During the reading of Alison Smithson article I went deeper in understanding what does it mean “knowledge in nature”.
In fact Saint Jerome during his live was addicted (if it possible to say like this) to knowledge,
but because of time when he lived in some moments it was difficult. Then through time different painters started to depict him in theirs paintings.
They were always depict  him in a different spaces with different details and this spaces were individual understanding of them.

I understand that details in painting were symbolize how Saint Jerome was feeling a life.
I want to transform it to how should Architect feel live in my opinion.
Architect should be as a conductor from environment around to people.
Juan Nuvel always says that  sacred duty of architect is to send positive emotions  through architecture you build to people.
If we will go deeper, we can understand from where architect can find positive emotions.
They are around. In food, drinks, music, movies, paintings, etc. But emotions, are not only  positive feelings. It is also inspiration and knowledge.
When you can study from nature around, you can find absolutely new horizons in what you design.
Thats what green architecture means. You explore enviroment around and then you use that knowledge to optimize, to integrate your ideas in live.
And to send your feelings.

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There is an undeniable link between mankind and nature, but if we were to graph that using time and connection as parameters, it will show as a descending line.

Contemporary life is defined by cities, concrete forests where even the green areas have been designed and feel artificial. This drives individuals away from their own essence to an artificial realm. In ‘The Conditioned Outdoor Room’, Bernard Rudofsky argues that the link between environment and mankind can be mended. He supports his theory by reminding us of our anscestors and the way they used to integrate a garden in the house, not as a separate space, but as a ‘room with sky as a ceiling’. He states that while the relation between us and nature deteriorates we lose parts of what make us human without realizing it.

Throughout history man has always strugled with the forces of nature. Climate has been more of an enemy than a friend. We could not control it, but we could hide and protect ourselves from it. First hiding in caves and later building their own habitats.

A home is called a shelter – a protective space where we feel safe, where we control the climate and where we seal out nature. But even with this attitude towards the environment, nature was not completly forgotten.

Today we speak of the indoor life we have settled into, subways as the ‘revival of the cave’.  Using technology to control the indoor environment we are just reinforcing what our anscestors were doing. Hiding. Sealing. This ultimate control of temperature, humidity and light solely through technology weakens the proverbial ‘if you can’t beat it, join it’.

Rudofsky proposes that we do join nature, within reason. He raises the issue that using a garden properly can improve the quality of life, that they can end up being ‘ oasis of delight’. Rather than sheltering ourselves in, can we not find comfort outside.

This introversion has pushed us to make the outdoor a fabric of wasted space.

Giving examples from Asia to Europe, he examines the pattern in wich he examines how the garden is used in relation to the users thoughout time.

He critices contemporary american lawns, which represent more a space that need exesive care than one that provides joy. Nature should not be viewed as a sacrifice of time, space and energy.

Rudolfskys proposal is one of interconnection between built environment and natural environment. He proposes integration of garden within a home. Walls would offer detachement from outside leaving one to feel more protected and making the garden more habitable. The walls act as a confroting factor and a privacy screen.  The reference to Ancient Rome, the way they used nature to generate a particular mood favorable to spiritual composure, strenghtens this idea and can be adapted to modern life.

Loosing ‘the essence of being human’ can be prevented through good design and nature-integrated solutions. The use of todays technology not to seal ourselves in, but to open ourselves up, will scrub away the artificial layers of contemporary lives.

[cc photo by gloomycorp]

1) DESERT, representing idyllic nature and the wild

For Smithson, the habitat of the “Desert” indicates the human need for interaction with the purity of nature and serenity of the untouched wild.

2) STUDY, representing the intellect

For Smithson, the “Study” is an indicator of the human need for societal organization and rigorous intellectual pursuits.

[The "Desert" and the "Study," as representations, exist in vacuums. Their two spheres of idyllic reality, which Smithson refers to as "enclaves," are irreconcilable and require occupants to move back and forth between the two. Only one can be experienced in any given moment. The third category of Jerome's depictions encompasses a paradigm shift from the first two.]

3) GROTTO, representing an integration of nature and intellect

For Smithson, the “Grotto” indicates that the basic human habitation needs displayed in the “Desert” and the “Study” can be fulfilled within one habitat.

[Smithson calls this phenomenon "creating fragments of enclaves."]

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Smithson’s conceptualization of the human habitat rests firmly on the premise that “nature” is synonymous with “untouched.” While this might have been a common cultural definition during the centuries in which these depictions of Jerome originate, and might persist to be a common definition, the current condition of “nature” calls into question its applicability.

