an inhabited structure - accademia di architettura · journey we will visit works by some of the...

PROGRAMME

Design studio BSc2

Professor: Walter Angonese

Assistants: Francesca Caravello

Roi Carrera

Margherita Pusterla

atelier angonese

Università della Svizzera Italiana

Accademia di architettura - Mendrisio

Autumn semester 2017

1° edition - printed in september 2017

AN INHABITED STRUCTURE

ATELIER ANGONESE AAM SA 2017 AN INHABITED STRUCTURE

Contents

build, don’t talk- Ludwig Mies van der Hohe -

but

any decision needs a reflection- Hermann Czech -

THEME Walter Angonese / An inhabited structure

A context / A concept

Iconographic references

The programme / Exercise 02

Iconographic references

TEXTS Jürg Conzett / Structure as space

Eduard F. Sekler / Structure, construction, tectonics

E. Torroja / Fifteen aesthetic commandments

METHODOLOGY Walter Angonese / Reflections on the method

Walter Angonese / Interstial thinking

EXERCISE 1 Walter Angonese / Redrawing and rebuilding

João Vilanova Artigas / Architecture and construction

Exercise 1 “10 houses of João Vilanova Artigas”

10 HOUSES Architect‘s house

Czapski house

Baeta house

Triangle’s house

Bitencourt house

Ivo Viterito house

Mendes Andre house

Elza Berquo house

Martirani house

Domschke house

TRAVEL ITINERARY Travel in Galicia / Madrid - SA17

Travel in Morroco - SP18

Calendar

Select bibliography

Acknowledgments

Credits

Source texts

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01 Mies van der Hohe, Farnsworth house,1945-51, River Rd, Plano, construction site;

ATELIER ANGONESE AAM SA 2017 AN INHABITED STRUCTURE PAG. 05PAG. 04 THEME

An inhabited structure Preface by Walter Angonese

Tectonic thinking in architecture, understood as the broader set of constructional, structural and

static elements, is one of the foundations on which our teaching method of “building the idea” is

based.

The term tectonic comes from the ancient Greek.

Originally restricted to the craft of the carpenter and the builder, called “Tekton”, it evolved through

the centuries towards a more general concept of “making”, including the idea of poesis, aspiring

to the category of aesthetics as well as technology, as Adolf Borbein stressed in his philosophical

study of 1982:1

Tectonic becomes the art of joining. “Art“ here is to be understood as encompassing tekne, and

therefore indicates tectonic as assemblage not only of building parts but also of objects, indeed of

artworks in a narrower sense. With regard to the ancient understanding of the word, tectonic tends

toward the construction or making of an artisanal or artistic product....It depends much more upon

the correct and incorrect applications of the artisanal rules, or the degree to which its usefulness

has been achieved. Only to this extent does tectonic also involve judgment over art production.

Here, however, lies the point of departure for the expanded clarification and application of the idea

in more recent art history: as soon as an aesthetic perspective – and not a goal of utility – is defined

that specifies the work and production of the tekton, then the analysis consigns the term “ tectonic

“ to an aesthetic judgement”.2

The principle of building – and not just in architecture – is the result of an activity, namely structuring:

giving a structure to things and meanings. The importance of the structure ought to go beyond the

usual confines of a scientific approach and manifest itself as tectonic expressiveness in an interstitial

dimension, between its physical-mathematical and artistic-cultural significance. Tectonics, as we

understand the term, is bound up with an act of architectural creation and manifests the architect’s

intention to make visible the intangible concept of the structure through a particular constructive

and expressive manifestation rooted in its time and in a given place.

It does not refer only to the task of producing the material construction necessary to meet certain

requirements and bound up with a principle of statics, but also with the activity that raises this

construction to a form of art 3.

“An inhabited structure” is a challenge for us to extend the significance of occupying a space

generated by the interplay between a system of forces, and exploring the many possibilities inherent

in the intrinsic meaning of structure, “an essentially autonomous entity of internal dependencies” 4

but one that is continuously changing.

