Towards an Understanding of the Analogical and Digital interface in Architecture by Means of Communication and Cultural Theory

In Siegfried Giedion's last text entitled, Architecture and the Phenomena of Transition, he traces the evolution of Western architectural space-conceptions from Antiquity to Modernity. In turn, Gideon's work influenced the cultural theorist Marshal McLuhan (McLuhan 1962, 44), who developed a media-structuralist account of the Western evolution of space-conceptions but, in terms of media effects on human senses, sensibility and consciousness. McLuhan referred to the pre-Socratic perception of space as ‘acoustic space', which engages perception synesthetically (a ratio of all the senses in interplay) at a human scale; i.e. as an embodied consciousness. However, since Antiquity, a Western space-conception evolved which he describes as ‘visual space'; the result of the abstraction of the eye from synesthesia or the dominance of the eye over the other senses. This sensibility, or spatial bias, was conditioned by the evolution of the phonetic alphabet environment (a medium that extends the eye) which fostered a progressively analytical mechanical worldview in the West. However, during the 19th century, with the invention of electric communications (a medium that extends the nervous system) and, eventually with the emergence of wired connectivity and information technology, McLuhan again characterised our post-modern space-conception as ‘neo-acoustic'; i.e. a digitally amplified space and concomitantly extended perception characterized as virtual synesthesia. Post-Modern neo-acoustic space is a side-effect of the electronic extension of our nervous system and brain which constitutes the environmental surround facilitating human communication within the ‘Global Village'. Today, we more and more live in a networked world (wired and wireless) sustaining individual and collective consciousness by means of disembodied images, or virtual simulacra; that is, a social reality in which consciousness is constituted of sensory images generated in real-time communication of information processing and programming. In particular, McLuhan's media studies enhance one's awareness of the cultural formation of spatial biases conditioned by technological environments. During our pre-alphabet (acoustic space) and phonetic alphabet (visual space) traditions, these respective cultures fostered conceptions of architectural space and form grounded in physical or analogue extensions of the human body. With the emergence of an electronic neo-acoustic space, or cyberspace, whereby synaesthesia is mediated digitally at the scale of a global surround, our body image, or paper identity tends towards the discorporeal. We are living between dual or hybrid influences of embodied and discarnate acoustic spaces, which foster new conceptions and approaches in architectural design. Architectural conceptions of visual space, acoustic space and neo-acoustic or cyberspace will be explored in this paper

"To build or not to build": LEGO® Shakespeare™ and the Question of Creativity

International audienceThis essay aims to explore the cultural stakes underlying the fleeting and almost incongruous Shakespearean presence in The LEGO Movie (2014), analyze the meeting of "LEGO" and "Shakespeare" in the cinematic and digital worlds, and suggest that at the heart of the connection between Shakespeare and LEGO lies the question of originality and creativity. "LEGO Shakespeare" evinces interesting modes of articulation between art and industry, production and consumption, high-brow culture and low-brow culture and invites us to study how Shakespeare is digested into and interacts with multi-layered cultural artifacts. It will be this essay's contention that Shakespeare's unexpected manifestation in The LEGO Movie is a symptom of LEGO's official re-appropriation of more playful and grass-roots productions. These creations stem from users who become "prosumers" in the participatory culture of Web 2.0 and who interact with both the LEGO world and Shakespeare's canon in a cross-over that turns the playwright into a figure that oscillates between spectrality and materiality

Between virtuality and reality: remarks about perception of city architecture

In the contemporary reality the term "diversity" has become the basic feature that characterizes both creation and perception of the surrounding world. Trying to describe the city as the place to live of the half of the Earth's population faces the same problem that occurs during attempts to define styles or tendencies in architecture, urbanism or each other area of human activity. Therefore it is not possible to indicate one model of the contemporary city, and to determine its appropriate scale, structure and function. Considering complexity of contemporaneity, it’s multi–layering and a variety of possible reference points (named here "perception"), the only element which can be identified as prevalent in discussion about the city is man. Developing space in our cities is followed by the continuous development of the parallel virtual world. Perhaps it is still too early to name it "virtual reality", comprehended in the way in which we perceive the reality around us. It doesn’t change the fact, that fragments of electronic space, acting as digital memory, change our perception of architecture and cities. Currently the technology development affects Homo Sapiens much more than other factors in the environment where we live. One can ask, whether this new reality won’t entirely replace the need of direct contact with the real world. The city and its architecture is perceived through electronic prostheses. The surrounding world ceases to be perceived in a natural way and images of images become objects of human perception. The intention of these considerations is not to answer these questions, but to focus attention on problems arising from the change of perceiving architecture