First, if “nature” is untouched, then there is no part of the current ecosystems of this biosphere that could accurately be called “nature.” Everything has been touched. Many parts of the biosphere have been directly disrupted by human intervention, and the rest have been indirectly (and often inadvertently) altered through chemical dispersal, ecosystem imbalance, and greenhouse gas effects. If we want to continue discussing “nature” as a crucial component of the human habitat, we need to draw new distinctions around it.

Some, such as David Gissen in Subnature, would argue that drawing any idyllic notions around conceptions of nature leads to the marginalization of some of its components. If only the beautiful or sublime portions of nature are considered, we might be ignoring the biosphere’s most significant parts (in relation to our health and everyday ecosystem interactions).

Second, the conceptualization of “nature” as touched or untouched presumes that humans, and their effects on various ecosystems, are not part of nature. Separating ourselves from nature, and calling ourselves something different, is not only biologically inaccurate, but potentially facilitates cultural decisions to harm the biosphere. If I think that I am outside of nature, then I might also think that harming nature will do no harm to me.

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Rather than conceptualizing the human habitat as part nature, part society, to be reconciled by fragmenting the two parts into pieces small enough to occupy a single spatial enclave, one might make softer distinctions between types of environment. Some portions of ecosystems are more altered by human action than others. They range from the undomesticated, to the agricultural, to the manicured. Portions of ecosystems could be organized on a continuum from most altered by human action (extremely urban) to least altered (those places only indirectly affected). The key to such a conceptualization is that even the most urban environment, completely constructed by human action, would be part of the continuum of “nature.”

[Subnature: Architecture’s Other Environments. David Gissen (2009). New York: Princeton Architectural Press. 224 pages. ISBN: 978-1-56898-777-4]

Critical essay by Rodion Eremeev

The world always generate new directions in Art and Architecture. It always implies new techniks and fabrication ways.
During the 20th Century it were a lot of different variety of styles - functionalism, constructivism, brutalism, metabolism, etc.
Nowadays is a time of a digital ways of design in Architecture.

Neil Leach book  ”Digital Tectonics” distinctly explains what does it mean Digital. How does it affect on architecture, design, art, live…
And also explains how it were developing through the years.

In chapter “Historical Perspective – Future Prospect” Mike Cook represent to our attention three key factors that were influencing on the form -
material,ability,need. By this factors Mike try to explain that is fundamental determinants of what we build. On the different examples like projects and experiments of Gaudi or Frei Otto,
he is showing how they used to work with modeling, simulation and fabrication without any computer tools. He is thinking that now is great ability than ever before to create a free form.
That old physical methods of modeling and describing form are still relevant, but now is digital age. Digital tools and methods will help to humanity to create buildings that would conserve materials and energy.

As I understand, Digital Tectonics means that you can go ahead from sketches on the paper to really difficult simulations.
That means that now, computer is really relevant tool for architects to design intelligent structures. Human mind can imagine and produce a lot,
but it has a limit and from that point to develop more complex things we should use computer to help us with it.
From idea to paper, then to 3D model and simulation, then to digital fabrication – that all involves Digital Tectonics.

Low tech fabrication, Silk Wall, Neil Leach, Philip E. Yuan

Neil Leach; Fabricating the Future

Leach’s text on Fabricating the Future precisely explains the trend and style of parametricism and digital fabrication. From defining the factors that affect the style, the use of new technologies, the shift in materials, and ultimately, the way of designing. The main topics in the text are digital tools, digital fabrication, materials, drawing logic, aesthetics, design approach, and design methodology. Each of these themes are explained and compared with previous techniques and traditional fabrication.

On digital tools and fabrication, he places digital fabrication as a new style of architecture, a style that regards a different approach to architecture rather than an aesthetic value. He explains that digital tools, such as new software, are enablers between design and construction. “They provide an avenue to explore architecture.. as a series of inter-related and logically conceived parts assembled into a coherent whole.” This change in approach goes hand in hand with a change of process that digital fabrication brings forth. These new technologies change the previous modeling object design to a modeling process design. This opens a new way of communication between the designer and the builder (fabricator), a communication that allows reciprocal information exchange between computational systems and physical objects which in turn enriches the design and smoothens the fabrication process.

