Mummification of Architecture
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| Picture of U.S. "architect" designing a building, circa 2011 |
Within Iñaki Abalos’ text “Interior. The Achilles heel of modernity” for the 2014 Spanish Pavilion, there is a sharp articulation of what has set the modern tradition in Spain apart from the rest of the world. Through post-war scarcity, the contemporary architecture of Spain displays an approach that is “more experimental with matter than with geometry, less iconic and more performative than the prevailing scene in the English speaking countries” (Abalos 3). What Abalos sees as the virtue of the rich, materialized Spanish interior is a counterpoint to the junkspace that has spread across the globe and observed by Rem Koolhaas. Architects working in the cultures of “solar geographies”, as Abalos categorizes the Mediterranean, have a way of resisting what I would call the mummification of architecture (Abalos 4).
We have witnessed for some time now in our everyday environment and in most of the works by the corporatized AEC industry the removal of the Interior, the soul of architecture and architecture’s raison d'être. What we have received instead is “an envelope of maximized intensity and an extremely banal interior layout that is left to commercial products and generic spatial configurations” (Abalos 1). In the pursuit for a low-cost, low-maintenance environment we have removed the “organs” of the body of architecture. Materiality, light, atmosphere are taken out to “preserve” financial investment. What is left within the cavity of the building is a dry, bland environment full of conditioned air. Products designed to, or at least advertised to, be adverse to “wear and tear” line the cavity. Drywall painted beige with the occasional accent color lathered on, acoustical ceiling tiles broken up by fluorescent lights, and randomized patterns of carpet or vinyl tiles. These are a few signs of a mummified building. To work with those products is to not create architecture, it is to work in the absence of architecture.
Absence is really what I would call (this type) of architecture. I really again, as we have said so many times throughout this course, started and derived from consumerism and capitalism. It's as if clients and people don't expect anything other than a beautiful building. Venustas. They just want it to look good, and for those who aren't actually using the building, which could be many, the beautiful part would be the envelope. How do we make something dull but palatable for the lay-person? Slap an envelope on it.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I have noticed lately is that financially sustainable architecture does not always have to be bland. I believe that as architects, it is our duty to look at recycling materials as ways to liven up spaces that we create. My favorite kind of architecture is when someone uses everyday materials in uniquely designed ways. Maybe the answer to combatting the mummification of architecture, is to look at old buildings that were made of locally sourced materials, and bringing them in at an affordable scale that a) spices up the atmosphere of the building, and 2) extends the aesthetical impact of the demolished buildings into the modern era.
ReplyDeleteI think that part of the reason that the "organs" are removed in exchange for a more complex skin is related to the way that we consume architecture now. A flashy, iconic skin provides the architect with the money shot but atmosphere is much harder to capture in a single photograph. But, the skin is just that - it's simply what is presented to the world and the absence of anything real.
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