01 philosophy

02 theory

The most elementary form of architecture is a dwelling, without dwelling we are not even capable of building. But what exactly does it mean to dwell, how does this elementary static feature relate to humans? What is the nature of dwelling? Heidegger [5A] wrote in 1930 “Poetically man dwells”, in this piece he is searching for the answers to these particular questions.

The dwelling perceived_ Our dwelling today is harassed by work, made insecure by the hunt of gain and success, bewitched by the entertainment and recreation industry. [5A] Safety is one of the most basic features a dwelling should provide for, safety from the environment; weather, people, animals, things, sounds, light, etc. Why is this dwelling harassed by work and bewitched by entertainment and recreation industry? Are we opening our dwelling or is our dwelling [violently] penetrated by these influences? The amount of work and the gain of success are both decisions of man, society only demands a certain level of participation. Money dominates our society and demands everyone to produce it, otherwise one is subjected and enslaved to money. Also the entertainment industry [the image] dominates and overwhelms man unnoticeably. But money and entertainment are both just systems created by mankind, constructed by rules and therefore boundaries, which can be bent or broken. So the fact that our dwelling is harassed by work has nothing to do with the capability of defending us, keeping us safe from these elements. We choose not to be protected, we choose to be exposed. People can seek refuge, but it seems that they do not want this, people need the constant flow of information or they do not understand the system in which they are living. By allowing the dwelling to be more transparent, the anonymous dynamic public enters our dwelling; our static private area. The once so clear boundary between private and public is blurring, or better: we are intentionally blurring it. Private becomes partly public and the public becomes partly private.

Man, to be sure, merits and earns much in his dwelling. For he cultivates the growing things of the earth and takes care of his increase. Cultivating and caring [colere, cultiva] are a kind of building. But man not only cultivates what produces growth out of itself; he also builds in the sense of aedificare, by erecting things that cannot come into being and subsist growing. Things that are built in this sense include not only buildings but all the works made by man's hand and through his arrangements. Merits due to this building, however, can never fill out the nature of dwelling. [5A]

The dwelling is the base upon which society is built. A building that cannot come into being is inappropriate for dwelling, but how can a dwelling come into being? A dwelling in itself is a static building, it's a creation of man, and since man is only capable of creating dead "products" the dwelling in itself is dead; not able to grow. Although the dwelling itself is dead it is related to growing by the inhabitants who cultivate the earth. For Heidegger [5A] dwelling has to relate to living [growing], to dwell is to live. This dynamic feature is situated within a static environment [dwelling]; the dynamic enforces the static and visa versa. Does this also mean if the dwelling would be more dynamic life would have to be less? Or should the penetrating public be seen as a part of life and therefore only enforcing the static dwelling even more? Still there is a limit to the logic of two opposites enforcing each other, which depends on scale. An overwhelming dynamic will destroy any static feature.

Man's taking measure in the dimension dealt out to him brings dwelling into its ground plan. Taking the measure of the dimension is the element within which human dwelling has its security, by which it securely endures. The taking of measure is what is poetic in dwelling. Poetry is a measuring. But what is it to measure? If poetry is to be understood as measuring, then obviously we may not subsume it under just any idea of measuring and measure. [5A]

