drawing in process - the role of drawing in the
TRANSCRIPT
Drawing and Visualisation Research
Published in TRACEY | journal
Drawing Across Boundaries
Sep 1998
www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/
sota/tracey/
Proceedings of a
symposium held at
Loughborough University
in September 1998
This paper addresses the issue of drawing and its role in architectural
design. There is often a view that concept development is a mental
activity, while drawing is a finished presentation of the outcome of this
activity. The underlying assumption is that a magic leap takes place
and these are transformed to precisely drawn plans, sections and
elevations of the finished product. Based on this assumption students
of architecture tend to move from the conceptual sketch to the design
solution and from speculation to execution in 'one step' logic. In reality
architects generate explorative drawings in the design process to
develop, articulate and refine an idea. This paper reviews drawing
strategies employed in the design process. The aim is to examine the
role of drawing in exploring concepts through its graphical system.
It argues that:
there is a close link between the development of architectural
concepts and visual expression;
design is an intellectual activity in process rather than a static
situation; this activity takes place through formal and spatial
experimentation based on visual transformations;
during the design process metaphoric interpretations establish
associations between a formal and a conceptual order.
DRAWING IN PROCESS - THE
ROLE OF DRAWING IN THE
DEVELOPMENT OF
ARCHITECTURAL CONCEPTS
Sophia Psarra & Wayne Forster a
a The Welsh School of Architecture
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INTRODUCTION
Architectural design is, by definition, a creative activity based on exploration. It aims at
creating new possibilities for spatial and formal articulation rather than reproducing forms
that already exist. These possibilities are discovered during the design process. Architects
explore, transform and refine ideas by generating a number of sketches, drawings, models
and other forms of two dimensional and three dimensional representation. There are two
main categories and modes of representation: (a) sketch drawings and models produced at
the early and intermediate design stages; (b) those that present the fully executed design.
The former are suggestive, no hard edge creations that lead to the formation of
architectural space and form. The latter are descriptive depictions with sharp and precise
contours. They are used to communicate the finished product as part of the process that
characterises the architectural and the construction practice.
This paper focuses on the first category of representation as an integral part of the thinking
process in the development of architectural ideas. The objective is to look at sketch
drawings and models and at their role in exploring concepts through their formal and
spatial system. This is achieved by reviewing explorative representation strategies
produced during the design process.
Ideas are in drawings
There is often a belief that architectural ideas are formed in the mind. Drawing is seen as
externalising these ideas and helping in their development rather than playing a crucial role
in their generation (Porter 1997). This belief has been expressed by a number of authors
and architects. Le Corbusier in one of his lectures to students of architecture explained
that form and space are first concepts of the brain being conceived with the eyes shut. The
same approach is taken by Frank Lloyd Wright, who designed the Guggenheim Museum in
New York in his mind before expressing his ideas through drawings.
There is also a view that the designer does not proceed from ideas developed in the mind
to drawing but creates drawings that help to induce ideas (Goldschmidt, 1991). One of the
most common observations amongst designers is that they actually find it hard to design
without a pencil in their hand (Lawson 1994). Architects talk about the pencil as their
'spokesman'i, or about the relationship between the cognitive process and drawings as
based on the eye reinterpreting what the hand has doneii.
Artists describe sketches, drawings and other kinds of marks on paper as untidy formations
that form hints, stimulate the mind and mediate the flow of images and thoughts. Drawing
was for Picasso his first medium of communication and he continuously used it as a
preparatory form for work (Galassi, 1996). He saw that images are not settled beforehand
and that while they are being done they change following the changes of thoughts. Paul
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Klee also described that the forms emerging under his hands gradually suggested some
real or fantastic subject to his imagination.
In the last twenty years there has been an increase in the attention received by drawing.
Before then, in the 1960s and 70s, drawing was seen as making no contribution to the
definition of architectural form. Analytic diagrams establishing functional relationships
amongst the various activities of a design brief, site analysis, objective scientific
information and rational reasoning were considered as the only means of arriving at a
design. The analysis/synthesis movement extended the 'form follows function' paradigm to
the exclusion of the depictive powers of the drawing from the process of exploration.
