Venturi Effect - acquisition of Architectural Knowledge in situ

[IMAGE: CHURCH OF THE AUTOSTRADA. PHOTO BY 'Doctor Casino', FLICKR]

The poster at Constructing Knowledge by New York based architect and teacher at New Jersey Institute of Technology Matt Burgermaster discusses a not so simple footnote in the 1977 2nd edition of Robert Venturi’s seminal book Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture:

“I have visited  Giovanni Michelucci’s Church of the Autostrada since writing these words, and I now realize it is an extremely beautiful and effective building. I am therefore sorry I made this unsympathetic comparison” p. 19.

In the book two churches by Alvar Aalto and Giovanni Michelucci are compared, categorized and judged. The first appointed attributes of ‘complexity’ and ‘contradiction’ as being positive, the latter presented as an anti-thesis. The footnote makes it obvious that Venturi had visited Michelucci’s church only for the first time between the two editions of the book. The experience of the church made him change a major point in the book.

Burgermaster writes: “This essay appropriates Venturi’s revision as evidence of a significant, but often overlooked aspect of how architectural knowledge is constructed, evaluated, represented, and distributed. It focuses on the acquisition of knowledge in situ as a disciplinary practice that has historically used observation-based methods of research to evidence its claims but has rarely recognized the subjectivity in the representation of this evidence.”

Constructing Knowledge, part I

I’m on my way to a conference in Aachen, Germany with the broad title Constructing Knowledge. The conference is a celebration of the inaugural (first) issue of a new peer reviewed architectural journal – CANDIDE. Journal for Architectural Knowledge. The name is taken from a fictional character of Voltaire, Candide who travelled on an eager but often disappointed search for knowledge. For now, I'm yet eager and really quite excited about the journal – and the fact that the theme is knowledge and not research; this has the potential of really opening up for a wide range of interesting entries, methods and media which again could generate a wide audience amongst architects and others interested in the field.

What is knowledge in architecture?
So – the opening conference has the title Constructing Knowledge and some open question regarding what is knowledge in architecture and architectural production – what is research by design (or should I say knowledge?); “Do we search for or generate architectural knowledge?”; and not least: “Why should architects write when what they do best is design?” with subtitles: “Architecture, fiction and other stories” and “The digital turn after the ‘end of history’” the black box is open.

Knowledge and fabric forming
The next post will be on knowledge and fabric forming. I'm presenting a poster at the conference and out of four main topics my contribution has been labeled under three of them already - by the organizers that is - I'm not sure myself either to which part of the Knowledge Construction the practice of experimental tectonics belongs.