To measure means to reference different objects to one and the same system, without a reference [one system] measure-taking becomes impossible. By measuring out the position of mankind, man is referring himself to the supernatural. The measure-taking secures the dwelling. What does this tell about the nature of dwelling? The dwelling is different from the other built environment since it is the basic place of reference. This does not mean that the dwelling is the reference. The measure-taking defines the dwelling, poetry seeks a reference to measure out the position of mankind. In what way does this relate to a dynamic moveable architecture? A reference implies a static feature, but does this also count for the place of reference; the dwelling? Could the dwelling be an always-changing environment? Referencing to the supernatural is impossible if mankind is unable to reference to the natural. So how could someone be able to dwell if there isn't any reference for his position, besides the global coordinates? Since the built environment won’t give any reference because it’s constantly changing. This however is not entirely true, the earth, sky, sun, nature and climate will still give people an indication of position. But an even stronger argument is the city itself; it already is the always-changing built environment. Politic and economic forces cause the build environment to change, only not that fast. The city is defined by the public [or individual] perception, and not by its physical appearance. In 1957 Debord [9] displayed this in “The naked city” [see Pict. 3]. This project displays a psychogeographical study of Paris shown in "The First Psychogeographic Exhibition". These maps were produced through the process of 'détournement' ['the integration of past or present artistic production into a superior environmental construction'] in which fragments of existing works are taken and rearranged or juxtaposed to produce new meanings. The maps show an experience of space, as fragmented and discontinuous areas, which are experienced as distinct, are pulled apart on the map. However, the arrows serve to relate the different areas and are based on the forces of attraction and repulsion or exclusion experienced in the course of the 'derive'.
Our perception of the city is fragmentized and changing regardless of any moving architecture. The city changes physically through time and even if the city does not physically change at all the individual perception of the city is changing all the time. Physically and socially the city changes over time due to political power structures. A flexible and relocatable architecture can and surely will change this; the power will shift to a smaller scale, back to the individual to a non-hierarchic system. The physical built environment will be subjective to improvisation but driven by money since economic viability applies to everything.

Structures are no longer seen as the presentation of homogeneous, linear systems, but as the process fields of materialization. Structures are scaleless, subject to evolution, expansion, inversion and other contortions and manipulations. [1]

In this way, the understanding and treatment of projects like single-family house, the museum, music centre or library shifts from an iconic typology with its determents in local conventions to a new, multi-facetted approach. [1]

Could these tendencies [mentioned in the previous quotes of Berkel [1]] be seen as a positive and logical result of contemporary society in line with global internet, money domination, commercialization, free [stock]market, etc? And could a flexible and relocatable architecture be seen parallel to this development? Berkel [1] however talks about evolution and a relocatable architecture is more likely to release a revolution of manipulation. So speed, the amount of elapsing time between the changes, is the differing element. The physically built environment will probably change increasingly when relocatable architecture is involved; instead of an evolutional changing environment more buildings will change their location even within a small amount of time. What will the effect be of this rapidly changing city? Will this drive the blasé individual [5C] to an ultimate climax, or to extinct?

The poetic_Man’s dwelling depends on an upwardlooking and measure-taking of the dimension, in which the sky belongs just as much as the earth. [...] Because man is, in his enduring the dimension, his being must now and again be measured out. That requires a measure, which involves at once the whole dimension in one. [5A] As mentioned before the measure-taking of man is a search for a supernatural reference, which depends on a natural reference. In other words, man is only able to reference to the divine [the upwardlooking] if he is able to refer to the natural [the earth]. Heidegger calls this appropriate poetry.

When the poetic appropriately comes to light, then man dwells humanly on this earth, and then - as Hölderlin says in his last poem - "the life of man" is a "dwelling life" [5A]

The dwelling is the place of measure-taking, but it is also the relation to the natural, the earth. To dwell, to live is to be in the supernatural as well as in the natural, the dwelling is the logical consequence of this kind of living.

The dwelling let the earth be as earth. [...] Poetry is the original admission of dwelling. [5A]

Man does not dwell in that he merely establishes his stay on the earth beneath the sky, by raising growing things and simultaneously raising buildings. Capable of such building only if he already builds in the sense of the poetic taking of measure. Authentic building occurs as far as there are poets, such poets as take the measure for architecture, the structure of dwelling. [...] Thus it might be that our unpoetic dwelling, its incapacity to take the measure, derives from a curious excess of frantic measuring and calculating. [5A]