An analytical approach to space was indicated by Konrad Wachsmann’s research into space,

understood as a mathematical function, produced by the human mind, and as such it can be

constructed, inhabited. Wachsmann thus theorized an infinite architecture that is identified with

See source text p.86

<

02 Konrad Wachsmann, Roof Construction for Aircraft Hangar, Model, United States,1951-1953;02

ATELIER ANGONESE AAM SA 2017 AN INHABITED STRUCTURE PAG. 07PAG. 06

the space in which it is set. In modularity, Wachsmann expressed the possibility of its assembly

and development in infinite space, thanks to a rigorous construction technique that enables the

ideational moment to be fulfilled without mediation in the construction 5.

“An inhabited structure” can also be understood as the act of sitting in a chair, since it is a structure

and has a tectonic, architectural entity, hence it is space. It is clear that the notion of dwelling,

habitually occupying a place or home, requires a spatial entity that is defined and circumscribed.

The very notion of space represents an extension of the body, but to define structure it is not

enough to determine the limits or insert pillars; the structural dimension is attained when a system

of relationships is established between the interplay of forces and the corresponding arrangement

of building elements that define form and space.

It is not necessary for structural thinking to be immediately present, even in its intuitive dimension,

in the process of “building the idea”, or whether it is instead a spatial architectural intuition.

What is important is that it should be considered in a specific and primary way.

As Pier Luigi Nervi wrote: “The conception of a resistant system is a creative act that is only

partly based on scientific principles. The static sensibility that determines it, though a necessary

consequence of the study of equilibrium and the resistance of materials, remains a purely personal

capacity, like the aesthetic sensibility.”6

The value of intuitive and conscious meditation has to draw on history, on collective and even

contemporary experience, as a source of knowledge and method, and enables us to be less

arbitrary in our choices. “An inhabited structure” is not to be understood as the act of physically

or conceptually occupying something that is already present, but as building the structure first and

then living in it, or even building it while living in it.

We can therefore claim that any architectural act should be associated with this structural

conception. In this field, the architectural world is divided: all too often its value is associated only

with its spatial/cultural entity, directed at the object and seeking to create or be reduced to its

notion of statics, the sole task being to absorb the flow of forces.

This year we wish to explore architecture in this fertile space between the physical and cultural

dimension, an experiment that seeks to restore awareness of tectonics in architecture. To enable us

to concentrate intensely on the theme of the structure, no specific context will be assigned.

Left to the student’s discretion is the choice of a place of his or her knowledge or memory, strong

enough not to be undermined and to accept the presence of a structural entity to be inhabited.

The housing programme is limited to 50 square metres, with the requirement that the space should

be related to everyday life (living, sleeping, etc.). The project will be explored down to the scale of

the constructional detail, developing and verifying the initial structural insight.

Several iconographic references will be included and will serve as a further element of understanding.

The semester, as usual, will start with the “redrawing and rebuilding” of ten significant houses in

the international architectural panorama.

This year we will devote research and study to the great architect and engineer João Battista Vilanova

Artigas, a prominent exponent of the Brazilian Paulista school. His buildings are all related to precise

and sustained tectonic thinking, which he succeeded in conveying in a spatial architectural concept

still unmatched today.

THEME

03 Alison and Peter Smithson, Solar Pavilion, Tisbury, Wiltshire, England, 1961;

<

03


04

THEME

<

04 Alejandro De la Sota, Construction site, Gymnasium Maravillas, Madrid, 1960;

Kenneth Frampton, Studies in tectonic culture, edith by John Cave, The MIT Press, cambridge, London, 1996, p.4;

Adolf Heinrich Borbein, “Tektonic, zur Geschichte eines Begriffs der Archäologie”, Archiv für Begreiffsgeschichte 26, n. 1

(1982);

Anderson, Modern Architecture Industrial Design, p. 83;

Louis T. Hjelmslev in Tristano Bolelli (a cura di), Linguistica generale, strutturalismo, linguistica storica: testi, note introduttive,

indici, Nistri-Lischi, Pisa 1971;

Pietro Zampetti, progetti di linguaggio, sistema di notazione per l’architettura italiana 1964-1973, Sapienza Università di

Roma, Dipartimento di architettura e progetto, dottorato;

Peter Eisenman, La fine del classico, in Peter Eisenman, Inside Out. Scritti 1963 – 1988, Quodlibet, Macerata 2014;

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The method of redrawing and physically rebuilding ten houses in models made of MDF will

introduce the students to all the factors and instruments that should be part of their architectural

equipment, and will make for an equally rapid learning of measurements, standards, vocabulary

and scale, a method that has proved very effective over the years.

