NIKOS SIDERIS

ARCHITECTURE & PSYCHOANALYSIS: FANTASY &

CONSTRUCTION

Nikos Sideris is

teaching psychoana-

lyst, member o f the

Strasbourg School

of Psychoanalysis

(EPS) . He teaches

“Architecture and

Psychoanalysis” at

the Postgraduate Pro -

gram of the School

of Architecture at the

National Technical

University of Athen s.

Cover illus t rat ion :

Maria Ts agkari, «Corr ido r I», 2010,

170 x 110 cm, o il on canvas

Cover des ign :

John Naou m

johnnaoum@hot mail.com

ARCHITECTURE AND PSYCHOANALYSIS:

FA N TA SY AND CONSTRUCTION

NIKOS SIDERIS

ARCHITECTURE AND

PSYCHOANALYSIS:

FANTASY AND

CONSTRUCTION

2013

© 2013 Nikos Sideris (www.siderman.gr)

eISBN: 978-960-93-4576-7

1. Archi t ect ure. 2. Psychoanalysis. 3. Fantasy. 4. Construction.

5. Le Corbusier. 6. Pikionis. 7. Tschumi. 8. Gaudi. 9. Nouvel.

10. Modern. 11. Postmodern

This book was first published in Greek under the title:

ΑΡΦΙΤΕΚΤΟΝΙΚΗ ΚΑΙ ΧΥΦΑΝΑΛΥΣΗ:

ΦΑΝΤΑΣΙΨΣΗ ΚΑΙ ΚΑΤΑΣΚΕΥΗ

© 2006 Nikos Sideris (www.siderman.gr)

and Editions Futura (www.futura.gr), Athens

This is a sample of the book.

Available at Amazon.com / Kindle book:

ASIN: B00FWPBWZ0

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00FWPBWZ0

According to the formulas

of ancient Grecosyrian magi

―What distillate can be discovered from herbs

of a witching brew,‖ said an aesthete,

―what distillate prepared according

to the formulas of ancient Grecosyrian magi

which for a day (if no longer

its potency can last), or even for a short time

can bring my twenty three years to me

again; can bring my friend of twenty two

to me again − his beauty, his love.

―What distillate prepared according

to the formulas of ancient Grecosyrian magi

which, in bringing back these things,

can also bring back our little room.‖

Constantine P. Cavafy (1931)

A man sets out to draw the world. As the years go by,

he peoples a space with images of provinces, kingdoms,

mountains, bays, ships, islands, fishes, rooms, instru-

ments, stars, horses, and individuals. A short time be-

fore he dies, he discovers that the patient labyrinth of

lines traces the lineaments of his own face.

J.L. Borges, Afterword to El hacedor, 1960

7

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Dimitris Papalexopoulos:

Nikos Sideris‘ three fronts ................................................................. 9

Summary ............................................................................................. 11

By way of a prologue .......................................................................... 13

The specificity of Architecture ........................................................... 17

Creation and fantasy .......................................................................... 23

The concept of fantasy ........................................................................ 29

Need –Desire –Demand and Savagery .............................................. 38

Fantasy as formulation ...................................................................... 54

Fantasy and identification ................................................................. 60

Questions and answers ...................................................................... 64

Personality: Psyche and Architecture ............................................... 83

Le Corbusier: The dispersion of the creator ...................................... 85

Pikionis: You will not find the unhoped for ...................................... 107

Tschumi, shock and Sade ................................................................... 116

Antoni Gaudi, the master-coppersmith ............................................. 130

Jean Nouvel or the eternal breast ..................................................... 135

Modern vs. post-modern ..................................................................... 141

The language of construction ............................................................. 144

The encounter with the other ............................................................ 146

Architecture and Fantasy .................................................................. 151

An illustration:

A country house in western Peloponnese .......................................... 153

Architecture and the Arts .................................................................. 157

The secret formula .............................................................................. 161

Bibliography ....................................................................................... 163

The writer ........................................................................................... 167

9

NIKOS SIDERIS’ THREE FRONTS

Starting from a cohesive view defining architecture as the

expression of the architect‘s fantasy in terms of construc-

tion, Nikos Sideris initiates three fronts of discussion.

