Structure versus Ornamentation Research Paper

Structure versus Ornamentation Research Paper

Paper instructions per Final Paper outline:

Choose one text from the course bibliography and one building, project, or architectural object that
you wish to discuss, and write a 12-15 page essay that presents and critiques a relationship(s)
between (choose one of these): 1) an architectural canon and an architectural theory of
representation or 2) an architectural theory of representation and an architectural design or 3) an
architectural canon and an architectural design.

As you write your essay, keep in mind that you are expected to argue a point and contribute new
evidence, not to summarize. Your thesis should be situated in an existing debate in architectural
discourse. Conduct thorough research on your subject, selecting relevant primary and secondary
texts that will provide the framework for your architectural analysis. Support and illustrate your
argument abundantly by interpreting the text of your choosing and images at hand. Consider
modes of writing and media, as well as historical context, not only the content of the theories
themselves.

The quality of your writing and analysis is expected to be high – give yourself enough time to
write and revise your essay. There are many right answers, as there are wrong ones: answers that
are too vague, that don’t engage the material, of that perform only point-by-point comparisons
without proposing any synthesis or making conceptual arguments. You may use secondary
sources, starting with those on the syllabus. Cite them appropriately. Note that Wikipedia is not a
valid secondary source.

Your paper should be 12-15 pages, double-spaced, in 12 pt font. A complete bibliography as well
as images should be attached at the end of the paper. The bibliography and images do not count
toward your page count.

—

Thoughts from me:

I have dropped the readings that I have looked at in the uploads which includes Laugier’s Essay on Architecture which will be the text chosen from the course bibliogrphy. The idea that I want to discuss and make an argument on is whether the column is structure or ornamentation (a debate that has gone on thoughout architectural history) and argue that they need not be separated as they are both unified in the column and cannot be pulled apart. Below, I’ll drop what I have so far consisting of an intro (very rough), an outline, thoughts from me and the prof, and some sources and ideas for examples.

In the end, I hope to have a 14 page paper that presents the argument thoughtfully and backs it up with other examples. I would love to even see an analysis of a counter argument but then bring it back around to respectfully lead the reader the other way. The instructions say keep the analysis to a limited amount but in speaking with my professor, they encourage analyzing the references and then putting them to use in the argument as reinforcement. My prof suggested, as the topic is based on the visual nature of columns, to add a number of reference images that reinforce the argument, analysis, and ideas. I have left a few examples that I have found particularly interesting and sure to spark some analysis below. The readings, Picon, Antoine. The Freestanding Column, and Rykwert, Joseph. The Dancing Column, should include some higlights that I noticed in reading which should aid in leading the research.

My writing style usually consists of detailed explanations but not using too large of words to maintain its understandability.

Again, the bibliography and images do not count toward the page count.

—

What I have so far:
The
Column

Throughout architectural history, the vertical column has
stood as a strong symbol of structural stability and has maintained the
spotlight as a crucial element of any structure. However, even with that
importance resting upon it, the column also finds itself in the midst of a
centuries long debate of whether it must be purely structure or purely
ornamentation. Throughout the duration of this essay, we will look at the arguments
and examples of both structure and ornamentation as well as a challenge to this
age-old debate asking why these two categories are so difficult to pull apart.

The
Primitive Hut

Intro

–
Thesis

–
Intro
to argument

Body

–
The
primitive hut – looking at the root of architecture and where the column “originated
from”

–
Structural
– hint corner problem somewhere? – Seagram Building(NYC), structure as
ornamentation

–
Ornamental
– hint the idea of a pilaster being an imitation of a column but exclusively ornamentation
– add on with the corner problem that plagues renaissance architecture up until
even today. Not much scholarly work that I could find but there are many articles
on how architects turn corners and maintain the aesthetics of it.

–
Argument

Conclusion

–
Tie
things up

–
Address
things at a broader context

Bibliography

Annotations

Thoughts from me and the prof:

Why Are these categories so
hard to pull apart? Something about the column that is irreducible. All
modern architecture as a polarized debate between ornament and structure.

Main Thesis: Not is the column
essentially structure or essentially ornament, but rather, why are these two
categories somehow so hard to pull apart?

When is the moment where we
start to look at architecture as an assemblage of discrete categories?

When do we start to think we
can separate ornamentation & structure? 19th Century? 18th?
Primitive hut? Where does ornamentation creep back in?

Structure vs Ornamentation:
Are these categories ever purely distinct?

Corner problem?

Prelim Bibliography

1)
Picon,
Antoine. The Freestanding Column

2)
Rykwert,
Joseph. The Dancing Column

3)
Mertims,
Detlef. Mies

4)
Picon,
Antoine. The Materiality of Architecture

5)
Vitruvious,
Marcus. The Ten Books on Architecture

6)
Laugier, Marc-Antoine. An Essay on Architecture – from course
reading

a.
All
architecture stems form 3 elements: Column, Entablature, Pediment

b.
Man
simply wants shade from sun and shelter from storm

c.
He
argued for the simplicity of architecture in the midst of the high baroque

d.
“architecture”
points to a new structural clarity found in nature, rather than the ironic
ruins of the past – wiki

7)
Rykwert,
Joseph. The First Moderns: The Architects of the Eighteenth Century

8)

Examples:

–
Primitive
Hut

–
Parthenon
– 447 BC

–
St.
Peters Basilica – 1505 AD

–
Mies
– Barcelona Pavilion – 1928 AD

–
Frank
Lloyd Wright – J&J HQ – 1939 AD

–
Gaudi?
Park Guell – They asked me why I made columns inclined to what I answered:
“For the same reason that the tired walker, when stopping, is propped up
with the staff inclined, because if I put it up I would not rest”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_architectura

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Primitive_Hut

https://www.cnet.com/pictures/why-frank-lloyd-wright-piled-60-tons-on-a-lily-pad-pictures/2/

http://papers.cumincad.org/data/works/att/ecaade2012_212.content.pdf

An Architectural History of the Corner “Problem”

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