Finally, since travelling to Brazil is out of the question, the field trip – an integral part of the teaching

process – will be devoted to the great Spanish architect Alejandro de la Sota, one of the fathers of

Spanish architectural success (together with Josep Antoni Coderch), whose works, with a similar

rigour, embodied an outstanding ability to combine tectonic and architectural thinking. The four-

day trip will take us from Galicia to Madrid. In addition to buildings by Alejandro de la Sota, on our

journey we will visit works by some of the disciples of this great architect.

ATELIER ANGONESE AAM SA 2017 AN INHABITED STRUCTURE PAG. 57PAG. 56 EXERCISE °1

01 Architect’s house Campo Belo, São Paolo 1942 / 49 02 Czapski house Sumaré, São Paolo 1949 03 Baeta house Butantã, São Paolo 1956 04 Triangle’s house Sumaré, São Paolo 1958

05 M. Taques Bitencourt house Sumaré , São Paolo 1959 06 Ivo Viterito house Aclimação, São Paolo 1962 07 Mendes André house Vila Mariana, São Paolo 1966

08 Elza Berquo house Jardim Dircinha, São Paolo 1967 09 Martirani house Alto de Pinheiros, São Paolo 1969 10 Domschke house Alto de Boa Vista, São Paolo 1974

EXERCISE 1 “REDRAWING AND REBUILDING 10 HOUSES”

The first phase of the studio sessions will focus on “an inhabited structure” through the redraw

and rebuild of ten significant houses by the architect João Battista Vilanova Artigas. The selection

of houses serves to bring out themes recurrent in his works, very differently distributed over the

years. For this exercise the students will be divided into groups.

Each group will be assigned a house to be redesigned in vector drawings on a scale of 1:50 by

developing plans, sections and facades. An accurate drawing, faithful to the original, is required.

Both the study material and the guidelines for the graphic design will be provided. On the basis

of the graphic material produced, which will include personal research and interpretation of the

material provided, each group will make a model of the house on a scale of 1:33, connected

with the internal spatial qualities of the house and its details, anticipated by a small study model

on a scale of 1:100. This model will display the structural and tectonic approach to the house

and make it possible to assess the value of the use of colour, which in some of Artigas’s houses

is closely bound up with their tectonic features.

This phase of analysis and structural study will receive support from the engineer Roberto Guidotti.

The models will be made of wood and will have to be painted white.

For the development of the models and instructions for their construction, detailed information

will be provided at the beginning of the semester through the support of Danilo Bruno, who is in

charge of the modelling workshop. This learning experience will enable the students to acquire

the ability to compare different projects and analyse them critically, with these abilities being

refined in the process of abstraction by making models on a scale of 1:33.

01 Architect‘s house 02 Czapski house

04 Triangle’s house 05 Bitencourt house 03 Baeta house

10 houses of João Vilanova Artigas

07 Mendes Andre house06 Ivo Viterito house 08 Elza Berquo house

10 Domschke house09 Martirani house

Drawing

1:50 Situation plan, elevation, section according to the layout given by the Atelier.

Model1:33 White model, made of wood-mdf material.