The first front discusses the relation between creator

and creation. Discussion about what creativity is, always

timely, is crucial today, at a time when the means of cre-

ation are changing and the concept of creator is being re-

defined. Psychoanalysis‘ contribution could not be but sig-

nificant. The lacanian ―Real‖ and its relation to the ―Other‖

delineate this front, where rigorously determined and inex-

haustible transformations of fantasy take place.

The second front is developed around two architects , cor-

nerstones for contemporary greek architectu ral thought. Le

Corbusier and the architect-god-creator, on the one hand,

and Dimitris Pikionis and the internal legitimation of ar-

chitectural practice through reference to tradition, on the

other hand.

The third front is about today‘s architectural practice,

about contemporary architects-creators. The circle of their

work and writings is not closed and the discussion about

possible interpretations of their architecture is constantly

changing. This of course is not a ―psychoanalysis‖ of prac-

ticing architects, but rather a suggestion of building a point

of view of self-knowledge for readers-architects.

10

ARCH ITE CTU RE AND PSY CH OANALYSIS

Nikos Sideris invites us to reconsider the relation be-

tween psychoanalysis and architecture not through a sen-

tentious discourse, but through discussions initiated on

these three open fronts. With his singular writing, disen-

gaging from theory and engaging in conversation, in a spi-

ral manner, the expression of a fertile persistence in terms

of ―architecture‖.

September 2006

Dimitris Papalexopoulos

Associate Professor

School of Architecture

National Technical University of Athens

11

SUMMARY

ARCHITECTURE AND PSYCHOANALYSIS :

FANTASY AND CONSTRUCTION

Architecture represents the fantasy of the architect formu-

lated in the language of construction.

Fantasy is the support of the subject‘s world — a world

real or imagined, encountered or fabricated.

Through fantasy, desire invents its forms, investing

things and attributing sense to them.

The architect creates fantasies in order to repair or re-

mould an imperfect or unfinished world. In the psyche of

each architect, in the beginning there always are certain

ruins.

The language of construction frames and constrains

the transposition of the architect‘s fantasy into forms. Its

components embrace limitations, determinations and codes

— natural, technological, technical, practical, economical,

social, historical, political, institutional, cultural, communi-

cational and psychological ones… Its nodal organizer is the

encounter with the Other.

The diff icu lt dialectic synthesis of th is kind can lead to the

emergence of architectural symptoms: Language deficit,

speech emptiness, double language, deficient form, stereo-

typing, repetition…

However, it can also engender the constructed work,

where the subjectivity of the architect is embodied, recog-

nizable as a signifying construction. There, the language

of construction is sublimated and constitutes the space of

creativity, offering fantasy its most favorable mode of ex-

istence: Encounter with things — with its consequent risk

and enjoyment.

The concept of fantasy enables the transition from an

architecture of needs to an architecture of desire.

13

BY WAY OF A PROLOGUE

This text originated from a recorded lecture and the subse-

quent animated discussion, given on the 26th of May 2003,

at the Interdepartmental Postgraduate Program orga-

nized by the School of Architecture at the National Techni-

cal University of Athens. The impact of this undertaking,

repeated in 2004 and 2005, led the school to include the

course ―Architecture and Psychoan alysis ‖ in the postgradu-

ate program since the academic year 2005-2006.

The material was re-elaborated in respect to the basic

needs of written discourse. Still, it retained some of the

grace (I hope) and the shortcomings of oral speech (regard-

ing the second, mostly some redundancies).

Everyone can enjoy what they can, condoning this hy-

brid writing that already has, in psychoanalysis , a tradition

inaugurated by Freud with his Introductory Lectures and

New Introductory Lectures to Psychoanalysis.

