Abstract
Form is a matter seldom considered when addressing sustainability. A substantial amount of the waste produced, however, depends on the unforeseen aesthetical degradation of manufactured objects, which has direct consequences for the planet’s sustainability. This appears to be the result of the high regard in which contemporary mentality holds the “value of novelty” (Riegl) as concerns form. Novelty and the related concepts of modernity and creativity have become the main targets of contemporary aesthetic production and also the main criteria in assessing it. Such a view has had an undeniable impact on Architecture, Design and Urban Planning. In the twentieth century, many buildings have been demolished or abandoned merely because the inhabitants could no longer comply with the unusual form of dwelling that the said buildings determined, both as regards private and public space. I intend to cast some light on the root causes of this trend, while also providing a perspective on some solutions, namely those in the field of architectural education. Vernacular traditional architecture stands out as a wellspring of sustainable forms. Following its lessons, a wider concept of sustainability will be presented, one that is rooted in the “global ecology” understanding.
Hypotheses are nets: only he who casts will catch.
Novalis
Novelty naturally rouses the mind and attracts our attention.
David Hume
(David Hume—“Of Tragedy” in Essays Moral Political and Literary. London: Oxford University Press, 1963 (1741), p. 226)
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Notes
- 1.
The word “Design” in the English language and in the field of Architecture and Art seems to have at least three different meanings, which correspond to three different words in Latin languages. “Design” translates to “projecto” (in Portuguese), “proyecto” (in Spanish), “progetto” (in Italian), “projet” (in French), meaning the process by which an object is idealized and communicated and also the documents that represent the object prior to its building. It has a sense similar to “plan”. It is the use of the word that occurs when someone speaks about “Design Methods”. “Design” translates also into “desenho”, “diseño”, “disegno”, “dessin”, which means the shape of an object from which a certain style or personality emanates (in a sense diverse from which these Latin words translate to “drawing”). This meaning occurs when someone speaks of a “good design”, or a “bad design”, or the design of some architect (or designer). The third meaning of the word designates the discipline that focuses on giving form with aesthetical value to any kind of instruments. It matches what in Italian is called “Disegno Industriale”. It also names the objects produced by such a subject (in as much as they have a certain amount of aesthetical quality). It is the meaning that occurs in expressions such as “a piece of Design”, a “work of Design” or “a Designed object”. In this last sense, as a subject, I will capitalize the word: “Design”.
My field of specialization is Architecture, not Design, so I can only speak with full awareness and responsibility of Architecture—and, in this field I will freely use the two concepts of design I have mentioned first (which in my own native language—Portuguese—are quite different from design). As far as the third meaning of the word, I will be silent (except for some very common sense examples). Nevertheless, because the processes of production of Design, as a subject, seem similar to those of Architecture—as much as they use a design process (a process of planning), require a client, and the persons who execute the plan to be different from the ones who planned it—I dare suggest that what is said about Architecture can be broadly applied to Design.
- 2.
UNO—Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future, 1987 especially part I, Chapters 2 and 3. See also: UNO—Agenda 21: United Nations Conference on Environment & Development. Rio de Janeiro Brazil, 3–14 June 1992; M. Adil Khan—Sustainable development: The key concepts, issues and implications, in Sustainable development, Vol. 3, pp. 63–69 (1995); Plan of Implementation of the World Summit on Sustainable Development (especially paragraphs 14–46), Report of the World Summit on Sustainable Development, Johannesburg 26 August–4 September 2002, UNO, New York, 2002; UNO General Assembly—2005 World Summit Outcome (especially paragraphs 48–56); Steve Connelly “Mapping Sustainable Development as a Contested Concept” Local Environment 12(3) (2007): 259–278.
- 3.
The extraordinary qualities of the Portland cement—in relation to lime, for instance—come from the energy imprisoned in the chemical connections of the molecules of the material. This energy is incorporated in the material during the process of burning the raw materials at high temperatures. Replacing cement by lime, at least partially, will mean a substantial energy saving in the overall building process, and less pollution, with combustion related gases and debris.
- 4.
