READING COMPREHENSION 6

[1]

Art Nouveau in Spain

Art Nouveau was more than a mere style, It was a way of thinking about modern society and new production methods. It was also an attempt to redefine the meaning and nature of the work of art. From that time on, it was the duty of art not to overlook any everyday object, no matter how utilitarian it might be. Art Nouveau had a big impact in design in North America all the way to the European continent. The period of time is when architecture and design were flourishing and on its way to the modern style of new inspirations, materials, and techniques. In Spain the style was concentrated in the eccentric hands of Gaudi in Barcelona. His unmistakable style characterized as organic architecture, often used Moorish, Gothic and Baroque elements, combining them with fabulous solutions in a special way: mushroom hat roofs, face shaped windows, colorful mosaics from broken ceramic tiles, amazing works of a talented mind.

He could have been considered even a madman if the aldermen of Barcelona would have been somewhat more conservative, but instead of that many big orders were provided to him fortunately. Casa Battlo is a building that illustrates his style of architecture and the movement of art nouveau in Gaudi's designs. From the outside the facade of Casa Batllo looks like it has been made from skulls and bones. The skulls are in fact balconies and the bones are supporting pillars. Gaudi used colorsand shapes found in marine life as inspiration for his creativity in this building, the colors chosen for the facade are those found in natural coral. The inside dining room illustrates the undulating ceilings, strangely curved windows and door frames, and containing biomorphic furniture designed by Gaudi himself and carved in solid oak. 

Image from Massey pg 47, Art Nouveau in Barcelona, Spain

Art Nouveau in Munich, Germany

Art Nouveau in germany was commonly known by its German name, Jugendstil. Drawing from traditional German printmaking, the style was much different than that in Spain, including precise and hard edges, an element that was rather different from the naturalistic style of the time. The movement was centred in Munich and Darmstadt and was an essential element of the German movement. Within the field of Jugendstil art, there was a variety of different methods, applied by the various individual artists. Methods range from classic to romantic. One feature that set Jugendstil apart was the typography used, whose letter and image combination was unmistakable. The combination was used for covers of novels, advertisements, and exhibition posters Designers often used unique display typefaces that worked harmoniously with the image. The movement was influenced by different individuals, unlike in Spain, August Endell was one of the designers that was creating beautiful designs in Munich. When looking at the Elvira photography studio stair case, one gets the illusion of floating marine motifs just like illustrated in the image above, which makes sense because all the shapes used on this stair case were originally marine inspired shapes. 

image from Massey pg 46, Art Nouveau in Munich, Germany

[2]

One of the most famous houses of the modern movement in architecture, the Villa Savoye is a masterpiece of LeCorbusier's purist design. It is perhaps the best example of LeCorbusier's goal to create a house which would be a "machine a habiter," a machine for living in. Located in a suburb near Paris, the house is as beautiful and functional as a machine. 
The Villa Savoye was the culmination of many years of design, and the basis for much of LeCorbusier's later architure. Although it looks severe in photographs, it is a complex and visually stimulating structure. As with his church of Notre Dame du Haute, Ronchamp, the building looks different from every angle. After falling into disrepair after the war, the house has been restored and is open to the public for various tour purposes. Features of the villa include modular design, abstract sculptural design, pure colors, a very open interior plan, spiral stair cases and ramps, roof garden with the idea of building what has been removed from earth, ribbon windows. All these features are part of the modern movement used in most of LeCorbusier's designs. Also the idea of the house raised on stilts to separate it from earth and use the land efficiently. 

LeCorbusier, Villa Savoye 1928 - 1931 Roth pg 531

[3]

Grete Schutte Lihotzky Frankfurt Kitchen  1926 pg 77 Massey

REFLECTIONS SUMMARY

Kathryn

http://kmfryeblog.blogspot.com/

she states how iron and glass became the dominant idea and the explorations of new building materials and techniques as the 19th century emerged. She also talked about how the royal pavilion incorporated many of the western and eastern influences in design. She states how exotic the interior of this building is and how the chandelier in the middle becomes hierarchy to establish the gathering space of the dining room table. 

Hailey

www.hrtaylor.blogspot.com

states  the explosions of how new design revelations were brought into the western designers viewpoints. According to Hailey, world Fairs began to expose  from all across the globe under a single roof, allowing people to be able to touch and experience the world around them. Image below illustrating the new era of design in the early 19th and late 18th centuries. 

Samantha

http://samanthalynnsmith.blogspot.com/

focused on the arts and crafts movement that started in Britain and comes to the United States of America later. She also discussed the great exhibition of the 1851 crystal palace of how it was an era in design of many ideas and introduction to new innovations in design.