As a reaction to this movement, drawing has been re-defining its identity in two ways: (a) as
a working tool by reference to the ideas it provokes; (b) as an entity that concerns the
mechanisms of its creation in a way that is similar to the 20th century painting (Evans
1997). Elaborately rendered and seductive drawings, with a greater or lesser degree of
clear reference to the object they represent, have been crowding the showrooms of
architectural schools and the glossy pages of architectural magazines. In recent years
drawing and its possibilities of seduction have been increased following a revolution and a
proliferation in the production of images by digital technology.
Seduction is often seen as a function of appearances. It can be also seen as a function of
the intellect and its power to stimulate, provoke and generate ideas. Without prejudice in
regard to appearances, it is the second possibility for 'seduction' that this paper focuses its
attention on. The question it tries to answer is: how does drawing stimulate, contribute to
and induce creative design?
Drawing - precedent and invention
In his book Form to Programme Kevin Rhowbotham makes the proposition that abstract
drawing is the primary container for speculation (Rhowbotham 1995). This is drawing
without conventional architectural figuration and conventional graphical codes. It
facilitates formal experimentation prior to any reference to a design brief. In his teaching
approach Rhowbotham introduces the programme after the formal composition is resolved.
In this way, students abandon pre-existing knowledge of forms and solutions to design
briefs.
Form to Programme offers an alternative to the 'form follows function' paradigm which
despite the current formal tendencies still dominates architectural education and practice.
It takes the emphasis from the architectural brief and its non-visual, descriptive nature and
puts it back on the visual processes of form and its platform of development - the drawing.
It also makes an interesting contribution to architectural education, devising ways that can
prevent students from adopting preconceived ideas unquestioningly.
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The seductive images that illustrate Rhowbotham's book might potentially make creative
conceptual propositions (this is left to speculation as there is no reference to the ways in
which these images render themselves to meaning other than forming graphic spectacles).
However, creative design ideas do not necessarily emerge from clearly worked out
theoretical positions. Abandoning all previous knowledge about existing forms,
Rhowbotham seems to extend long standing polarities and dilemmas: does design move
from an already structured knowledge of possible forms to new propositions or can the
mental processes be internal to the design activity without any previous knowledge and
precedent?
Form to Programme is situated on one side of the argument claiming that preconception is
unnecessary to creativity. Christopher Alexander in his Notes on the Synthesis of Form
makes a similar proposition. The designer of a new kettle can draw a list of kettle design
requirements without knowing anything about previous kettlesiii
(Alexander 1964).
A structural approach to design is proposed by Hillier, Musgrove and O'Sullivan (1972).
According to this approach the mind is not a tabula rasa but actively structures its
knowledge. In 'How is Design Possible' Hillier and Leaman suggest that a repertory of
cognitive schemata provides the basis for developing a design idea (1974). The designer
searches this repertory and tests it against the design requirements. If the chosen schema
does not respond successfully it is either abandoned or creatively manipulated. In
'Typology and Design Method' Colquhoun also suggests that in all fields of design, solutions
are creatively adapted either from mental pictures of past forms or from past aesthetic
ideologies (Colquhoun 1985).
Drawing and the conceptual development
These authors put emphasis not on the existing knowledge or on forms emerging during
design but on the interaction between the two. In this way, they explain more clearly the
role of invention and precedent in the design process. The role that drawing plays in this
interaction is examined in a number of studies. Looking at the process of sketching,
Goldschmidt suggests that the building to be designed does not exist and consequently it
has not been known or perceived before (Goldschmidt, 1991). Its making relies on
tentative images which suggest existing or unknown forms and concepts. Zooming in on
design episodes, she proposes that there is a systematic exchange between figural and
conceptual arguments. Designers move from figurative displays to conceptual propositions
relating forms and concepts to one another until a satisfying match is reached amongst
them.
'During the process things are not as orderly. The designer may lack an overall concept for
quite some time, or else no search for it would be necessary. Incomplete concepts come to
mind and likewise, partial forms are generated both randomly and intentionally ... a
concept might lead to a figure just as a figure might lead to a concept'iv
.
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The suggestion that concepts become figurative and figures become conceptual seems to
imply that there is no linear development from figures to concepts or vice versa. The
designer might generate images randomly and through the use of precedent and metaphor
develop a concept. Design can also begin with existing concepts-precedents which are
defined and transformed into new formal and conceptual propositions through images.