Adequate reason leads me to believe (among others)

that teaching ―Architecture and Psychoanalysis‖ at the

National Technical University came to cover an existing

gap and a substantial need. The most convincing indica-

tion is the eagerness of the architects in class. And, above

all, the way they creatively assimilated and productively

integrated in their thought –architectural thought– basic

concepts of psychoanalysis. The results of this process are

already apparent: They are the essays the architects sub-

mitted when the course was completed, where they sensi-

tively, acutely and adequately approach a wide range of

subjects, such as ―The dream as spatial installation‖, ―Pre-

fabricated bath, R. Buckminster Fuller: Towards a psycho-

analytic study of a sublimated fantasy‖, ―A psychoanalytic

reading of the Jewish Museum in Berlin, a work by the ar-

chitect Daniel Libeskind‖, ―Baker residence by Adolf Loos‖,

14

ARCH ITE CTU RE AND PSY CH OANALYSIS

―Surrealism and dream –A reading of the painter Dimitris

Geros‘ work through dreams‖, ―Towards an inscription of

the architectural work into the double spatiality on the oc-

casion of a photographic contingency‖, ―Analyzing the code

of construction –Zaha Hadid, PHAENO‖, ―Readings of the

‗Psychic Project‘ of the work ‗Rooftop Remodelling‘ in Vi-

enna (1983-1988) by COOP HIMMELB(L)AU‖, ―Architec-

ture as the result of the subject‘s fantasy –Utilization of the

model for an architectural element‖, ―Issues of familiarity

in the structurally complex space –A comparison of dream

condensation with sets of forms and meanings in the Gug-

genheim museum by F. O. Gehry in Bilbao‖… A selection

of the best essays, according to my judgment, are already

in the process of being published (by Futura Editions, Ath-

ens), in a collective volume. Apt readers will find there the

material they need in order to look into the fertility and

validity of the encounter between two prominent realms of

the human spirit.

Even though everyone thanked here already know I

am indebted to them, I wish to specifically mention some

people, who, through the years, represent my living chan-

nels of contact with architecture (in some cases, more than

that): Maria Kokkinou and Andreas Kourkoulas, whose

kind friendship and our fertile conversations brought me in

actual contact with Greek architectural thought and real-

ity. Dimitris Papalexopoulos and Eleni Kalafati, who, af-

ter endless hours of deep reflections and wild jokes, at the

beach or elsewhere, represent for me the model of human

and spiritual friendship. Giorgos Parmenidis and Stavros

Stavridis, who fervently embraced the teaching of ―Archi-

tecture and Psychoanalysis‖ at the School of Architecture

of National Technical University. Zissis Kotionis, for his

friendship and inspiring work. The architects Aristidis An-

tonas, Konstantinons Patestos and Dimitris Philippidis,

15

BY WAY OF A PROLOGUE

who participated with productive eagerness in our discus-

sions about Architecture at the Center of Literature and

Art ―104‖. My teachers and students, who represent for de-

cades now breaths of soul and integral parts of my life. And

the publisher Michalis Paparounis for his exceptional sup-

port in intellectual undertakings and ventures.

Athens, September 4, 2006

Nikos Sideris

17

THE SPECIFICITY OF ARCHITECTURE

I will elaborate on some reflections, beginning with the sim-

ple remark that a work of architecture is a piece of creation.

It is evidently not a piece of creation in general. It carries

some distinctive qualities –because, if it were a piece of cre-

ation in general, then it would not be any different from

a poem by Walt Whitman, for example, or one of Martha

Graham‘s choreographies. Furthermore, the precise, albe-

it tautological, expression that it is an architectural work

does not suffice, since something like that, taken by itself,

tells us nothing. So, methodologically speaking, the ques-

tion that rises is: What exactly is it that renders a work of

architecture a particular kind of creation –or, to be more

exact, what is the differentia specifica [distinguishing char-

acteristic] of an architectural work that renders it discern-

ible, factually and conceptually distinct from its kindred

(the visual arts, for example)?

Figure 1 shows the following:

There is a more comprehensive class, the genus of ―cre-

ation‖, which embraces every creative act –from a new reci-

pe for french fries to (imagine that!) architecture. We move

from the genus to different subclasses, the species, through

the differentiating mediation of a certain determination,

the exact epistemological term for which is differentia spe-

cifi ca –i.e. the difference that distinguishes a species within

a genus. To move from the genus of ―creation‖ to the species

of ―architecture‖, the differentia specifica, as I will attempt

to show, is the builder’s way of practice. Later on we will see

what this could mean.

