Urban Culture Institute
  • Home
  • Projects
    • Worcester
    • Howes Park
    • Coppens Square Park
    • Codman Square Park
    • Gourdin Park
    • Kulturpark Berlin
    • TEMPOart
    • Ringer Park
    • Mather School Green Space
    • MBTA Red Line Wollaston Station
    • MBTA Silver Line Extension
    • Boston Children's Hospital
    • HarborArts Boston
    • Social Muscle Club
    • Memphis Art Walk
    • To Extremes
    • Art in Architecture Study
    • BSA Placemaking Network >
      • 2019 Placemaking Seminars
      • 2018 Placemaking Seminars
      • 2017 Placemaking Seminar Series
      • Placemaking Seminar Series 2016
      • Placemaking Seminar Series 2015
      • Placemaking Seminar Series 2012
      • Placemaking Seminar Series 2011
      • Placemaking Seminar Series 2010
      • Placemaking Seminar Series 2009
      • Placemaking Seminar Series 2008
  • Blog
  • Publications
  • Team
  • Maps
    • Fenway-Kenmore
    • Fort Point-Seaport
  • Contact

Time, Space and Material

2/15/2016

1 Comment

 
Picture
Book Review of Time, Space, and Material: The Mechanics of Layering in Architecture by Anne-Catrin Schultz
Dr. Christina Lanzl
​
In her new monograph, Time, Space, and Material: The Mechanics of Layering in Architecture (Edition Axel Menges, 2015) Anne-Catrin Schultz deepens her inquiry into spatial layering of the built environment. Schultz delved into the subject with the publication, Carlo Scarpa–Layers (Edition Axel Menges, 2007), an examination of the 20th century Italian architect, whose vocabulary and inventiveness is closely related to traditional craft and the knowledge of materiality. Scarpa’s design thoughtfully integrates historic structures with contemporary materials. Time, Space, and Material covers the concept of layering in architecture, its mechanics, a wide array of uses and narrative in architecture and urban design in an overview survey. The book offers an insightful, scholarly view of layering, an important topic because “cities and buildings are continuously exposed to additions and subtractions according to changes in social structures, use patters, technology, transportation, and economy (p. 7). “
​The author presents a useful, interdisciplinary discourse on architecture understood as a continuous process based on the concept of layers. Clear definitions of layering in several scientific fields examining the physical environment are introduced and serve as structure of the entire book with chapters on:
• Temporal layering: sedimentation, additive or subtractive process over time;
• Spatial Layering: simultaneous perception of spaces; and
• Material Layering: additive configuration of planes.
More recently, Schultz has expanded her scientific scope to include cultural placemaking, thus adding the dynamics of the immaterial, i.e. human memory and narrative, which inform the meaning of place.
 
Laid out are layering processes in geology, archaeology, engineering, graphic design and the visual arts. The key to Schultz’s approach is an examination of sections beyond a structural or stylistic understanding, ultimately aimed at dissecting, analyzing, and folding a period, a city, or a structure into a system of data. In the literature the ‘monolith’ dominates up to the 18th century. A layered approach enters the conversation beginning in the 19th century.
 
A thoughtful connection is made to visual artists intense experimentation with layering starting with modernism. Prominent examples showcased are early 20th century Cubism, developed by George Braque (and Pablo Picasso, though not mentioned) with collages of single objects that are defined through simultaneous, coexisting planar layers. In the 1960s and 1970s, Robert Smithson’s minimalist geometric forms introduce repetitive layering and serialization in this minimalist vocabulary, further developed by Gordon Matta Clark in his ‘building cuts’. The link to contemporary art is established by the large-scale installations of Japanese artist Nabuko Nakanishi, comprised of hundreds of successive images in his Layer Drawings. Also mentioned might be the infinite mirrored assemblages of Josiah McElheny.
 
The phenomenon of layering in architecture is painted in broad strokes beginning with a review of Vitruvius, followed by insights on the temporal layering of important historic buildings through the centuries with their evolving architectural styles. A subchapter is dedicated to the important discovery of polychromy and its connection to textile design in Greek temples beginning around 1800.
 
Outstanding recent, featured examples of layering include the Santa Catarina Market in Barcelona and the transformation of this former convent to a covered market by architects Enric Miralles and Benedetta Tagliabue who collaborated with artist Toni Comella on a dramatic colorful roof mosaic.
 
A comparison of fifteen case studies in contemporary architecture that measure both the effective depth and the chronology of layering in building envelopes reveals surprising insights. The exteriors of notable designs by Foster + Partners, Morphosis, Sauerbruch Hutton and Peter Zumthor range in depth from over four up to eight feet. Others, such as Duiker, SANAA and SOM, designed walls of less than one foot in depth. Interestingly, it is revealed, intense layering clearly is a preferred architectural practice rather than an evolving trend.
1 Comment

    Urban Culture Institute

    The Urban Culture Institute
    ​works with diverse communities to transform civic spaces into meaningful, dynamic places. Our award-winning practice is committed to excellence in the arts and culture. 

    Archives

    May 2021
    August 2020
    June 2020
    January 2020
    November 2019
    June 2019
    March 2019
    November 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    June 2017
    April 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    June 2016
    April 2016
    February 2016
    December 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    June 2015
    April 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    September 2014
    July 2014
    April 2014
    September 2013
    July 2013
    March 2013
    January 2013
    November 2012

    RSS Feed

    Categories

    All
    Airport Art
    Anne-Catrin Schultz
    Art
    Art In Architecture
    Art-in-Architecture
    Artists Help Desk
    ARTitecture
    Arts And Culture
    Arts And Technology
    Art Tour
    ArtWeek Boston
    Austin TX
    Blue Trees
    Book Talk
    Boston
    Boston Center For The Arts
    Boston Creates
    Boston Society Of Architects
    BSA Space
    Campus
    Chelsea Art Walk
    Chelsea MA
    Christina Lanzl
    Christine Henseler
    Christopher Janney
    Dendroids
    Department Of Architecture
    Dieta Sixt
    Digitalkunst
    Diller+Scofidio
    Durig & Rami
    Edward Ingersoll Browne Trust Fund
    Einstein Tower
    Erich Mendelsohn
    Exhibition
    Facade
    Fort Point Arts Community
    Fort Point Tech & Art Tour
    Forum
    FPAC
    Friends Of Fort Point Channel
    Guarracino Family Gallery
    Historic Fort Point
    ICA Boston
    Imagine Boston 2030
    Institut Du Monde Arabe
    Institute Of Contemporary Art/Boston
    Jean Nouvel
    Josefine Günschel
    Julian Opie
    Julie Burros
    Kinetics
    KMD Architects
    Konstantin Dimopoulos
    Kulturpark
    Kunst Im öffentlichen Raum
    Land Art
    Landing Studio
    Materialitaet
    Mather School
    Medien
    MIT Museum
    Ned Kahn
    Open Room Austin TX
    Patrick Dougherty
    Peabody Essex Museum
    Placemaking
    Port Park
    Projection Mapping
    P+ Studio
    Public Art
    Richard Bertman
    Richard McGuinness
    Roxy Paine
    Sculpture
    Soma
    Stefan Pietryga
    Steven Holl
    Stickwork
    Storefront For Art And Architecture
    The Blue Trees
    Urban Culture Institute
    UrbanScreen
    Vancouver Biennial
    Vito Acconci
    WBUR
    Wentworth
    Whitney Biennial

Proudly powered by Weebly