Examining the kind of reasoning that is employed in the course of design experimentation,
Goldschmidt suggests that the designer reads concepts in the images created and through
dialectic reasoning develops ideas about space and form. To discover patterns of
reasoning she uses the notion of design argument as a 'rational utterance' the designer
makes, bearing on the design entity. The process by which images and dialectic reasoning
interact is based on an alternation of two kinds of design arguments. These are described
as 'seeing as' and 'seeing that'. The former refers to ways in which figures are read as
figural, gestalt-like entities or as metaphors referring to things known in advance. The
latter refers to non-figural examination of the figures that are drawn.
'The square-configuration could be seen as a puzzle. She sees that this metaphor leads to
nowhere. She tries another metaphor: Seeing the square as a casbah. She sees that in
the casbah there are confined territories. In this short passage the designer alternates her
reasoning modality with every new argument she makes'v.
Extending this analysis to other design episodes Goldschmidt observes that single or
groups of arguments shift from the 'as' mode to the 'that' mode alternately. She concludes
that sketching employs interactive imagery to create self-updating displays.
Fish and Scrivener (1990) reached a similar conclusion. Drawing and sketching translate
from descriptive systems of representation such as language, abstract ideas and design
constraints into depiction.
'Sketches and drawings are the percept half of a hybrid percept - mental image that
amplifies the mind's capacity to make descriptive to depictive translations'vi
.
Although these authors underline the importance of drawing and its interaction with the
mental processes during design, they seem to focus mainly on cognition - on how the mind
interprets the figures ('seeing as') rather than on the figures themselves. However, before
the figures are given a certain content in the mind, they carry their own meaning. This is
achieved through their formal organisation - a combinatorial system of rules organising
relations amongst the various elements with a greater or lesser degree of regularity. In a
way that is analogous to language, the designer operates within two planes: the plane of
form (signifier) and the plane of content (signified). In the former, meaning is intrinsic to
the formal organisation itself. In the latter, meaning is established between the formal
organisation and externally and culturally defined domains. The architectural concept is
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what links these two planes into a whole. The role drawing plays in this link is crucial in the
sense that it mediates between the two planes.
The proposition put forward is that the designer borrows ideas from a number of sources.
Existing building forms, elements and solutions to design problems may be used and
creatively transformed to fit into a new context. Alternatively, concepts belonging to extra-
architectural domains may be assimilated into architecture and given symbolic
significancevii
. Conceptual borrowing can take place either prior to or during the activity of
sketching or both. Sometimes designs are generated by using previous knowledge of
forms and concepts which are creatively adapted to respond to a given situation through
drawing. In other cases ideas come to mind by watching the development of randomly
drawn entities and then associating them with existing notions.
DRAWING: THE SURFACE OF NESTED ORDERS
This study will examine a number of projects in terms of their formal principles and will
follow their transformation into principles of content.
Project 1 - Office and residential building, third year (Student: Wong Wei Ping)
The brief requirements were about the design of an office and residential building on an
elongated site by the riverfront in Swansea. The student's intention was to balance the two
activities of the programme - work and habitation - which he saw as increasingly similar
based on changes brought by information technology.
FIGURE 1
The intention for similarity and differentiation defines the rules of the geometry: the
orthogonal versus the shifted grid, the elongated box versus the square box (fig. 1). The
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difference in the grids and the shapes becomes eventually translated into a principle
carrying the difference in function. The designer creates associations between
orthogonal/elongated and work, between shifted/square and home (fig. 2). He sees the
formal ordering as a plane that can express and order the principles of content, the
activities themselves. It could also be said that the geometrical shift transforms itself into
a content principle signifying the act of habitation and its liberation from the homogenising
nature of the grid.
FIGURE 2
Project 2 - Museum of metallurgy, third year (student: Wong Wei Ping)
The programme for this project was an aluminium can-recycling centre situated in the
Swansea docks. The student's aim was to create a visitor's circulation route and a process
of recycling where both interact and depart from each other.