1:100 Structural study model, made of cartboard

Calendar

21.09.17 W01 Presentation of exercise 1 and lecture by Roberto Guidotti

28.09.17 W02 End-in of the mock-up model 1:100 and first draft of drawings

04.10.17 W03 End-in of the second draft pdf drawings with final layout

19.10.17 W05 End-in of exercise: presentation and exhibition

135-144

<

135-144 10 houses of João Vilanova Artigas;

See source text p.91


Travel itinerary

GALICIA - MADRID

TRAVEL ITINERARY

Alejandro De la Sota‘s projects:

145Varela House, 1964;

146Residencial buinding, 1972;

147Dairy CLESA, 1966;

148Dominguez House, 1976;

149Calculation Unit, 1975;

150Gymnasium

‘Colegio Maravillas’, 1961;151

‘Cesar Carlos’ High School,1967;152

Sport Pavillion, 1966;

12:30 R. Molezún, Roiba house

15:00 A. De la Sota, Dominguez house

16:30 A. De la Sota, Residential building Pontevedra

16:30 A. De la Sota, Sports pavillion

18:30 M. Gallego Jorreto, House in Corrubedo

19:30 D. Chipperfield, House in Corrubedo

06:45 Flight from Santiago de Compostela to Madrid

10:30 Alejandro De la Sota Fundation

11:30 A. De la Sota, Gymnasium of ‘Colegio Maravillas’

13:30 M. Fisac, Hidrographic study center

16:00 Fernando Higueras Fundation

17:30 F. Oíza, BBVA - Bilbao’s bank

18:30 Architectural promenade along Paseo de la Castellana

19:30 Francisco Alonso de Santos, Shoe shop ‘Manuel Losada’

21:00 Herzog & de Meuron, ‘Caixa forum’

09:00 A. De la Sota, ‘Cesar Carlos’ High School

10:30 A. De la Sota, CENIM

11:30 R. Molezún, Huarte house

13:00 F. Alonso de Santos, house in ‘Puerta de Hierro’

16:00 S. Zuazo, ‘Casa de las flores’

17:30 Mansilla + Tuñón, Museum of Royal Collections

18:30 J. I. Linazasoro, ‘Escuelas Pias’

20:00 ‘Matadero’

09:00 Molezún y Corrales, Pavilion of exagonos

10:15 Ensamble studio, Hemeroscopium house

11:30 A. De la Sota, Varela house

13:30 Fernando Higueras, Lucio Muñoz house

13:30 15:00 MVRDV, ‘El Mirador’ collective housing

16:00 A. De la Sota, Dairy CLESA

16:30 A. De la Sota, Calculation Unit

20:45 Flight from Madrid to Milan Malpensa

05.10.2017

06.10.2017

07.10.2017

08.10.2017

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149148

150 152

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MOROCCO TRAVEL SP18

The field trip in the second semester will take us to Morocco, travelling to the cities of Marrakech and

Casablanca. Morocco is a fascinating country, with its blending of different cultures and its architecture

expressed in a impermanence, between past and present.

What the memory retains, engraved in my mind from those golden days, and the experience of

friendship, brings it closer to the latent and mythical essence of Happiness, feed of the rest of our days

(the sun lappes the sea, seen from the tower of the unfinished Mosque of Rabat, set on a sprinkled

ground of shafts and column foundations, baths on the deserted beaches of the Atlantic, high and soft

waves, Roman ruins at the sight, dust covering horses and knights, rifles fired a meter away, windows

open in a broken car, boiling under the sun, refusing the Atlas as the Desert, curved trunk upon the

entrance of the Mosque of Fez, leather tinged with a thousand colors, odor as unbearable as beautiful,

sharp line on the desert frontier, black pebble against sand in the color of Gauguin, calm in the terraces

where one drinks mint tea, silence or whisper, sweet look, look and voice of an ancient culture of wise

men and poets, landing in Algeciras, again the shrilly voices, in the cafes and in the terraces).

I remember this and more and I do not believe it’s just nostalgia. I remember the absence of anxiety.