Why is the authentic dwelling, which derives from appropriate poetry, unable to cope with frantic measuring and calculating? Why does Heidegger assume a conflict, a disjunction? This is rather remarkable since the dwelling is the intermediate between the supernatural [measuring] and the natural [measuring], from my point of view. Does the frantic measuring pull the dwelling to the earth and thus out of its balance? The frantic measuring is not just the natural counterpart of the poetic measure-taking. It’s the consequence of the valuing force of money. In society money has a very controlling attitude, it gives a value to everything, from a bunny, to three hours of intense labour, to psychotherapy, to candy bars, to brain surgery. Everything has become comparable, nothing has a value of its own but it’s always in reference to dollars. Funny as it seems the frantic measuring and calculating is [indirectly] connected to movable architecture. The calculated mind is not simply a result of the money-economy, this is what made the frantic measuring and calculating possible. In fact the human mind reacts to overwhelming imagery. This imagery is born in the rapidly changing dynamic city, it expresses all the stimuli [Simmel [5C]] that are present. Besides this the image again is itself also a stimuli for the human mind. The real image triggers the mind, tries to cling to the mind as long as possible, but enters it in a blink of an eye. The image is very well displayed in Sans Soleil [10], in which society is projected as a continuous flow of images [see Pict. 7]. Simmel [5C] does not specifically refer to the image when he talks about stimuli, but there is no doubt that the image is the most strongly present stimuli in this visual-orientated society [Pict. 6]. Movable architecture however is not about the image, it does not want to stay in the mind, it disturbs the mind. In fact it is a counter reaction to the image and therefore to the frantic measuring, but is the dwelling the proper place? Or isn’t it a counter reaction at all? Disturbing could also be seen as indirectly enforcing the image.

The actual design process of architecture will be like making a film: invisible research and business culminating into a short time of intense action... [...] Developing specific visualizing techniques, re-thinking virtual and material organizational structures, engaging public space, public forces and the public imagination, puts the architect once more at the centre of his own world. [1]

Architecture surely has been strongly influenced by the image e.g. postmodernism; this is all about the image. Berkel [1] takes it even further, the image is [the centre of the world of] the architect; architecture presents itself as the image. This relation between the image and architecture is not static, it is evolving, the architect is re-thinking virtual and material structures. Architecture has received the image and now tries to disturb it, to pull out reaction by action. Or that is at least the tendency it seems to evolve to a reactive and interactive space [chapter 3.5]. This interactive architecture has its specific boundaries; it is restricted to the public. Berkel [1] deliberately does not include the most basic form of architecture, the dwelling. But why is the dwelling left out? Maybe the position of the dwelling, the intermediate between the natural and the super natural, is the cause. The dwelling should be the place to measure out the position of mankind, to live and not necessarily to critique society or to engage the public space.

And a preconceived idea of urbanism preceding the specifics of location program or users has become redundant. Instead, the project emerges interactively. Structures emerging in this way operate through living forces at physical and public levels; they are performance envelopes. They are in motion as long as those forces are in motion and contain no hidden meaning independent of those forces. [1]

Again Berkel [1] talks about the public environment, which is the performance envelope. The public is the dynamic space, which is not more than logical regarding the situation of today in which the urban environment is already changing all the time, only on an evolutionary basis. By this the movable dwelling does not lose future possibilities, since the boundary between the public and private is blurring anyway [like discussed previously]. Through the public [the urban] the dynamica could still penetrate the dwelling. How far this will go is hard to say, maybe dynamica will never really enter the dwelling. But out of all the presumptions the architect has to choose a certain direction, only which?

Blob or box – it doesn’t matter anymore. [...] Time and construction are compressed into one organizational structure [1]

Architect = inventageous, fashion designer of the future, holding up a mirror to the world, oscillating between the experimental practice and the physical world. [1]

The position Berkel [1] gives to the architect is however not very inventageous, it is more the ancient idealistic point of view, on which i would surely not disagree with him. But in a way this description seems insufficient, shallow or naive. The image is the style of presenting that claims to be regardless of style. If the image, which can never escape being a style, is disturbed it would be the ultimate non-style. Although no form of appearance but no-appearance is able to escape appearance and therefore style. Berkel [1] knows this, but still he tells us to be indifferent to style; blob or box it does not matter anymore. In fact he doesn’t give an answer, he only tells to continue to be good, idealistic and maybe oblivious. Although it seems to be not that intelligent, architecture is not omnipresent and is not empowered to change society fundamentally so maybe the only thing that could be done is the good, the idealistic.
But how can an intellect operate in an undetermined void? Maybe the style is indeed not important anymore; maybe the program, time and construction are becoming the spill of architecture. But does this legitimate movable, relocatable architecture, which has the potential of the embodying of the ultimate and paradoxa non-style?