Words have been integrated into the drawings in an attempt to translate the ideas they
represent into a visual order (Moebius strip, passive/active strip). The twisted strip is an
element of such order (fig. 3). It marks a route and organises the visitor's movement
through the spaces. It becomes also a content principle borrowed from mathematics - a
domain that is external to architecture (Moebius strip). This strip is translated into a space
for a route and a space for a recycling process (figs. 3, 4, 5). In linguistics a metaphor is a
substitution of one term for another. The student has engaged in a metaphoric
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transformation in which a visual/formal principle, a borrowed notion, a circulation route
and a recycling process meet and become nested within each other.
FIGURE 3 FIGURE 4
FIGURE 5
Focusing on other features of the design - the auditorium and the gallery spaces - a second
system of concepts has been developed. The folded strip is a linear order with an
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unchangeable origin and destination (figs. 6 & 7). The broken strip is an order of elements
in a state of flux. The linear versus broken motif signifies not only two different functions
but also the difference between a linear/passive and an active way of learning. In an
auditorium, learning is subject to the linear and temporal development of somebody else's
speech. In a gallery the individual's free choices with regard to seeing and moving can
shorten or lengthen time and allow control over one's knowledge. In the student's mind
axiality, its twists and interruptions, as well as the building itself become signs for
architecture as narrative through space and time. They also become signs for architecture
as narrative for passive or active travellers through life.
FIGURE 6
FIGURE 7
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Project 3 - Urban design, Swansea, third year (student: Gil Komet)
The first sketches acknowledge the formal properties of the site - the square defined by
buildings on three sides and opening to the sea front together with the axis coming from
the docks (fig. 8). The square is read as an urban enclosure and the positions of the
proposed buildings highlight this reading. The axis forms a route which is intentionally
extended to the sea side. The student completes a formal structure which had not reached
a conclusion. The formal intention for completion encompasses an intention for
signification. The urban enclosure and the route recall particular urban typologies and an
ideology that celebrates the urban character.
FIGURE 8
The positioning of the activities follows the back to front distinction at the formal level -
from the office block to the recreational buildings and from the urban to the natural
landscape (fig. 9).
FIGURE 9
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Project 4 - Office and residential building, third year (student: Gil Komet)
The basic formal structure and its translation to a programmatic/content principle
preceded drawing. The student decided to raise the buildings from the ground and create
an association between the vertical/horizontal motif, and the residential/commercial
distinction (fig. 10). So, vertical becomes residential for views and 'stacked' living and
horizontal becomes commercial for an open-plan working environment (fig. 11).
FIGURE 10
FIGURE 11
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However, sketching gave the project further articulation and helped in the development of
metaphors. The vertical block supported by a concrete grid frame is seen as a 'figure in
motion' (fig. 12). This led to the generation of intermediate sketches that gave the block
anthropomorphic appearance (fig. 13). These explorations were finally abandoned.
Nevertheless, they demonstrate the role of drawing in the exchange between form and
content and in the development of a concept.
FIGURE 12 FIGURE 13
Project 5 - Museum of metallurgy, third year (Student: Gil Komet)
In this project a clear distinction between two formal/spatial entities is constructed again
(figs. 14 & 15). The regular/irregular formal opposite expresses a distinction between the
museum ancillary activities and the galleries (fig. 16). The clarification of different
functions through different formal languages becomes a generic rule that is applied to all
of this student's projects. The desire to lift from the ground and deconstruct the shapes is
his formal idiom. The formal motif of finite versus deconstructed volume, however,
transforms itself into a content principle talking about Gestalt-like notions of shape and
space and those that challenge it.
Peter Eisenman notes:
... to distinguish architecture from building requires an intentional act - a sign which
suggests that a wall is doing something more than literally sheltering, supporting,
enclosing ... but on the other hand, without use, function and the existence of
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extrinsic meaning there would be no conditions which would require such an
intentional act of overcomingviii
.
FIGURE 14 FIGURE 15
FIGURE 16
It can be suggested that the formal rules of the tilted and clashing volumes and planes and
the structural system that supports them speak about an architecture of 'lightness' - an
architecture that challenges the viewer's perception of walls and ceilings as customary
vertical and horizontal preconditions for building and building loads.
