The Golden Section in Architectural Theory

The never-ending—but always young—discussion about the Golden Section in architecture never lacks a hint at Luca Pacioli and architectural theory. But what it always lacks is a thorough study of the Golden Section in architectural theory. This paper aims to present this analysis. Marcus Frings traces the Golden Section from the mathematical and rather theoretical character of Pacioli’s concept, the the treatises of Alberti, Serlio, and Palladio, to Adolf Zeising in the nineteenth century. and to theorist Matila Ghyka and the practitioners Ernst Neufert and Le Corbusier in the twentieth. In the latter’s writings and designs the Golden Section seems to play the role of a scholarly element which shows the master’s theoretical erudition, leading to contemporary architects such as Ricardo Bofill.     

Third Natures: Incubators of Public Space

Cristina Díaz Moreno and Efrén García Grinda , founders of the Madrid-based office AMID.cero9, shift the notion of the urban from the classic idea of the complete or ideal city, to one which engages with essential urban phenomena: the dynamics of confrontation, dispute and agreement between individuals, social groups and subcultures. In this way, public spaces are transformed from empty spaces into a real context for social interaction; and active involvement with social exchange becomes the main purpose of a project for a new architecture of the city.     

Walter Pichler

Throughout his lifetime, the Austrian-born artist, maker and recluse Walter Pichler has defied an easy understanding of his work or its purpose. ‘Coming into contact with any product [of Pichler's],’ writes critic David Dunster , ‘elicits for me the sensation of a chilling proximity to the inevitable.’ Pichler, the practitioner of personal obsessions, ‘created a commentary that is far from private but retains the nature of an archetypal investigation’. In a rare look at his work, Dunster here offers us an eloquent personal insight that stirs a potent array of emotion. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

About Piero Matematico (CD)

Daniela Gentilin and Ennio Bettanello reflect on the realization of their project for the CD Piero Matematico.     

The Unified Project

Albert Pope argues that a unified architectural and urban project is not possible without addressing the conceptual divide that exists between building and infrastructure. It is a split that was first set in motion by the breakdown of Modernism in the 1960s and was reaffirmed by the rise of Postmodernism. Since then, architectural form and urban infrastructure have not only remained disjointed, but have been overtly celebrated by the collages and juxtapositions of the contemporary and the historic in our cities.     

出新意于法度之中——巴洛克建筑师博罗米尼

博罗米尼是盛期巴洛克的代表建筑师,他的建筑语言充满了动感、节奏、秩序。他从哥特式建筑中汲取结构特性,向帕拉迪奥学习古典元素,并将建筑和雕刻艺术充分结合。他赋予建筑前所未有的动感,创造出全新的空间体验和装饰母题,而这一切都是在严格遵循法度的基础上取得的。     

Proportions in the Architecture Curriculum

Roger Herz-Fischler presents a revised version of a chapter entitled “Proportions” that appeared in the problems part of his book, Space, Shape and Form /An Algorithmic Approach, developed for a mathematics course he taught in the School of Architecture at Carleton University from 1973-1984.

Example of reckoning of a pyramid, Height 250, base 360 cubits. What is its seked?......(Answer:5+1/25 hands). From the Rhind Papyrus¹

¹The Rhind Papyrus is from the Fifteenth Dynasty (c. - 1800), but is known to be based on a Twelfth Dynasty text. For details of the pyramid problems, as well as a discussion of the archaeological, historical and philosophical aspects, related to the problem of determining how the Great Pyramid was designed, see [Herz-Fischler 2000].     

Figuring Mood: The Role of Stimmung in the Formal Approach of Heinrich Wölfflin and Alois Riegl

Roughly translatable as ‘mood’ or ‘atmosphere’, Stimmung plays a key part in the late-19th-century writings of German art historians Wölfflin and Riegl. Andrew Saunders , Associate Professor of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania School of Design, studies the origins of the concept, which links rational perceptions of harmony with notions of emotional response. He examines the two writers' contrasting views of Stimmung in relation to the Baroque, and highlights its little acknowledged role in the inception of formalism.