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.

The Morality of Specificity and the Tragedy of Architecture

     A student postulated that it was the student's purpose, through delineation, to evoke the imagination of spaces with ambiguity, and not make an attempt at portraying something that would indicate specificity. In light of this position, it struck me that this was contrary to the whole existential enterprise, which was predicated on 'standing out' (ex sistare in Latin: the figure) presumably against 'the other' (the ground). Individuation and specificity characterize the moral dimension of life. Making choices, and being responsible for choices, form the backbone of morality. The tragedy of architecture is that you have to build something specific. The environment that we live in, the environment that we learn from, and the environment that we perceive, are all the result of very specific decisions or processes. The people who made these decisions have the moral obligation for the consequences of the decisions. Wanting to abdicate specificity for ambiguity, is an abandonment of the moral life. It is easy to create architectural drawings that evoke the experience of ambiguous spaces. It is unforgiving to attempt to portray specificity in an architectural delineation or rendering. Often the exquisite pain in portraying an exacting specificity is passed up with an ambiguous compromise. It is moral to try to be specific. It is not easy to be moral.

Taking What We Can…

     In writing about the life force (élan vital), Bergson envisioned a vital force coursing through matter taking from it what it can. In Western civilization this has become the spirit surging to manifest itself in the material, consuming vast amounts of energy in the process. The entropy in transforming material, limits what can be done in the future, often in irreversible ways. The need for the spirit to ex sist in the material and not just be of itself is a philosophical need. Should this be re-evaluated? The earth has a lot of material resources, a limited pool of non-renewable energy resources, and the potential of unlimited renewable energy resources. By regulating what materials we choose to manifest our spirit in, we can change the future course of civilizations dramatically. We may also be able to balance our energy resources with the demands for what is needed to transform material. What are the material and energy demands for a sufficient manifestation of the human spirit? Can we manifest the full vibrancy of the human spirit with a limited palette of materials and energy resources? Soon this may not be a choice, but an imperative!

Permeable Densities

     In a recent class discussion, a student suggested that space is an absolute, and is a container for all things that exist. I then posed a question asking him why, just as there is room in a partially-filled box, there were no empty pockets of space with no matter in them, because zones of vacuum do not exist naturally. One could counter with an argument that when we move to microscopic subatomic levels of matter, there seem to be empty pockets of space between the molecules and atoms. Only now, the space is held within the matter, not matter held within the space, which acts as a container! What if there is no empty space, only contiguous matter in which space is entrapped! Space, then, would always be contained by 'vessels' of matter, varying in density, which are contiguous. What if, like a precious and vulnerable child, space is always contained and held within matter! Contiguous containers of matter, containing space! Now, what would this world of permeable densities mean to the modeling of energy transfer?

The Linear Arrow of Time folded into a Peano Curve

     The concept of cause and effect has created a linear model of Time...Time's arrow...this unraveling of Time, like a ball of string, requires infinite space. If the space is confined, as in our skull, like the brain, the linear arrow of Time folds to pack itself within the finite space. This is like a Peano curve...the curious situation that arises, is when there are short circuits...in space...that tangle the linear unfolding of Time's arrow...or is it Time's ball of string (like Ariadne's)...these are links in between the folding/unfolding Peano curve...which, in the theory of networks...creates small worlds...not the expansive, infinite world that is required for the unfolding of Time's arrow.

 

When the short circuiting happens in space, what happens to cause and effect and the linear model...and entropy?...this is why feedback systems...which may be different from short-circuited systems...and non-linear systems have fascinated scientists. Time may unfold...if it does so in finite space...say, within effective system boundaries...there are chances for it to become entangled and present itself to alternate readings...

On the Passage of Time

     In order for Time to pass something must resist the flowing of Time...something must stand still or flow relatively slower than Time...this is our sense of Self...that which endures...enduring means that a duration is involved...duration that may stand still or move slower than Time...a close reading of Bergson and the notion of Self, as in Advaita, will let us see...why, in order for Time to pass...something must stand still or move slower than Time...

 

I ask this question of all my students in the seminar class on the Architecture of India...what if you are standing in the entrance to the Taj Mahal at sunrise...when there is no reference for chronological time (sounds of cars, buses, aircraft overhead)...what time is it at the Taj?...is your experience rooted in the 16th century or the 21st century...a little bit more pondering... and we realize why we mark Time with materials and technology...or as Einstein would have it, events in a Space-Time continuum...does Time slice Space or does Space slice Time?...material culture is an external reference to the passage of Time...far different from the sense of Time as known by one who endures...

What does Time measure? Or, what do we measure, when we measure Time?

 When we measure using a ruler, we know what we are measuring is an inorganic or organic object, because that is what we put the ruler against to make our measurement. When we run a clock, what is it that we are putting it against, that we are measuring?

 

We can tell time has passed, only when there is a reference that stands still, or moves relatively slower than the time that has passed. We mark time by observing or recording the states of changing physical (inorganic) matter, changing organic matter, or changing mental worlds. If inorganic matter stood still, if organic matter stood still, and our minds stood still, there would be no flowing of Time, there would be nothing to mark (or measure) its passage.

 

Ever since the dissipation that began with the Big Bang (one of the theories of cosmology)...the cosmos has been transformed by the flow of energy that alters the states of the various things that exist. These states are perceived by sentient beings...who structure them in a sequence...before, now, after...a process that marks and gives rise to Time. So a measurement of Time is really a measurement (or is it a recording or marking) of the changing state of the universe, which in turn, is a measure of the energy transforming it.

 

The primary function of Architecture is to mark Time...to allow Time to exist (to stand out against its own passing) and to pass. Without a changing architectural substrate...how can we tell of one thing being of a particular time...and another thing being of another time. Even in our mental experiences we have a substrate that is the architecture of our minds...our samskāra...that which has created our minds...the mental passage of time...from memories to hopes...plays out against this samskāra.

 

We all know that clocks tell the time...but what is it that they measure?...Einstein gave us the relationship between matter and energy...what is the relationship between matter and time? An answer will close out a loop of enlightenment!