"Breaking the cage" : tradition and innovation in Marcos Novak’s architecture-music relationship

Tradition and innovation / edited by Maria do Rosário Monteiro, Mário S. Ming Kong. - London : Routledge, 2021. - ISBN 9780367277666.This paper discusses how tradition and innovation cross and confront each in the thought of Marcos Novak and in his ideas for a new architecture - liquid architecture - which is conceived as a hybrid discipline, which he calls archimusic and which emerges from the fusion of architecture and music

Re-inventing the Black Box Theatre

I propose the creation of a Re-Invented Black Box Theatre on the premise that the current black box theatre is no longer living to its fullest potential as a small intimate theatre. This Re-Invented Black Box is a space where audience, performer, and dramatized subject is successively integrated with the external world. This type of theatre is an attempt to utilize elements of the original Black Box Theatre – the level of intimacy between audience, performer, and drama – and synthesize it with mediated levels of outside influences and environment. As a result, this will cause the audience and performer to be keenly aware that the drama presented has no independent reality in some fantasy world. By doing this, the mind is kept in the present with full analytic faculties to determine solutions for correlative problems that might actually exist in the real world. The architecture of theatre is key in determining the rapport with the audience, the perception they will have, and the level of critical engagement they will have with the material presented. Currently, the delineation of the audience and performer via the elevated proscenium, changing stage props, and darkened theatre hall creates a perfect environment for the audiences’ mind to slip into a fantasy world. The creation of the more intimate ‘Black Box’ theatre, was designed to remedy the ‘psychic’ distance between audience, performer, and the drama being presented. However, this evolution still remained ineffective to a certain degree, since the darkened room and intimate black box theatre hall separated the audience, performers, and drama from the external reality that existed in the outside world. Such isolation of the entire theatre experience still allowed the audiences’ mind to slip into a distant fantasy world, where the mind cannot completely disassociate real from performance. Most importantly, however, this means that this proposed Re-Invented Black Box Theatre has both new utility and new aesthetic contributions and value to theatre, architecture, and the society for which it comments upon

A Historical Account on Italian Mechanism Models

This illustration-based paper presents and account of Italian History on the collections mechanism models that were used and still can be used in design, teaching, and research activities not only on research and development of mechanical systems. A conceptual procedure is outlined for the development and use of mechanism models mainly at reduced scaled size. Main Italian collections of mechanism models are introduced with their historical values and current status. Those examples are reported also to show the value of Cultural Heritage that mechanism models and corresponding developments may have as worthful for preservation and understanding of past achievements in mechanism design and its application even in other frames

Observations and experiments in architecture and corporeality

Tese de Doutoramento em Arquitetura, com a especialização em Teoria e Prática do Projeto, apresentada na Faculdade de Arquitetura da Universidade de Lisboa para obtenção do grau de Doutor.N/

“E-DAKWAHâ€: TINJAUAN AWAL KONTESTASI ISLAM, DAKWAH, DAN INTERNET

Sebagai agama universal, Islam sejatinya tidak pernah berbenturan dengan kemajuan zaman. Umat Islam, karenanyam dituntut untuk mampu mengaktualisasikan ajaran-ajaran yang ada di dalamnya serta meremajakan metode penyampaiannya agar dapat kebenaran klaim universalitas tersebut. salah satu fenomena terkini yang muncul dalam konteks peremajaan metode penyampaian ajaran-ajaran Islam adalah model dakwah elektronik atau biasa dikenal dengan e-dakwah. Makalah ini menyajikan tinjauan kritis tentang fenomena anyar tersebut dari berbagai aspeknya dan mengajukan kesimpulan bahwa suatu usaha peremajaan metode dakwah sejatinya haruslah diimbangi dengan kematangan pertimbangan dan kajian atas berbagai hal yang mungkin muncul kemudian. Kata Kunci: dakwah, Internet, Islam, dan Kontestasi