The presence of absence. Alvaro Siza July 2006 Porto. (translation edited by Atelier Angonese)

153-154-155-156Alexandre Alves Costa, Alvaro Siza,

1967 Marrocos, Circo de Ideias, 2011;157

Delacroix, les carnets du Marocco, 158-159

Gabriele Basilico,Marrocco 1971, Umboldt books;

160Marrakech, Morroco,©Virginia Duran;

SPRING SEMESTER SP18

160

153 154

155

158 159

157156


WEN 20.09.2017 16:30 Atelier presentation THU 21.09.2017 09:00 First meeting in atelier 09:30 Opening lecture by Walter Angonese “An inhabited structure” e “The construction of the idea” 11:00 Presentation / Starting exercise °1 “Redrawing and Rebuilding” 14:00 Presentation “Study trip / E02“Stimmung” Lecture by R. Guidotti about “João Battista Vilanova Artigas”FRI 22.09.2017 09:00 Atelier TH 28.09.2017 06:00 Atelier + drawings critic / end-in of sctructural mockup / start 1:30FRI 29.09.2017 09:00 Atelier

WEN 04.10.2017 18:30 End-in of pdf drawings exercise 01 THU 05.10.2017 07:20 Study trip - departure SUN 08.10.2017 20:45 Study trip - return THU 12.10.2017 09:00 End-in of pdf / jpg exercise 02 + atelier FRI 13.10.2017 09:00 Atelier THU 19.10.2017 09:00 End-in of exercise 01 / Presentation + atelier FRI 20.10.2017 09:00 Photo shooting Models E01+ start individual project THU 26.10.2017 09:00 Lecture by Walter Angonese + the concept model + atelierFRI 27.10.2017 10.00 Lecture by Mario Monotti + atelier THU 02.11.2017 09:00 End-in of context individual model + atelier FRI 03.11.2017 09:00 Atelier + structure critics with Valeria Gozzi / Lorenzo Pini THU 09.11.2017 09:00 Atelier + structure critics with Valeria Gozzi / Lorenzo Pini FRI 10.11.2017 09:00 Excursus 01 “Abitare lo spazio” + atelier THU 16.11.2017 14:00 Mid-term criticFRI 17.11.2017 09:00 Mid-term critic THU 23.11.2017 09:00 Atelier + structure critics with Valeria Gozzi / Lorenzo PiniiFRI 24.11.2017 09:00 Atelier THU 30.11.2017 09:00 Atelier + detail critics FRI 01.12.2017 09:00 Atelier

THU 07.12.2017 09:00 Atelier + Model shooting

FRI 08.12.2017 09:00 Atelier + Model shooting MON 11.12.2017 09:00 PRINT WEEK / End-in of project’s pdf and prints FRI 15.12.2017 09:00 PRINT WEEK / End-in models SUN 17.12.2017 14:00 End - in of models + Atelier cleaning and exhibition set upMON 18.12.2017 09:00 Final critic TUE 19.12.2017 09:00 Final critic / Atelier dinner WEN 20.12.2017 09:00 VotesTHU 21.12.2017 09:00 Archiving / photo shooting modelsFRI 22.12.2017 18:00 Atelier cleaning

Select bibliography

K. Wachsmann, Una svolta nelle costruzioni, Milano, Il Saggiatore, 1960;

R. Gulli, Struttura e costruzione, Firenze University Press, 2007;

Kontext n.78, Architekturabteilung, ETH, Zürich, Baukonstruktion III & IV, Prof. H. Ronner Hoenggerberger, Oktober 1984/86/88;

K. Wachsmann, Holzhausbau - Technik und Gestaltung, Basel, Birkhäuser, 1995;

Konstrukteure im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, Lehrstuhl für Entwerfen und Baukonstruktion, Prof.Uwe Kiessler, TU München, 94/95;

D. van den Heuvel and M. Risselada, Alison and Peter Smithson - from the house of the future to a house of today, Rotterdam, 010

Publishers, 2004;

M. Mostafavi, Structure as Space, Engineering and architecture in the works of Jürg Conzett and his partners, London, AA Publications,

2006;

A. W. Charleson, Structure as architecture : a source book for architects and structural engineers, Oxford: Elsevier, 2005;

F. Giovanni, G. Roberto, C. Martine, P. Agostina, Histoire de l’architecture moderne : stucture et revêtement, Lausanne: Presses

polytechniques et universitaires romandes, 2008;

A. Bologna, P. L. Nervi, Pier Luigi Nervi ou l’art de la structure : photographies de la collection Alberto Sartoris, Bologna, Lausanne:

Presses polytechniques et universitaires romandes, 2013;