Figure 1 shows more schematically the same thing by

way of circles: There is a wide circle of creations· this con-

tains the subclass of artifacts, which in turn contain cre-

ations of architecture, i.e. a particular type of artifacts.

18

ARCH ITE CTU RE AND PSY CH OANALYSIS

Figure Ι: THE ARCHITECTURAL WORK AS CRE ATIO N

Genus = CREATION

Differentia specifica

(“the manner of the tekton”)

Species = ARCHITECTURE

CREATION

ARTIFACT

ARCHI T EX T URAL WORK

19

THE SPE CIFICITY OF A RCHITE CTU RE

The architectural act in our case means three things: To

create; second, to create in the way of the τέκτων [builder];

third, to create under the guidance and inspirati on of an αρ-

χή [principle]. Therefore, with that further consideration,

our question can be reformulated as follows: What is the

principle that specifically determines creation in the way of

the builder –that is, the creation of the architectural work?

Where do architectural inspiration and creation emerge

from? For example, how is the solution adopted in a proj-

ect (this is what architectural inspiration and creation are

about) constituted as practice and articulated in the way of

the tekton? These are the issues we are going to examine.

When we consider places, periods, schools, etc., we en-

counter recognizable kinds of architectural works. Hence,

there is something suprapersonal here –the style, a certain

fashion, a period, sensibilities or hypaesthesias, authority

or revolt, etc. Still, if examined more specifically, we can see

that every project, every structure, entails a certain choice

being made among alternatives and carried out as it can.

The choice that is being made every time, despite involving

affiliations and references to schools, trends, styles, ideolo-

gies etc., does not just reproduce the existing. It is an act of

creation. Then what follows is: Since it is a choice among

available solutions or the conception of a new one, every ar-

chitectural act also entails a personal involvement.

How is the personal involvement constituted and how

does it work in the case of architectural creation? That is

the question. Allow me here to remind, closing this short

inspection, what the great Greek poet Dionysios Solomos

said: What matters for the good artist ―is not to display pas-

sion and imagination, it is to subdue those two, with much

time and great labor, to the meaning of Art‖.

At this point, while I was checking my notes to sort them

out, put away some and add some others missing, I felt that

20

ARCH ITE CTU RE AND PSY CH OANALYSIS

in a way, the question of imagination and passion has been

marginalized in the theory of architecture –as far as I can

follow it. And there raises another question: Why? While

even in the numerous books I read people often say that one

gets into architecture heart and soul, body and soul (there-

fore passion and imagination could not be missing from

architecture‘s practice), the question of imagination and

passion, the specific imagination and passion that animates

architecture, seems almost untouched, at least in rigorous

theoretical terms. I hope that, with what we discuss today,

we will shed a little more light on this somehow unvisitable

territory.

Obviously, I am not telling you, architects, what to do:

You are taught this by others and by your inspiration . How-

ever, I will show you what you do as architects from a cer-

tain point of view –the one that corresponds to the concept

of fantasy. Think not that I came to destroy the law… I

came to fulfil it. I am proposing, that is, to bear in mind,

in the comprehension and operation of the architectural

practice, a further aspect –one more order of phenomena,

determinations and conceptual tools, singular enough but

still crucial. Or, in other words, to complement the current

notion of architectural practice with a further logical and

operational aspect constituted around the phenomenon of

fantasy.