“The viewpoint of fashion as ephemeral is contrasted by the weighted reality of an overwhelmingly saturated consumer market, which has resulted in an ever-increasing rate of disposal. The impetus to address this becomes clear in acknowledging that textile waste is prolific, with recent United States estimates claiming that 85% of over 13 million tons of textiles discarded annually ends up in landfill (Wallander 2012). United Kingdom reports state 2012 rates of disposal as 1.4 million tons (PennWell Corporation 2013). After reviewing the literature I believe that fashion as an industry charged with these systemic failures has an imperative and ethical duty to research and activate more viable fashion futures” (pp. 17–18). “The lifecycle of current fashion is a rapid and one way trip from design, manufacture, to being worn, being washed, and discarded to landfill. The extraordinary growth of fast-fashion retailers has been attributed by Birtwhistle (2007) to high impulse buying, an increase in sourcing from low-cost countries and a change in consumer attitudes, with the removal of stigma attached to buying from value retailers. This planned obsolescence has spiraled into a faster cycle, with chain stores pushing consumers’ desire for newness. The consequence of excessive consumption has been increased disposal, prompting this investigation of sustainable perspectives that could contribute to a more equitable and ethical future”. (p. 21) (Miranda Smitheram. The Superfluous and the Ephemeral: Consumerism, globalization and future fashion systems. Master Thesis, accessed online, 12.07.2015).
- 5.
The classical example is, of course, Fashion itself. Known couturiers like Coco Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld have repeatedly stated that Fashion is ephemeral. The complete aphorism normally states that “Fashion passes; style remains” (interview of Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel conducted by the journalist Joseph Barry in McCall’s magazine in 1965—Chanel originally said Mode instead of Fashion, as she was a native French speaker). Yves Saint Laurent says: “Fashions fade, style is eternal” (Andy Warhol’s Interview—New York, 13 April 1975). Karl Lagerfeld: “Fashion is ephemeral, dangerous and unfair”.
A lot has been said about Fashion—it suffices to recall the works of Barthes, Baudrillard, Lipovetski.
Although some of them mention the ephemeral nature of Fashion (namely, Lipovetski), they fail, to my knowledge, to implement the full consequences of this ephemeral nature of Fashion. Only recently have some works on this subject appeared: Mackay, Stuart. NON-CONSUMERISM: Less becomes more—ProQuest. Brand Strategy, 2008; Ehrenfeld, J.R. Sustainability by Design: A Subversive Strategy for Transforming Our Consumer Culture. Yale University Press, (2009); and Miranda Smitheram. The Superfluous and the Ephemeral: Consumerism, globalization and future fashion systems. Master Thesis, accessed online, 12.07.2015.
- 6.
“There are professions more harmful than industrial design, but only a very few of them. And possibly only one profession is phonier. Advertising design, in persuading people to buy things they don’t need, with money they don’t have, in order to impress others who don’t care, is probably the phoniest field in existence today. Industrial design, by concocting the tawdry idiocies hawked by advertisers, comes a close second. Never before in history have grown men sat down and seriously design electric hairbrushes, rhinestone-covered shoe horns, and mink carpeting for bathrooms, and then drawn up elaborate plans to make and sell these gadgets to millions of people. Before (in the “good old days”), if a person liked killing people, he had become a general, purchased a coal mine or else study nuclear physics. Today, industrial design has put murder on a mass-production basis. […] By creating whole new species of permanent garbage to clutter up the landscape, and by choosing material and processes that pollute the air we breath, designers have become a dangerous breed”. (Victor Papanek. Design for the Real World: human ecology and social change. London: Thames and Hudson 1992, p. ix). According to Alice Rawsthorn, “by the time of the second edition of Design in the Real World appeared in 1985, it had been translated into more than twenty different languages. Still in print today, it is one of the best-selling design books ever published” (Alice Rawsthorn. Hello World. Where Design meets Life. London: Penguin Books, 2013, p. 170).
- 7.
“Industry pandered to the public’s ready acceptance of anything new, anything different. The miscegenation of technology and artificially accelerated consumer whims gave birth to the dark twins of styling and obsolescence. There are three types of obsolescence: technological (a better or more elegant way of doing things is discovered), material (the product wears out), and artificial (the death rating of a product; either the materials are substandard and will wear out in a predictable time span, or else significant parts are not replaceable or repairable). Since World War II our major commitment has been to stylistic and artificial obsolescence”. (Victor Papanek. Design for the Real World. op. cit., p. 34).
- 8.
Bryan Lawson. How designers think: the Design process demystified. Oxford: Elsevier/Architectural Press, 2005, p. 116.
- 9.