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DRAWING AS A TEACHING STRATEGY
In the last three projects the student has used sketching to externalise a set of generic
rules, a design idiom and a personal taste which were gradually developed during his
studies. Sketching and drawing have taken on the initial ideas, have explored and
developed them further. Less experienced or skilful students though, find it difficult to
translate known forms to new ideas or establish links between emergent and unknown
forms and an existing cultural knowledge. Their design approach tends to develop in two
ways: (a) it derives ideas from a canonical world of spheres, drums and cylinders
determining the overall form of the building in a top-down manner; (b) it splits the brief
requirements into small units of reasoning assigning forms to these units. In the first case
it moves from finite shapes with a precise boundary to architectural space in one-step logic.
As various authors have stressed, it is the incompleteness and indeterminacy of sketches
that stimulate visual invention and further development of ideas (Fish and Scrivener,
1990). In the second case the forms emerge from descriptive reasoning and the intended
function of minimal units. Both processes edit out visual exploration and its ability to
provoke suggestive images relating forms to conceptsix
.
In the projects that follow, first year students were asked to engage in a process of formal
and conceptual experimentation before they commit to a design solution. The aim was to
ease the development of visual language and its translation to architectural ideas. This
development was based on borrowing concepts and forms from their observations of the
site and from non-architectural sources, like abstract painting, and the condition of human
movement. Abstract painting was chosen for its property to express and represent space
on a flat surface, approaching by analogy the exploration of architectural space through
two dimensional drawing. At the same time it enabled an understanding of the principles
of formal order as a system of combinations. The human body in motion was another
source for study and inspiration enabling students to make associations between the
human form and movement and the elements of their design. A series of visual
transformations were established where painting gradually became space while human
body became a container structuring views to the site.
Project 6 - Artists' studios and gallery, first year (Student: Steve Chung)
The diagonal shapes developed from a study of Malevich's Suprematist Composition
establish an axis, a direction and a point of convergence (fig. 17). This is translated to a
linear space of entry which decreases in width following the diagonal line of the site. This
space brings movement through the building and interfaces the gallery space on the right
with the studios on the left side. The leap from the formal order to architectural order does
not happen through a literal transformation of shapes into building blocks. It takes place
through a metaphoric shift which substitutes the converging solid shapes for a void-entry
and for a perspective condition.
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FIGURE 17
Project 7 - Gallery space, first year (Student: Tom Wood)
A collage-relief study serves the development of formal composition (fig. 18). It consists of
a rectangle, a curve, a circle and a grid. These are eventually transformed to a cubic space
with a ramp, a tower and a gridded roof (fig. 19).
FIGURE 18
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FIGURE 19
The student saw architectural drawing as a metaphor for abandoning a single viewpoint
and representing the object as seen from all points of view simultaneously. The
development of the building becomes possible through this metaphor. The layers of
overlapping shapes are read as superimposed layers of building plans. The student
imagined the formal elements as dislocated from the flat plane they initially belonged to.
Then he assigned different architectural content to each of them - the grid becomes a roof
structure, the circle is transformed to a tower for views over the water.
Project 8 - A space for moving and viewing, first year (Student: Philip Holden)
The brief asked the students to design a structure that served the purpose of observing the
site. Site elements, floating objects, deteriorating piers, a power station and a gravel yard
together with the human form provided sources of inspiration which were metaphorically
embedded into their work.
The human body stretching its arms evokes the notion of flying. An intention for
signification precedes the development of formal order. In the next stage flying takes
shape and form through the construction of a sketch model (fig. 20). This eventually
becomes translated into a viewing structure that retains contact with the initial idea (fig.
21).
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FIGURE 20
FIGURE 21
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Linguistic theory defines metonymy as a substitution with other aspects of reality with
which a given thing is customarily connected (Eco 1976). The translation from the human
figure and flying to architecture and space takes place through metonymic displacement
instead of a direct resemblance. Head becomes a series of viewing platforms and arms-
wings become a series of mobile components framing different views to the site.
While the concept was giving shape to the form, the form served for the development of
new concepts. Flying machines and airfields at night were evoked to enable the student to
visualise a lighting strategy for his structure. Shadow studies enabled the development of
a strategy for shaping the ground. The marks that shadows left on the sloping plane were
transformed to incisions that sculpted the land. The viewer could follow a promenade from
the top side of the bank to the viewing platform or to the excavated ground and in between
the vertical rods where light could shine from.