From this particular aspect, fantasy in architectural cre-

ation, I am certain that you all have an experience or an

observation to testify –not only those of you present, but

also those absent. For example, in ―Whatever Happened

to Urbanism?‖, The City Cultures Reader, Malcolm Miles,

Tim Hall, Iain Borden, (ed.). Routledge, London, 2000.],

Rem Koolhaas says: ―If there is to be a ―new urbanism‖ it

will not be based on the twin fantasies of order and om-

nipotence; it will be the staging of uncertainty (…)‖. In his

21

THE SPE CIFICITY OF A RCHITE CTU RE

monumental study Modern architecture since 1900 (p. 184),

W. Curtis writes: ―This tendency to believe that architec-

tural forms might themselves have redemptive potential

recalls the moralism of Pugin, who had imagined that good

Christian forms (i.e. gothic ones) would accelerate a moral

regeneration […] it comes as a shock to find Walter Gropius

indulging in fantasies of a similar tone in the period around

the founding of the Bauhaus, that is, in 1919‖. Likewise,

Alan Colquhoun (Modern Architecture) maintains: ―The

Art Nouveau movement was overtaken […] and it disinte-

grated with the decline of a certain set of bourgeois and

nationalistic fantasies‖ (p. 33). And elsewhere: ―The [Rus-

sian] Rationalists, starting from the architectural fantasies

of Expressionism…‖ (p. 122) (my italics everywhere). The

point is that, as far as I could make out from the books I

have read and the conversations I have had with people

driven by a wide range of interests, even where the word

appears, the concept has never been introduced in an epis-

temologically rigorous and valid way (not simply a word,

something rhetorical, metaphorical) concerning architec-

tural creation1. There arises an argument not based on the

1. John Shannon Hendrix‘s book Architecture and Psychoanal- ysis –Peter Eisenman and Jacques Lacan, (Peter Lang Publish-

ing Inc., New York, 2006) was recently published. What is worth noting is that the book, very interesting indeed, uses the word

―fantasy‖ very few times, while the concept ―fantasy‖ never enters as an analytical and operational tool, within the context of an ap-

proach based on the lacanian account of psychoanalysis in terms

of a ―linguistic analogue‖. My book on Inner Bilingualism shows rather thoroughly how uncertain this discursive endeavor is, in-

dicating its limitations. Still, Hendrix‘s book is complementary to ours and fully illustrates the necessity as well as the fertility of

a systematic dialogue between architecture and psychoanalysis.

The same can be said about the book ―Phychoanalysis and Ar-

chitecture‖, edited by J.A.Winer, J.W.Anderson, and E.A.Danze,

published by Mental Health Resources, 2006: Although no full

22

ARCH ITE CTU RE AND PSY CH OANALYSIS

relation between architecture and the unconscious, but

rather on the common reduction of both to certain linguis-

tic, or quasi-linguistic mechanisms.

This conceptual void becomes even more dramatically

odd when we think about how often it appears, indirectly

and symptomatically, in the form of circumlocution. Cir-

cumlocutions clearly imply a conceptual void where they

occur. The more strategic this lack, the more circumlocu-

tions appear, ineffectually and awkwardly trying to com-

pensate for it. So, Curtis makes several attempts to talk

of the architect‘s fantasy without resorting to the concept

of ―fantasy‖: ―We have to do with the ways in which fanta-

sies… are translated into architectural terms‖ (p. 14); ―In-

tellectual gambits were thus often used to post-rationalize

what were really intuitive preferences‖ (p. 25); ―Sullivan…

was obsessed with the idea that the architect was specially

endowed with [a] gift‖ (p. 114). Or, even more eloquently,

―[A new tradition in architecture]… lies in the special intel-

lectual chemistry of the individual work of a high order‖ (p.

275); ―(Scarpa) had a myth and a language of his own‖ (p.

482); ―A great architectural creation is like a symbolic world

with its own empires of imagination, its own mental regions

and its own inner landscapes‖ (p. 636); ―[A]uthenticity is

inconceivable without… shapes pregnant with meaning

embodying a mythical interpretation of the world‖ (p. 689).

At this point, allow me to note that the above remarks, re-

gardless of their accuracy, reflect consecutive unsuccessful

attempts of thought, discourse and language to compensate

for a tangible conceptual void, resorting to successive cir-

cumlocutions, metaphors, tropes… It is obvious that figures

of speech of this kind do not even accurately describe the

theory is presented, the multiple approaches and perspectives of-

fer a precious, thoughtful illustration of the need of rapproche-

ment between these two major sensibilities and reasonings.

23

CREATION AND FAN TASY

phenomenon in question: The architectural practice does

not amount, of course, to an alchemy or intuition… The lat- ter

just mark the locus of a question and along with it the

inability to answer it without resorting to an appropriate

concept and the corresponding suitable word –le mot juste.

Therefore, this rhetoric points to something, bringing into

light the simple but fundamental question: How can the

thing I want to say be said? Does that thing have a shape and

a name? If the answer is yes, where can we find them? If not,

how are we to invent them?

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