricks look like a pile of ruins from a long-forgotten structure. Only the bricks are not ruins. They are 'pregnant' bricks which have not yet been given a form to exist as. Nobody has yet asked these 'pregnant' bricks what they want to be. Even before they are 'born' these bricks take the form of the dying in a strange loop of existence. This beauty of a pregnant death foretells why death is inherent in all things born.

Observing the Obverse

     The crux of observing the obverse depends on making head or tail of it. If you have to take the opposite viewpoint in order to observe the obverse, then your current viewpoint is on the reverse side of the obverse. If the obverse is the principal side or the 'head' then is your normal viewpoint simply entailed? In our experience with coins, because the 'tails' side is the one with utility, indicating the monetary value of the coin, it has become the principal face instead of the 'heads' side. Are we reading the world in the same way as we read our coins? Are we always observing reversals of the obverse? Do we ever use the gaze of the other? Do we need to observe the obverse for the principal experience? On the other hand, if what we normally observe is the obverse, then we just have to be. A more intriguing option is to be the milled edge and engage both sides of the coin.

Touching with the Senses

     The central thesis of Juhani Pallasmaa in his book, The Eyes of the Skin, is that all our sensory experiences are modes of touching - how our interiority touches the exteriority that envelops us. In the Buddhist doctrine of dependent origination, this touching or Phassa, is the contact that brings together the object, the sense medium and the sense consciousness, which is a prelude to becoming-in-the-world as a result of the karmic force of volition (Bhava).

Cuts Like a Knife

     When one ponders a simple operation such as cutting, one has to think about what came first: the desire to perform the operation of cutting, which necessitated the invention of a cutting implement, or, the invention of a cutting implement that made the operation of cutting possible. What implements have we yet to invent if we started with desired operations and then sought the tools or implements to perform those operations? The Greeks pondered the atomic structure of matter because they could cut through an apple! Have we invented all the tools for our desires? What will these tools reveal about the universe? What irreversible operations might these tools unleash upon the processes of the universe? What have these tools enabled that were not the desired operations that were the cause of their invention? What have we implemented? Cuts like a knife...

The Dance of the Afferent and the Efferent in Creative Media

     At the gallery talk in connection with the display of the historical collection of drawings, an interesting idea was put forth about whether drawing was a process of 'output,' or a process of 'input' for a curious activity called 'thinkering.' In meditating upon this concept, it struck me that all media used for creative activities, be it clay thrown on a potter's wheel, or the use of paint on canvas, or a musical instrument, provide for this rapidly oscillating dance of the afferent and the efferent. Our neural system is described as a "closed loop" system of sensations, decisions, and reactions that engage the world around us. This process is carried out through the activity of afferent neurons, interneurons, and efferent neurons. This oscillating dance can happen at varying speeds, in varying cadences, and with syncopated patterns. A master of a creative activity is one who is of a clear enough mind, where there is an awareness of when the activity in the bodymind is afferent, that is, when it draws in the world, when the mind mediates the world in perception, and when the body is in its efferent phase, that is, acts on the world. This dance happens in cycles, like an endless waltz, transforming the world creatively. The power of a creative medium is in how it enables the afferent and the efferent, the kinds of cadences between them, the patterns that can be created, and the ability to achieve coherence in the process. Learning how to dance like this, evokes the cosmic dancer, whom the Hindus know as Nataraja, the lord of the dance.

The Lexicality of Stimuli

     When we are presented with stimuli in the form of things, we are prompted by the lexicality of the stimuli to consume those things perceptually as words. We see a 'cup' on a 'table' before we really see the things themselves. So much so, we consume the words, instead of the things. How much of architectural stimuli lend themselves to us as words, hiding their true experience from us? Do we often achieve closure with the words and miss out on the seeing?

The Eye of the Beholder

At any given moment, the universe is being perceived by billions of sentient beings (including humans). There is no coincidence of the 'locus' (that is, the spatial location) of these perceptions. For example, no two sets of eyes of human beings see the world at the same time from the same location (except maybe, curiously through the one 'eye' of a camera transmitting 'live', an artificial device).

 

There could be a synchronicity of all the perceptions (this would assume a disengaged clock (mechanical, electronic or even atomic)) giving rise to a notion of absolute Time that goes on independent of the perceptions. There could not be...coining a new use for a word here perhaps...a 'syntopy'...a coincidence of spatial locations of the perceptions.

 

This challenges the notion that we could consider discussing a 'one common world' when all our perceptions have different spatial loci (not to mention mental loci). What do we actually share? This spatial distribution of sentience probably began with the origin of the universe...say in a Big Bang...and has continued since. How can we ever see through another's eyes (though there may be clever electronic devices that get us close)?

 

This is why, designers and architects, who work on spatial problems, use abstract representations, so that they have a realm of syntopy in which they can address a 'common world'...and perhaps why the ancients stumbled upon Geometry, as an abstract realm...which in the words of the architect, Louis Kahn...provided the common ground of agreement between men (and of course, women).

Towards an Architecture of Silence

     The eye is a silent place. The mind's eye, however, is different. In the mind's eye, there is an acoustic chatter, the vehicle of desire, that adds a layer of complexity to the silent world of the eye. What if architecture is created in pure silence? What if we draw, make models, create computer graphics or animations, all in a purely silent world of manipulations? Is there another word we could use instead of manipulations, which suggests the use of our hands? How do we transform with a silent eye, without the complicating acoustic chatter of desire? Words have wrought the world, while the eye has remained silent. There is a saying that suggests that our reach often exceeds our grasp. Words have no limits in what they can set in motion. The eye never sets anything in motion, a limpid pool of reflection. Could we let the eye set things in motion? Let us create with the eye. Let us create in silence.