ALTERNATIVES SUMMARY

Kathryn

http://kmfryeblog.blogspot.com/

opened the alternatives summary with the explosion of the Renaissance  making an interesting  point on how simple shapes became a reason for resonance. Then after exploring the renaissance she begins to talk about the baroque period in which she states that this period of time is where breaking the rules and boundaries becomes the alternate to design. Also you begging to see more fluidity in design in terms of new techniques as the design continued to change. To illustrate how the baroque and renaissance periods emerged, she provided an image of the Laurentian library. According to Kathryn the image shows Michelangelo's technique of representing the idea of waves and how there is not a boundary for water.

Hailey 

www.hrtaylor.blogspot.com

begins the alternatives unit with defining what the word alternatives mean and according to her definition the word "alternatives" is defined as employing or following nontraditionalor unconventional ideas,  and methods.  As she explored the renaissance unit she provided the image of the Florence cathedral as the domes were beginning to be incorporated on buildings. 

Samantha

http://samanthalynnsmith.blogspot.com/

states how churches allowed people to travel across Europe and the influence of how the renaissance changed the design of churches during the renaissance period. Image of the Basilica San Marco illustrating the gothic revival on churches as well as the incorporation of domes.  

COUNTERPOINT: CLOCK

For the Reflections unit we had to fashion a clock which the main purpose was to incorporate one form one scale and all of four aspects as we had previously addressed in all of the past counterpoint projects. My idea consisted of a word that meant revolution to the 19th century, then address people, material, symbol, and nature. For this project I incorporated the images of the Crystal Palace in London, The Galleria Vitorio Emanuele II at Milan, and The Galerie des Machines in France. The three buildings show scale as it relates to people, show material which was iron and glass the two new building materials that revolutionized the 19th century. The images of the three building also showed symbolism which was marked in each city because of the impact that it created by the exhibition of iron and glass. The clock part comes together as emphasizing a timeline that started with the Crystal palace as the great exhibition of 1851 took place in London. That's where Iron and glass was considered to be a revolution, which later transformed the style of architecture of different places in Europe such as Italia and Francia.

POINT: REFLECTIONS

In the reflections unit we studied the stages of  architecture and design and the different shifts as the introduction of new building techniques and materials emerged. But first we studied how Thomas Jefferson borrowed  inspirations from different places in Europe. For example the design of the U.S. Capitol building was inspired on ancient classical buildings which were The Roman Pantheon,  and the circular domed Rotunda dedicated to all pagan gods. As we talked about the different buildings in Washington D.C , we explored the lay out of the city of Washington and how it was design to accommodate the different branches of government. After surveying the site of Washington, Pierre L'Enfant which was the designer, developed a Baroque plan that featured ceremonial spaces and grand radial avenues, while respecting natural contours of the land. The result was a system of intersecting diagonal avenues superimposed over a grid system. The avenues radiated from the two most significant building sites that were to be occupied by houses for Congress and the President.

Influenced by the designs of several European cities and 18th century gardens such as France's Palace of Versailles, the plan of Washington, DC was symbolic and innovative for the new nation. Only limited changes were made to the historic city bounded by Florida Avenue on the north and the waterways on the east, west and south until after the Civil War. The foremost manipulation of L'Enfant's plan began in the 19th century, and was codified in 1901 when the McMillan Commission directed urban improvements that resulted in the most elegant example of City Beautiful tenets in the nation. L'Enfant's plan was magnified and expanded during the early decades of the 20th century with the reclamation of land for waterfront parks, parkways, an improved Mall and new monuments and vistas. Two hundred years since its design, the integrity of the plan of Washington is largely unimpaired boasting a legal enforced height restriction, landscaped parks, wide avenues, and open space allowing intended vistas. Constant vigilance is needed by the agencies responsible for design review, it their charge to continue the vision of L'Enfant.

As the 19th century approached, we were introduced with the revolution of iron and glass, and the changes in manufacturing , transportation, architecture, furniture and so many other fields of study. The great exhibition of the Crystal Palace is a great example of the revolution of iron and glass and how this two new building materials combined made such great structures.

Furniture in the 19th century had major changes as well, The design and development of furniture over the centuries had been steady and predictable. It was largely influenced by the availability of materials such as iron, and the changing fashions of the eras. Armoires were designed for suits of armour, but later became wardrobes for clothing. Chairs lost their arms to accommodate wide skirts, and became upholstered and comfortable to fit in with the drawing 

rooms of fashionable ladies. 