On materials and machines, he makes an emphasis on composite materials and computational design. Composite materials are a hybrid which brings forth the best of tectonic materials into a new material which performs better. This shifts the traditional and predominant tendency to layer envelopes and materials to achieve the desired effect to a single, new material, which does the job more efficiently. This efficiency in material is what should drive sustainability as it does in other design areas as industrial and machines. The idea is to achieve energy efficiency by lowering the ratio mass/performance which allows lower embedded energy and  consumed energy in the life-cycle of the material. This is supported by machining processes, in terms of design and fabrication. Leach supports the promotion of truly computational design where the machine learns and helps designs rather than just aiding the drawing representation. “These changes provide novel possibilities for a material-oriented computational design approach in architecture.

In practical terms, it is very interesting what is being done in China in terms of Low-Tech digital fabrication. Since most of the world still doesn’t have the technological nor financial means to use technologies and materials coming from the western world. This low-tech solutions are based on utilizing new fabrication technologies and traditional materials and “effectively reprograming them  (both digital tools and traditional materials) to deal with our situation as a redefinition and deep consideration of architectural design and fabrication logic.

Finally upon the aesthetics of this new style, he considers that “placing digital fabrication as a tool or approach to architecture rather than a style or from decision maker. Negotiating and restraining the visual opulence of these compositions is an operation that entails elegance.” It is important to understand this, since algorithmic modeling and parametric design itself doesn’t bring aesthetic beauty by itself, but it requires the designers ability to bring forth the beauty out of the logic behind it. This process requires “a highly sophisticated formal language – including the driving force of aesthetic pleasure – propels elegance”.

In summary, fabricating the future is both an explanatory text of how digital tools and fabrication is being used as much as how it should be used and where it is leading to in the future. A complete text that thoroughly explains new technologies, new fabrication processes, and new design approaches and how these create a new style of architecture, parametricism.

For this new style to become a new driving force in word architecture is absolutely important to place it in a worldwide reality.  Hence, it is of uttermost importance to explore and research on how to apply this new technologies to low-tech and low-budget architecture. I personally believe that any achievements on this field will have the power to change the world and solve many of the problems being faced in third world countries and catastrophe affected regions.

In his writing on Architecture and Atmosphere Mark Wigley is arguing several fundamental to the architectural practice concepts: the importance of atmosphere and what really creates it in a project, architectural representation of atmosphere and how it differs with the diverse design scales: from a city to a building.

The long tradition of architectural theory suggests that architecture is a complex medium, the mere purpose of which is to create a theatrical effect – an atmosphere. It is an intangible collection of particles that surrounds a certain configuration of walls and floors, and is volatile with the addition of a human touch to the building. Wigley’s writing raises several questions: who or what is the creator of an atmosphere: an architect or the inhabitant? Can a complete and fulfilling atmosphere be sole designed by an architect? What is the value of architecture as a design field if an inhabitant contributes as much input to the creation of a given “atmosphere” as does the long months of work of an architect?

Since early works of Frank Lloyd Write “architectural representation” became an expression that goes hand-in-hand with the word “atmosphere”. Several decades ago architects have already understood the importance of showcasing the best parts of the project design and even further enhancing its effects on the surrounding and vice versa, inherently influencing the project’s commission and revenue values. While some rejected the idea of manipulating the representational medium, the majority of designers continued creating idealized images of the pseudo-real projects.   Hence, further embedding the value of architectural representation visual “atmospherics” into the monetary equation of architecture as a business. Thus, an atmosphere of a building is no longer a predefined and carefully articulated “soul” of the design, but rather a mere commercialized product produced by “image-making artists”.

Reading Toyo Ito’s writing, Tarzan in the media forest, you feel dispatched into his architectural journey, a fortieth years journey where the architect deal with his works and the architectural movements he is related whit , in order to determinate an “architectural code” result of  four top events, four buildings which determinate his “code”.

To read this “journey” is really important to put it into a specific context , Tokyo.

The Modern movement is generously criticized, its principles are even replaced by themes that he considers as tree properties:

1- Environment relationships

2- Increasing design process

3- Complex order

4- Redefinition of inside/outside boundaries

5- Architecture opened to the environment

The modernist architecture extremely changed Tokyo’s spaces, up to create abnormal relationships between high-rise and low-rise buildings, in order to appear as a building fight ring. Personally the movement itself has not to criticized but the architects misunderstand the power of its principles. The modernism created one of the strongest revolutionary process into the architecture world, overused by its second generation followers, the same happened for the Cuba revolution, it should have been the starting point to create a new era, not the era itself !

Modernism message wasn’t only to conceive architectural principles but to introduce the revolutionary spirit into the architects mind, the audacity of breaking rules.