A lot of Design theorists have addressed the sustainability-novelty issue in recent years. Other than Papanek (quoted above), Hella Jongerius and Louise Schouwenberg, in a 2016 manifesto say: “It is absurd and arrogant to begin the design process with an empty piece of paper. Cultural and historical awareness are woven into the DNA of any worthwhile product. Otherwise the designer is merely embracing newness for its own sake—an empty shell, which requires overblown rhetoric to fill it with meaning. […] However, currently the appeal of the NEW is celebrated as the one and only, inherently desirable quality of commodities. As such is no longer equals real innovation and might even be rephrased as “the illusion of the new”. An empty shell, devoid of meaning and substance; design has become a goal instead of a means to an end”. (Beyond the New, a search for ideal in design). About the same subject, one may also refer to: John R. Ehrenfeld. Sustainability by Design. London & New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008, especially Chapters 3, 4, and 11; Victor Papanek. The Green Imperative. Ecology and Ethics in Design and Architecture. London: Thames and Hudson, 1995, passim; Carlo Vezzolly, Ezio Manzini. Design for Environmental Sustainability. London: Springer, 2008; Alice Rawsthorn. Hello World. Where Design meets Life. London: Penguin Books, 2013, especially Chapters 10, 12, and epilogue.
- 10.
The invention of a new way of dwelling is somewhat improbable, considering that mankind did not evolve radically in relation to dwelling (and we may accept that because we can still enjoy today old buildings with pleasure), and that Man has more than five thousand years of producing man-made environments that can still be experienced today. This issue is dense and complicated and I cannot address it thoroughly here. I have tackled it in some of my early papers, see, for instance, « The Vitruvian Crisis or Architecture: the Expected Experience, on aesthetical appraisal of architecture. » in Proceedings (ed. Kenneth S. Bordens), XX Congress, International Association of Empirical Aesthetics, Chicago, 19–22nd August 2008. Nevertheless, for the sake of comprehension, I will leave a small note.
The issue has to do with the essence of architecture, meaning its purpose and the effect by which it can be identified. We have to assume that the purpose of Architecture is not aesthetical or functional, because other subjects have the same task: Sculpture creates aesthetical effects in space; Civil Engineering solves functional and technical problems in space; Design sometimes merges these two tasks. So the purpose of Architecture is none of these. What should it be then? Dwelling (as defined by Heidegger and Levinas): the shaping of the territory in such a way that the new space enables human beings to be fully themselves.
Then, accepting the above statement as the purpose of Architecture, one should also accept that there were not noteworthy changes in essential human demands in relation to dwelling. Why? Because one can still relate with, or even prefer, old or vernacular architecture, which would be impossible if the dwelling expectations had changed in time. (I am not considering here changes in the demands of comfort levels, such as thermal and humidity control, which are, of course, in higher demand now, but whose upgrading in a pre-existent space does not alter substantially its architectural quality).
Consequently, it should also be accepted that the form of the spaces people most easily attach to have already been invented and that the invention of new forms of dwelling is highly risky. (Regarding this subject, consider the quotation of Nikos Salingaros presented in this paper.)
- 11.
Magatti, Mauro (curator). La Città Abbandonata: Dove sono e come cambiano le periferie italiane. Bologna: Società Editrice il Mulino (2007).
- 12.
Charles Jencks. The Language of Post-Modern Architecture. London: Academy Editions, 1977, pp. 9–10. It is not true that this design received an award. Jencks purports here two events. What effectively happened was that the couple of architects that designed Pruit-Igoe had previously received an award from the American Institute of Architects, not related with Pruit-Igoe. It was a career award. The implosion time is not accurate also. Nevertheless, the diagnosis is, and could be corroborated by other sources. (J. Nasar, Preface of J. Nasar (Ed.), Environmental Aesthetics, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. xxi–xxvi.; L. Soczka, “Viver (n)a cidade”. in L. Soczka (Ed.), Contextos Urbanos e Psicologia Ambiental, Lisboa: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 2005, pp. 91–131). Similar cases happened all around USA: “The dynamiting of Pruitt-Igoe was an iconic moment since the project had won a design award for its architect, Minoru Yamasaki (who later designed the World Trade Center towers in New York), but the demolition was to be repeated scores of time. Over the next two decades, public housing units in Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Detroit suffered similar fates, as did the 4321 units of Robert Taylor Homes in Chicago. That was the other aspect of the failure: it was widespread”. (Withold Rybczynski. Makeshift Metropolis. New York: Scribner, 2010, pp. 81–82).
- 13.
Stefano Serafini. “L’egemonia Artistica di Corviale”. http://www.grupposalingaros.net/edifici.html (25/09/2013).
- 14.