Charles Rennie Mackintosh is another household name in design today. 
He was primarily an architect and designer and a great exponent of Art Nouveau, but his progressive ideas spilled out into his furniture designs. Together with his wife, Mackintosh had a great influence on the changing styles from the Arts and Crafts movement to the radical mass produced Art Nouveau styles of the late 1800's and early 1900's.

Image above illustrating the use of wallpaper covering in the walls and how it revolutionized the interiors of rooms in the 19th century. Wallpapers were used much more like to tell stories and record timelines. 

READING COMPREHENSION 5

[1]

(ROTH, PG 488)
The use of glass and iron in structures such as the Crystal Palace revolutionized architecture not only in architecture but also in bridges, and machinery as well. This period of time is what marked the science of building and transformed architecture into more modern and firmness buildings. Now in the present iron and glass is what most used in buildings, modern structures, sustainable design structures and basically in all architectural building types. Furniture took a different shift as iron was introduced in the 19th century being the fact that almost all chairs and tables were made of wood until the beginning of the 19th century, when new materials inspired new designs.

When it was first used, iron had to be hand wrought, but with the innovations of the Industrial Revolution, iron could be molded or cast. The earliest cast iron furniture in England, made about 1823, was used in gardens, parks and cemeteries.

But it was the 1851 Crystal Palace exhibition that made cast iron popular. Benches that looked as if they had been made from branches, ferns or grapevines were made for gardens. Soon geometric patterns, leaves and scrolls were designed so the furniture resembled the Gothic or Rococo Revival styles of wooden furniture. The garden could be furnished with iron chairs, tables, benches, urns, fountains and statues.

[2]

The history of crafting and using Chinese furniture began during the first millennium AD when some Chinese decided they would be more comfortable sitting on chairs instead of squatting on the floor. Before this time, the Chinese usually conducted their lives and their business at floor level, as many Asian cultures did and some still do today.

Westerners may have used furniture before the Chinese, but once the Chinese cabinetmakers began crafting cabinets, chairs and tables they learned their craft and the intricacies of furniture making quickly. They learned to construct superbly designed and proportioned pieces without using nails, and with only a minimal use of dowels and glue. One of their greatest accomplishments are cabinets. 

(CHINESE CABINET ARTIFACT)

http://www.shanxi.co.uk/images/products/cabinets/tall_cabinet01.jpg

The architecture of a traditional Chinese home made no allowances for built-in closets. Closets are a Western innovation, and are still a rarity in Chinese societies from Hong Kong to Taipei to Beijing. Also, the Western concept of an armoire or a wardrobe cabinet did not exist in the Ming Dynasty China, as the Chinese would never hang clothes vertically inside a cupboard. Instead clothes and bed linens were laid flat inside a chest or cabinet, or hung on wooden racks. Dynastic robes were folded and stacked horizontally, rather than vertically on hangers. 

(THE BAHIA LOTUS TEMPLE INDIA BUILDING)

http://luckypennies.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/lotus3.jpeg

After the British left India in 1947, Indian architecture dropped into an abyss. Indian architects, who were relegated to the role of being assistants to the British architects under the British Raj, took their own time to express their ingenuity. Perhaps, there was an identity crisis, a dilemma whether to bask in the glory of the past or move forward with times using new ideas, images and techniques. Perhaps indian architecture has influenced the design in some parts of the world. 

While in other fields like art, music and culture, the distinct Indian imprint was more enhanced in the post Independence period; no such thing was discernible in the case of architecture.  It is no doubt that the Indian architects were unable to achieve a transformative architecture despite the existence of great potential at the time of Indian Independence. Now in the present indian architecture has evolved just like the image represented above. 

(SPACE) http://71.18.245.63/images/Japanesearchitecture

Traditional Japanese architecture has been highly affected since Japan decided to open its gates to western culture and architecture in particular. Japan made efforts to preserve traditional Japanese architecture features, but western modern architecture has taken its tole and now we see more concrete and steel and flat-roofs terraces in modern Japanese houses.

(PLACE)

The principal Islamic architectural types are: theMosque, the Tomb, the Palace and the Fort. From these four types, the vocabulary of Islamic architecture is derived and used for buildings of lesser importance such as public baths, fountains and domestic architecture. Today Middle Eastern architecture has not only influenced the design in surrounding areas but all over the world. Mosques have been built all over the U.S. territory for worshiping and gathering purposes. 

(Jerusalem mosque)

http://wwwdelivery.superstock.com/WI/223/1890/PreviewComp/