How can we convey our atmospheric sensual feeling of  the matter to others through the quiet physical materials?  What is the meaning of the environment for every person? Can we give a definite  line between the spaces? Is the atmosphere is the space between the walls or can it include kinds of constructions and natural elements?

Alison Smithson in her article speaks about the way of representation of the allegory of the Saint Jerome’s two habitats through the paintings. Several of them show the pure idea of the perfect place for studying  as a Desert – burned-in-clarity, open-minded, giving the pristine knowledge. And on the other hand we see kind of a protected domestic ordered space full of books, tools, with lots of comfort abilities and civilised services. But the purpose of these two polar spaces is the same and they achieve this goal through people’s understanding of atmosphere.

This understanding can be motivated by various combinations of elements. Mark Wigley says that even the air and the mood can change the perception of the space. Everything is related and we should search for these relations.

And going back to the borders the point is what defines them, even the definition of the space can be changing.

The reading to analyze is about Saint Jerome, a saint who lived 1100 years before it became an artistic reference for painters between 1400 and 1700.

The artistic movement vary according years of painting and the author. The important thing to note is the cunning of the author of the article in question, as it takes this artistic reference of earlier times to refer to human needs.

The author’s analysis is divided into three main points:

Saint Jerome in the desert.

In the representation of St. Jerome in the desert, the author clearly states the individual’s interaction with nature in the simplest way, without protection of any kind of rock or sand, and in direct contact with nature and the introspection of the individual.

Saint Jerome and the Study

In the analysis of this stage of the monk’s life, it becomes evident the emergence of civilization, the building and the greatness of man through the study, organization and order, developing into community and to the common greatness of individuals.

Saint Jerome and the Grotto.

At this stage of artistic representation, is expressed at a Saint Jerome hybrid, in contact with nature and the study but protected by a cave.

Personal conclusion

It is evident that of the three passages in which is exposed the life of St. Jerome (for me a representation of the human being), the first two are completely polarized.
The first, the life in the desert, it refers to an austere lifestyle and in direct contact with nature, in total isolation from any interaction with other humans, highlighting the spiritual and divine through study and meditation.

The second, the study, it refers to life in the city, the civilization protection in contact with other human beings, more human way , civilized , physical and material where what matters is knowledge and the greatness of human.

Moreover, the third, St. Jerome and the Grotto , is a fusion of both human needs , not only divine but also material, not only natural but also with artificial protection , not only spiritual but also intellectual, making this mixture between “The desert and the study” , reveals the perfect way to complement the man , “enclaves” of nature – civilization or civilization – nature.

This apparent need to blend between two poles “Nature and Civilization”, is precisely successfully expressed in the draft House N by Sou Fujimoto, in which is easily to deciphered the architect’s intention, the need to interact between the house and the street, the city and the nature, getting to generating an advanced architectural project with a simple set of forms, gardens, spaces and the interaction between all previous with the city and the environment.

The indoor outdoor relationship has always been an endless topic in intellectual discussions , whether spiritual, philosophical , biological or physical.

Men is always involved in endless points of view and ideas, which are discussed under the term “the conditioned outdoor room” in how the necesity of create spaces with high standards , climatic controls , and re-create false enviroments simply to have “comfort” , which are caused by social criteria that lead us to implement these systems in our lives , and controls our metabolism, feelings and pleasures. Men did not dare to face in a more compatible perspective his physical needs with natural and virtual environments.

For so many years we have seen societies living in hostile places because of the immigration, places that no one had lived before and how, their ability to adapt is focused on meeting the needs of their know environments such as what happened to the colonists in north america, their ability to adapt led them to the creation of mechanical houses, totally detached from architecture environments and microclimate controlled by the machine and technology, and completely focused on your needs with out thinking their basic functions and programs.

As a contrasting example we saw ancient cultures as Pompeii and their ability to crete relationships with the natural surroundings , creating transitional spaces with gardens, overgrown with vegetation and sculptures that attempt to explain the large sensory ability possessed by this culture and how that inner space became and exterior. How to dematerialize the “inside” and rebuilt in nature and metaphorical elements within the natural landscape.

The changes in our natural environments always have to be simplified , so that our procedures and methodologies lead us to create sophisticated and complex scenarios that demand any unnecessary infrastructure, I tend to have more formal discussions and topological, new ways that invite us to think the commonly constructed surfaces, endless surfaces that help us to appropriate internal and external spaces as one. “An open no non-orientable surface in which Euler characteristic is 0 ¨, A Klein bottle in which we find no sharp edges and everything can be green yet functional, customizable and supports new technologies from 3.0

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