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Difficult Writing vs Clear Expression Jun 6, 2007 (26 of 31 found this helpful)
This book gets lots of play right now in (big "A") Architecture schools. I'm a firm believer that if your thoughts are clear, your writing is clear. This book embarks on many dialectical examples that are explained with too much "difficult writing" for its own good. Grad students of the world, beware the three DDDs that inspire some of this writing: Deleuze, Derrida and Delanda. They plow enormous fields in complicated patterns and only yield a kernel or two. Ironically, I admire Reiser + Umemoto as architects and am looking forward to a book on their more recent work.
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The Sinews of Design May 7, 2007 (14 of 19 found this helpful)
An unxpectedly fine book on architectural theory that's rooted not in politics or aesthetics or lit-crit theory, but in the worlds of physics and engineering-- a look at architecture and architectural possibilities based on the sinews of buildings rather than the ideology of architects. I'm an historian by training, and an aficionado of architecture and design theory. Reiser + Umemoto have created a small book that offers a view of postmodern architecture seen through the lens of the physically possible. Anyone who wants to imagine new cities and new styles of building needs to consider the sheer physical constraints of design, and this book is a fine place to start.
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ideas are good, annoyances are plenty May 8, 2009 (2 of 3 found this helpful)
Yet another example of great architects with great ideas using obscene amounts of archispeak.
Even though RUR chops the reading into 2-3 paragraph length chapters--more digestible chunks--it only kind of eases the hassle of sifting through the jargon. Don't get me wrong, the ideas are interesting when you get to them. I just think they could be communicated with MUCH clearer language. For instance, here's how I would phrase the majority of the "Matter" chapters: "Repetition is good, but it can be boring. It often helps to deviate, slightly, in order to make the repetition visually interesting. Consider these examples..." There you go.
One could argue that the density of verbiage employed by RUR is a result of the "density" of ideas. If that is the case, reading Atlas is like eating 1000lbs of dense brownie. You don't need to eat all of it to get the point(s).
Visually, and this might anger some people, I found the repetition of certain images a little irritating. It doesn't happen all the time, but when it happens it induces a "not again!" response. How many times do they have to show that bridge or moire screen? It would've helped if they introduced some diversity to create a stronger visual narrative. At its worst, the visuals can be as inaccessible and irritating as the writing. At its best...they are very, very interesting.
It's kind of disheartening to see architects that I admire write so obtusely. It's like there's an overlord forcing them to remain high-brow and flamboyant with their language. (an overlord called "we-must-preseve-our hoity-toity, artsy, brilliant architect image-lest-we-lose-business"). I'm glad I read it, but wish some brilliant architectural mind out there would deviate, slightly, from this repetitive tradition.
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a rare exemplar of clarity in architectural writing Oct 17, 2007 (9 of 16 found this helpful)
Reiser and Umemoto (henceforth R&U) have put together a wonderful role model of a textbook in a field that erroneously prides itself on having NO textbooks -- that is, by having far too many "must-read" books that remain disconnected and often irrelevant to the problem of learning HOW TO GO ABOUT wrapping one's head around this thing called Architecture. Without turgidity, mysticism, pedantry, or pretentious narcissism, the authors elegantly demonstrate one version of architectural head-wrapping: THEIRS. But make no mistake: to call it 'theirs' is only to specify the site of the (unavoidable)subjectivity that propels this kind of demonstration. And the clarity with which this demostration is done is yet another demonstration of the refinement of their subjectivity.
This book, along with those by George L. Hersey, is one of the very few books in the field that can actually help one in reducing the confusion in trying to understand what Architecture as a DISCIPLINE really deals with, so overcrowded it is today with so many extra-architectural issues/agendas. After all, it was never Architecture as such that was confusing or difficult to understand. People with clubby exclusionary motives, aided and abetted by academic survivalists -- the small sort of people Dryden derided as 'criticules'(teeny weeny critics) -- have made the topic into the unnecessarily convoluted intestine that it is today. And given the paucity of well-paying or creatively challenging work for architects in the real world, this nefarious practice of obfuscation will likely continue since "all forms of power are always accompanied by some form of mysticism."
But I digress.
I mentioned George L. Hersey's books earlier as exemplars of clarity. I was thinking of his `Architecture and Geometry in the Age of the Baroque'. There you see what actually qualified AS an architectural problem for architects like Borromini and Guarini. You also see the INTENSITY and COMPLEXITY in the SIMPLICITY of the problems they chose to deal with. This kind of architectural cathexis (focus of interest) is something that got lost a while ago with people wasting their vital fluids arguing over possibly important but ultimately extra-architectural issues like low-income housing, importance of having porches, evils of capitalism, etc -- issues that are really a matter of political will, compassion, self-control, and/or common sense.
Enter R&U:
Knowledgeable admirers of the Baroque that they are, they remind us what it really means to "play ball" in Architecture: ripped-pantyhose mediations on Heraclitus be damned, Architecture, like Baseball, has its internally generated/regulated rules that demand consistency with how Nature designs; and playing a great game regardless of all external factors (politics, ideology, economy, management, the weather, etc) is really all that counts in the end.
In five sections, R&U demonstrate the very thing they profess to practice - strategies of ordering - by crystallizing the perennial topics of Architecture. The five headings are:
1. Geometry
2. Matter
3. Operating
4. Common Errors to Avoid
5. The World
Under those five headings, Reiser and Umemoto present short discussions based on themes that are often paired into their basic Yin & Yang. Some examples:
Difference in Kind / Difference in Degree
Variety vs. Variation
Selection / Classification
Classical Body / Impersonal Individuation
Exact / Anexact-yet-rigorous
Continuity / Discontinuity
Intensive / Extensive
No doubt there are ways of looking that go beyond the binary but I agree with this manner of presentation for the clarity it can offer to the student who needs to first get his conceptual house in order anyway.
With their confident yet quiet presentation, R&U steer clear from trying to be clever or pointlessly esoteric. Every illu
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hook, line and sinker May 17, 2008 (0 of 3 found this helpful)
maybe I was once again fooled by how sexy this book is, but I pandered to every word Jesse and Nakano had for me inside. The short entries are well composed and illustrated, have great arguments, and the entire thing can be gobbled up in an afternoon or two.
Currently the book is in my bag, and goes pretty much wherever I do.