Project 9 - A Space for moving and viewing, first year (Student: Guy Wilson)
Explorations on the site lead to the first concept. A number of broken pieces of timber half-
buried in the river's bank provide the idea for a fossil. The study of the human body in
motion develops as a parallel line of exploration. A series of marks expresses selected
fragments of the human form - chest and head (fig. 22). These are eventually translated
into a ribbed structure containing a series of platforms and a number of spherical spaces
to visit and view the site from (fig. 23).
FIGURE 22
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FIGURE 23
The formal system evokes the notion of a skeletal form. The way in which this is anchored
to the ground recalls the original idea - a fossil projecting from the ground. Two parallel
investigations, the site study and the human body, become gradually interrelated into a
formal and conceptual whole. The whole structure is exposed to tidal influences
suggesting an analogy between recurring natural events and life cycles.
CONCLUSION
This paper has studied the role of drawing in architectural design in the light of recent
theories and in the context of nine design projects. It has pointed out that although
theories acknowledge the interrelation of drawing and concepts, they separate visual
representation from the ideas it represents. Drawing is seen as a formal entity bearing no
relevance to the ways in which it can carry and modify an already structured knowledge.
This separation has led to two different attitudes: on the one side, drawing has no content,
making limited contribution to a design process which is dominated by a descriptive and
non-visual reasoning (form follows function); on the other side, its content is specific to
form only and is divorced from any other type of human knowledge (Form to Programme).
Studies on the cognitive processes associated with sketching outline the close interaction
between visual imagery and the thought operations involved in the creative process.
However, they seem to focus on how the mind interprets images rather than on the
structural relationship between these images and the possible meanings the designer can
invest in them.
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As the discussion of the nine projects suggested, drawing lies in the boundary between
content and form. Its intrinsic character to be a visual entity captures aspects from both
areas. Language cannot do the same thing, having no direct sensory contact with reality.
Content derives from the relationships within the drawing, the formal organisation of lines,
shapes and forms. However, like every other communicative system - language, music,
painting - it cannot be reduced to mere formal structure. It carries with it the potential for
expressing and transforming an existing cultural understanding ranging from the intended
function to the symbolic and the poetic.
The architectural concept - what the designer wants to say at the formal, sculptural level
and at the social, semantic level - is dependent upon the plane of visual representation.
The way in which the two levels interact is structured through a system of transformation.
Visual manipulations take concepts and forms from one state to the other establishing
links between a formal and a conceptual order. These can be appropriated either from
inside or from outside the immediate context of architecture. The extent to which creative
links can be achieved depends on the designer's capacity to perform continual back and
forth movements between explorations of form and those of content. It also depends on
metaphoric displacements from one context to the other and from extra-architectural to
architectural domains. These intensify perception, defining the perceptual resemblance
between two things that belong to different contexts. As Judith Wolin notes, they use
'elements that are already known and subject them to operations that allow them to be
read as for [the] first time.'x
Creativity is not a mystical operation to be found in the private and esoteric realm of the
imagination. It can be rationally defined and it can be achieved by encouraging students
and architects to stretch their explorations - from the abstract structures of the shapes and
forms to the ways in which these are interpreted within a given culture or within different
cultures, from the sensational to the intellectual and from the most immediate and obvious
to the remotest and most unexpected.
REFERENCES
i 'I haven't got an imagination that can tell me what I've got without drawing it ... I use drawing as a
process of criticism and discovery', Richard McCormack, in the book Design in Mind, Lawson, B.,
Butterworth Architecture, 1994, p.66.
ii Denise Scott Brown and Robert Venturi refer to drawing as 'a facility between hand and mind', Lawson,
B., Design in Mind, Butterworth Architecture, 1994, p. 98.
iii Mark Gelernter suggests that a designer does not abandon all previous notions about kettles because
without these notions he would not know the requirements for a good kettle design. Gelernter, M.,
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Sources of Architectural Form - A Critical History of Western Design Theory, Manchester University
Press, 1996, p. 273
iv Goldschmidt, G., 'On Visual Design Thinking: the Vis Kids of Architecture', Design Studies, Vol. 15, no 2,
April 1994, p. 159
v Goldschmidt, G., 'The Dialectics of Sketching', Creativity Research Journal, Vol. 4(2) p. 132
vi Fish, J., Scrivener, 'Amplifying the mind's eye: Sketching and Visual Cognition', Leonardo, Vol. 23, No 1,
1990, p.124
vii Colquhoun suggests that the classical piano nobile, wall, pediment, entrance front and roof and
Le
Corbusier's five points are linked together by organisational similarities as by analogy and metaphoric
substitution. Fragments from vernacular and monastic architecture, from paintings and from
technological phenomena are also assimilated and metaphorically absorbed in Corb's work.