In 1975, in Lisbon, some of the population that came back from the former Portuguese colonies were housed in the old parts of the city, in the Castle Hill. No social problems as those described above, other than poverty, were noticed. Newcomers fit peacefully. The same did not happen when similar population were to inhabit in the outskirts of the city, in shantytowns or new low-income neighbourhoods (Maria Manuela Mendes. “Bairro da Mouraria, território de diversidade: entre a tradição e o cosmopolitismo” Sociologia—Revista da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto, s.n., thematic issue entitled Imigração, Diversidade e Convivência Cultural (2012): 15–41).
- 15.
Nikos A. Salingaros—“La Geometria Contro gli Ecomostri”. http://www.corriere.it (02/04/2011). Nikos Salingaros (born 1952) is a professor of Mathematics, Urbanism and Theory of Architecture at the University of Texas, who has published several books on Architecture and Urbanism. He has also been a close collaborator of Christopher Alexander and was an important contributor to the editing of The Nature of Order.
- 16.
Luigi Pareyson—“Specificazione del arte” in Luigi Pareyson. Estetica: Teoria della formatività. Milano: Bompiani, 2002 (1955), pp. 9–15. Pareyson argues that what distinguishes a work of art from another sort of object is that its value resides in the form; not in what it performs but solely in the aesthetics of its form.
- 17.
Aloïs Riegl. “Moderne Denkmalkultus: sein Wesen und seine Entstehung”, Wien: K. K. Zentral-Kommission für Kunst- und Historische Denkmale: Braumüller, 1903. Translation published as “The Modern Cult of Monuments: Its Character and Its Origin”, trans. Kurt W. Forster and Diane Ghirardo, in Oppositions, n. 25 (Fall 1982), pp. 21–51.
- 18.
My underline.
- 19.
Riegl, op. cit., cap. 3 b) α) “Newness value”.
- 20.
Cor Blok—“Arte e creatività, un identità?” in Paul Feyerhabend and Christian Thomas (curators), Arte e scienza, Roma: Armando Editore, 1989, [Kunst und Wissenschaft, Zurich, 1984], p. 117: “[…] alla creazione non si fa alcun cenno”.
- 21.
Cor Blok, op. cit., p. 117: “Per quanto ne so, solo a partire del 1910 circa, si è parlato di creazione e di creatività in relazione all’arte […]”.
- 22.
- 23.
- 24.
Cor Blok, op. cit., pp. 118–119: “[…U]n poeta spagnolo, Vincent Huidibro, fece del creativo in generale il contrassegno dell’epoca moderna. « Si deve essere creativi. L’uomo non imita più, inventa una poesia, un’immagine, una statua, un piroscafo, un’automobile, un aeroplano ». […I]n questo testo di Huidobro le opere d’arte sono immediatamente accostate ai prodotti della tecnica, quali esempi della forza di creazione umana. Forse l’immagine dell’uomo come di un creatore, per cosi dire, accanto a Dio e alla Natura, prima che con la storia dell’arte si è sviluppata in connessione con la tecnologia”.
- 25.
Le Corbusier. Towards a New Architecture. New York: Dover Publications, 1986, especially chapter “Eyes Which do not See”, pp. 85–148.
- 26.
In this section, we will follow Hannah Arendt’s thinking especially what is presented in Chap. 4 “Work” of Arendt, Hannah. The Human Condition. Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press, 1970 (1958).
- 27.
Hannah Arendt notes that object is derived from the latin verb obicere, which means “to put against” (cf. Arendt, p. 137, note 2).
- 28.
Hannah Arendt. The Human Condition. Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press, 1970 (1958), p. 136.
- 29.
Hannah Arendt. The Human Condition. Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press, 1970 (1958), p. 135. Arendt adds: “It is this durability which gives the things of the world their relative independence from men who produced and used them, their “objectivity” which makes them withstand, “stand against” and endure, at least for a time, the voracious needs and wants of their living makers and users. From this viewpoint, the things of the world have the function of stabilizing human life, and their objectivity lies in the fact that […] men, their ever-changing nature notwithstanding, can retrieve their sameness, that is, their identity, by being related to the same chair and the same table. In other words, against the subjectivity of men stands the objectivity of man-made world, rather than the sublime indifference of an untouched nature, whose overwhelming elementary force, on the contrary, will compel them to swing relentlessly in the cycle of their own biological movement, which fits so closely into the over-all cyclical movement of nature’s household. Only we who have erected the objectivity of a world of our own from what nature gives us, who have built it into the environment of nature so that we are protected from her, can look upon nature as something “objective”. Without a world between men and nature, there is eternal movement, but no objectivity” (p. 137).
- 30.
Auguste Comte’s paraphrase in Paul Connerton. How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989, p. 37.
- 31.
