ARCHITECTURE: Fractals.

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From: tsuchiya@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Naoki J Tsuchiya)
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Subject: con't. the Fract. Arch. disc.--but has nothing to do with Fractals
Date: 16 Mar 1993 05:12:25 GMT
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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In a previous article, Micah Rosen wrote that "the Seagram Building,
outside of subjective issues of what constitutes 'beauty,' does respond well
to its program." It is true that the Seagram Building "responds well" to
"the program for an office building" as defined by Rosen to be "the opportunity
to host other programs." However, this office building program implies only
obvious, rather simple, and relatively few needs, as Rosen probably agrees:
"the office building itself is MERELY the landscape for interior construction"
(emphasis added). It requires nothing more than common sense or a minimum
amount of thinking to meet these requirements!

What the Seagram Building and other Internationalist buildings do not
take into account the other "programs" that are inherent in any building
whatsoever. These "inherent programs" are those that take into account, for
example, the microclimate of the site, the fact that human beings (most with all
of their senses fully functional) and not machines are to use the building.
When
one considers how the Seagram Building "responds" to these inherent programs,
it is immediately obvious that it does not even approach the needs that these
programs demand.

Any building responding to its climate would never have any two windowed
"sides" identical... never! (since the sun travels in a distinct path along
the dome of the sky (from the site's perspective, of course) which is NOT
a 360 degree circle at a constant elevation, as the Seagram building practically
implies). And any building which responds to the human use of the building
would provide for it, as any Wright office building does-- and the many positive
comments by those who actually use it (not just academic architectural
historians)
proves it! The positive comments are not important merely for the sake of
the building, but that THE EMPLOYEES, WHO LIKE THE BUILDING SO MUCH, WORK THAT
MUCH BETTER! For example, the employees at Frank Lloyd Wright's Johnson
building
in Racine, Wisconsin, liked the building so much, they began to want to stay for
lunch and after work, and their productivity increased, simply because their
environment was actively ENcouraging them rather than actively DIScouraging
them.




A note about beauty: if anyone asks themselves whether or not something
is truly beautiful, the answer would be the same for everyone. However, all
people have some sort of mental filter that distorts their perception.
Familiarity is probably the largest filtering factor--- people like things that
are similar to things they've experienced before. Truly beautiful things last
beyond familiarity and other mental filters. People will quickly get "sick of"
or bored with things that are merely familiar. People will realize how
different something they have always thought beautiful is after they have
experienced something truly beautiful.

I will give some concrete examples from music just for the sake of
having examples: every musician I know, and practically every non-musician
as well, thinks Bach's music is beautiful! There isn't anywhere near this
almost unanimous agreement for any other composer (only other individual
pieces).
Perhaps because Bach's music is truly beautiful? One might say that it is
merely because people are familiar with strict tonal music, but Bach's music
is not the strict tonal music that we are all familiar with--- his music
stretches tonality as much as Romantic composers! The second example: hearin
a piece (called, Theme and Variations) for concert band by Schoenberg (who
writes completely atonal music) for the first several times, I completely
disliked like... "shocked" by the unfamiliarity with atonal music. However,
at some point, I suddenly, literally suddenly, started liking it! When the
shock the atonality leaves you, you suddenly hear how beautiful it really is.
A friend of mine, a musician, agrees completely, and the concert band director
always referred to it as "a masterpiece" that would last forever--- just as
anything else truly beautiful!




N. John Tsuchiya
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