R. Mahendra, M. Vandini; M. R. Raj, The structure: works of Mahendra Raj, Zurich: Park Books, 2016;

W. Blaser, Mies van der Rohe : the art of structure, Basel - Boston, Birkhäuser, 1993;

F. Otto, Natürliche Konstruktionen: Formen und Strukturen in Natur und Technik und Prozesse, Deutsche Verlags- Anstalt, 1985;

C. Townsend, R. Whiteread, The art of Rachel Whiteread, London: Thames & Hudson, 2004;

K. Frampton, J. Cava, Studies in tectonic culture: the poetics of construction in nineteenth and twentieth century architecture, MIT

Press,Chicago, 1996;

M. Monotti, L’insegnamento della statica agli architetti, Archi, 2013, n. 4, p. 29;

A. Deplazes, Constructing architecture : materials, processes, structures : a handbook, Basel, Birkhäuser, 2008;

A. Cornoldi, L’architettura della casa- Manuale di progettazione architettonica. Sulla tipologia dello spazio domestico con un atlante di

100 abitazione disegnate alla stessa scala, Officina edizioni, 1988;

E. Camesasca, Storia della casa, Rizzoli editore;

E. Sussmann, Gordon Matta Clark, You are the measure, Wittney Museum NY / Yale University Press, 2007;

N. Baume, Sol Lewitt : structures, 1965-2006, catalogue published on the occasion of Sol LeWitt: structures, 1965-2006, on

view in City Hall Park, New York, 2011;

J. Chupin; C. Simonnet, K. Frampton, Le projet tectonique, Gollion: Infolio, 2005;

P. Wildenstein, Josef Albers - Donald Judd, Form and Color, 2007;

O. Eliasson, Your Engagement has consequences, Lars Müller Publishers, 2006;

Santiago Sierra. 300 Tons and previous works, Verlag der Buchhandlung König, 2005;

A. Muttoni, L’arte delle strutture, Mendrisio Mendrisio Academy Press, 2006;

G. Semper, H. F. Mallgrave, M. Robinson, Style: style in the technical and tectonic arts, or, pratical aesthetics, Los Angeles: Getty

Research Institute, 2004;

A. H. Borbein, Tektonic, zur Geschichte eines Begriffs der Archäologie, Archiv für Begreiffsgeschichte 26, n. 1,1982;

Alejandro de la Sota and spanish architects:

M. Gallego, J. Llinàs, M. Puente, Alejandro de la Sota, Escritos, conversaciones, conferencias, Barcelona, Editorial Gustavo Gili, SA,

2002;

A. de la Sota, Alejandro de la Sota, arquitecto, Ediciones Pronaos, 3ª edición, 2003;

Corrales y Molezún: Medalla de Oro de la Arquitectura 1992, Consejo Superior Colegios de Arquitectos de España, Madrid, 1993;

Miguel Fisac: Medalla de Oro de la Arquitectura 1994, Edición al cuidado de Andrés Cànovas, 1997;

AV, Alejandro de la Sota, Monografia Monographs 68, Editor Arquitectura Viva, Madrid, 1997;

João Battista Vilanova Artigas:

Vilanova Artigas, Instituto Lina e P.M. Bardi, Fundacao Vilanova Artigas, São Paulo (BRA), 1994; *

João Vilanova Artigas , 2G, n.54;*

Vilanova Artigas, 1:100 Ediciones, Buenos Aires, Argentina, March 2016, n. 56; *

R. Artigas y J. Tavares Correia de Lira, Vilanova Artigas - Caminhos da arcquitetura, Cosacnaify, São Paulo; 4ª edição, 2004; *

Vilanova Artigas e a FAU/USP, Monolito, 2015, n. 27; *

Vilanova Artigas 1915/1985, Tendências Atuais da Arquitetura Brasileira; Pro Editores, 1ª Edição - 1985;*

R. Artigas, Vilanova Artigas, Secretaria da Cultura do Estado de São Paulo e Ministério da Cultura, Terceiro Nome, 2015;*

(*) Drawings, sketches and images of 10 houses by João Battista Vilanova Artigas are extracted from these books and magazines.

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