Colquhoun concludes that the creative strength of Le Corbusier lies in the creative transformation of
elements coming from inside and outside the realm of architecture into the aesthetic message of his
buildings. Colquhoun, A., 'Displacement of Concepts in Le Corbusier', in the book, Essays in
Architectural Criticism, Modern Architecture and Historical Change, The MIT Press, pp. 43-50
viii Eisenman, P., La Maison Dom-ino, in the book In the Footsteps of Le Corbusier, ed. by Palazzoli, C. and
Vio R., Rizzoli, 1991, p. 34
ix In both cases students tend to take a single step from the initial stage to presentation drawings
avoiding any intermediate stages of visual experimentation. What happens then is that drafting and
presentation are complete but the ideas are still in an embryonic stage. The intention to finalise
drives a design that is not accomplished yet. The intellectual operations necessary to carry out and
complete the process become tailored to orthographic projection and to graphical codes. As Robin
Evans has suggested, conventional architectural drawing limits the design language by describing
buildings that can be only expressed by itself (Evans, 1997). At the same time, the existing graphical
code offers libraries of word-like elements (windows, spiral staircases etc.). These are used as signs
which are stitched to the projects rather than being integral parts of their formal and conceptual
structure.
x Wolin, J., 'The Rhetorical Question', in Via 8, Architecture and Literature The Journal of the Graduate
School of Fine Arts, University of Pennsylvania, Rizzoli, 1986, pp. 16-31
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Alexander, C., Notes on the Synthesis of Form, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1964
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Modern Architecture and Historical Change, The MIT Press, pp. 43-50
Colquhoun, A., 'Typology and Design Method', in Essays in Architectural Criticism, Modern Architecture and
Historical Change, The MIT Press, 1985, pp. 43-50
Eco, U., A theory of Semiotics, Indiana University Press, 1976, pp. 280-281
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Eisenman, P., 'La Maison Dom-ino', in the book In the Footsteps of Le Corbusier, ed. by Palazzoli, C. and Vio
R., Rizzoli, 1991
Evans, R., The Projective Cast, Architecture and its Three Geometries, The MIT Press, 1995
Evans, R., Translations from Drawings to Space, The MIT Press, 1997, p. 160
Fish, J., Scrivener, 'Amplifying the mind's eye: Sketching and Visual Cognition', Leonardo, Vol. 23, No 1, 1990,
pp. 117-126
Galassi, S., G., Picasso's Variations on the Masters, Harry N. Abrams, 1996
Gelernter, M., Sources of Architectural Form - A Critical History of Western Design Theory, Manchester
University Press, 1996, p. 273
Goldschmidt, G., 'On Visual Thinking: the Vis Kids of Architecture', Design Studies, vol. 15, no 2, April 1994,
158-174
Goldschmidt, G., 'The Dialectics of Sketching', Creativity Research Journal, Vol. 4(2), 1991, pp. 123-143
Hillier, B., Musgrove, J., O'Sullivan, P., 'Knowledge and Design', EDRA 3, 1972, pp. 29/3/1-29/3/14
Hillier, B., Leaman, A., 'How is Design Possible', Journal of Architectural Research, III, 1974, pp. 4-11
Lawson, B., Design in Mind, Butterworth Architecture 1994
Lawson, B., How Designers Think, Butterworth Architecture, 1990
Porter, T., The Architect's eye: Visualisation and Depiction of Space in Architecture, E&FN Spon, 1997
Rhowbotham, K., Form to Programme, Black Dog Publishing, London, 1995
Wolin, J., 'The Rhetorical Question', in Via 8, Architecture and Literature, The Journal of the Graduate School
of Fine Arts, University of Pennsylvania, Rizzoli, 1986, pp. 16-31