It all began around 3500 BCE as the foundations of architecture were being laid. Objects, spaces, buildings, and places all begin to have depth and meaning. People began to communicate through the spaces. Through observation and study we can to see how humanity once saw the world and their beliefs on the universe around them. These importance spaces begin to develop in the forms of circles, groves, and stacks. Circles were to mark sacred spots. They also mimicked the sun and moon in shape and showed how important these two elements were to people. We see this represented in one of the first efforts at communicating through places, Stonehenge. This circular stone marked a sacred spot which emulated the sun and moon. Another element, groves are a repetition of vertical elements taking on characteristics of humans or trees. Columns and the Egyptian porches are good examples of groves. The last element, stacks are representative of mountains. They are stacks of material serving as a visual representation of hierarchy, purpose, and importance. A great example of this is the pyramids of Giza. The pyramid is a series of stacks extending to the heavens. These three elements are still key elements in architecture seen today. For example, one can see visual representation all over campus of circles, groves, and stacks. The three elements help emphasize specific order within objects, buildings, spaces, and places.
The three elements serve as foundations to the principles of design harmony, contrast, unity, balance, order and proportion. Groves and stacks began to come together in the shape of temples and palaces such as the Parthenon and Xi’an, China. We begin to see the difference in Greek ideals and reality. For example, the Parthenon was a building that sought perfection and through the use of optical illusions the Greeks pursue this perfection. This can still be seen today with the grandeur of the Parthenon. In representation of order through columns we see archetypes of columns such as Doric and Ionic being used as structural support in megarons. Megarons are the prototypes for modern day buildings because they each had a porch, court, and hearth which are three elements still represented today. All of these new ideas began to take shape in temples such as the Parthenon where groves held up stacks, which told stories through sculptures. These stories were different on each temple across Greece and through this we can see the difference in life, time, and society. The Parthenon serves as the final phase of the evolution of megarons styles. We can also see how proportion was used for the Parthenon when looking at its placing and size as it sits to be seen as the grand prize on top of the acropolis. Economics, gender, and sacrifice all began to represent people’s ideas at the time. For example, the human characteristics in columns were gender specific, with each different archetype being representative of Grecians ideas of male and female. Economics is seen at Delphi which help all the banks of the Greek empire. Here rulers would express their power through the scales of their banks.
As the foundation elements and principles of design took shape three other elements of thought arose in the form of firmness, commodity, and delight. These elements are what people can score a building on being well built. Commodity is the quality of the space and how well it meets user’s needs. Firmness is the performance of the building such as materials used, structural system, and how well the building is built. Delight serves ones aesthetic needs in giving the sense of place a positive effect. As designers began to look at these three ideas building style and purpose began to shift as we moved to Rome. We see city grids taking shape in many of the same forms one would see New York City’s grid however at a much smaller scale. Axis began to be important showing power, balance, and dividing up spaces. Circles, groves, and stacks are still key elements as we see with the Colosseum. The colosseum is a stacking diagram of the empire keeping groves within its structure however they serve a different purpose which gives us a clear diagram of how columns began to serve more as decorative pieces and arches were used as the new structural system. The colosseum was in the shape of a circle and it was a sort of sacred gathering place for people to come and enjoy entertainment similar to the purpose of our modern day Coliseums.
All these terms, elements, and principles we have studied are humanities way of explaining life. They have developed over time into the objects, spaces, places, and buildings we have today. Although modern day buildings seem to be very different from buildings in 3500 BCE they still have the same elements and principles that help diagram similar stories.
Nice job. Expand on your last paragraph. You made very interesting points.
ReplyDeletekeep striving to bring together synthetic ideas that link material, readings, observations.
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