About the notion of “freshness” in relation to the human production, see Hannah Arendt’s “Crisis of Culture” in Between Past and Future, New York: Penguin Books, 1993, p. 206: “Panis et Circenses truly belong together; both are necessary for life, for its preservation and recuperation, and both vanish in the course of life process—that is, both must constantly be produced anew and offered anew, lest this process cease entirely. The standards by which both should be judged are freshness and novelty, and the extent to which we use these standards today to judge cultural and artistic objects as well, things which are supposed to remain in the world even after we left it, indicates clearly the extent to which the need for entertainment has begun to threaten the cultural world”.
- 32.
About the essential quality of form in relation to Aesthetics and Art see footnote 16.
- 33.
Pareyson, op. cit., Chap. 1: “Specificazionde dell’arte”.
- 34.
Immanuel Kant, The Critique of Judgement [1892], Part I: Critique of the Aesthetical Judgement, First Division: Analytic of the Aesthetical Judgement, First Book: Analytic of the Beautiful. For the purpose of this argument see especially “General remark on the first section of the Analytic” (Kant’s Critique of Judgement, translated with Introduction and Notes by J. H. Bernard (2nd ed. revised) (London: Macmillan, 1914). 7/23/2015. http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/1217#Kant_0318_195).
- 35.
Nevertheless, this contradiction is only apparent. A beautiful object is always seen as different (different from the rest of the objects, which in some way are considered to belong to the same class). Each one of a set of equal twins can be considered beautiful, because the class to which we refer to is not the set of twins, but children, girls, boys, and also because the form to which we refer to, in itself, is only one (the same form for both twins); that unique form in relation to the class to which belongs (children, etc.) is considered beautiful.
I think it is possible to say, however, that differentiation is not an essential quality of the beautiful thing. It occurs necessarily in the beautiful being, but it is not sought up. We can comprehend this inasmuch as there are objects in which differentiation was specifically sought up, and in a positivistic mechanical manner may be considered different from others of the same class, but from an aesthetical point of view neither is considered beautiful or different.
On the other hand, if we consider the case of antiques—objects that were not made specifically to be aesthetically appraised (like the works of art) but that are so nevertheless—it seems plausible to assume that what gave them aesthetical quality was the handicraft work that make them unique and personalized by the craftsman (though it seems plausible to assume too that some kind of aesthetical purpose was present in the mind of the artisan). About this topic see also, in the field of Design see also Chapman, Jonathan. Emotionally Durable Design. Objects, Experiences and Empathy. London: Earthscan, 2005.
- 36.
Martin Heidegger. The Origin of the Work of Art. p. 72.
- 37.
The argument that it is not possible to change the situation portrayed above, since we live in a market system, is recurrent. It is often pointed out that the reduction of built-in obsolescence, in order to reduce consumerism, would increase unemployment, among other economical injuries. Not being an economist, I cannot answer this argument as thoroughly as it deserves. Nevertheless, I am able to give some hints. The argument is based on a Keynesian view of Economics, which defends that increasing consumption favours societal wealth. This is only true in situations of under-consumption, where there is not enough money for trading. In these circumstances—like in the American post-depression period—it is advisable for the State to inject capital in order to release money into the market. This implies a growth in consumption, until normal levels are reached. In other circumstances, the above argument does not apply. (See on this subject, for instance, Allgoewer, Elisabeth. Underconsumption theories and Keynesian economics. Interpretations of the Great Depression. University of St. Gallen, Department of Economics, 2002; Edmund S. Phelps. “Macro Economics for a Modern Economy” (Nobel Prize Lecture, December 8, 2006), in Karl Grandin (ed.), Les Prix Nobel. The Nobel Prizes 2006, Stockholm: Nobel Foundation, 2007; and, for a more comprehensive approach, Blaug, Mark. Economic Theory in Retrospect. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985.)
In a normal economic situation, the argument that favours consumption, as a required policy for the health of the Markets, simply forgets “externalities”. Market economics only considers the production costs; it forgets costs that derive from after-use: recycling, pollution control, etc. Would it consider these costs, the economical balance, it would no longer favour consumption economic policies, and bring forward more sustainable economic policies. Nevertheless, the subject of Sustainability in Economics is not a simple one. About this subject refer to, for instance: Arrow, Kenneth; Dasgupta, Partha; Goulder, Lawrence, et al. “Are we consuming too much?” The journal of economic perspectives: EP; a journal of the American Economic Association 18, no. 3, 2004; Hanley, Nick; Shogren, Jason, White, Ben. Introduction to Environmental Economics. Oxford University Press, 2013; Arrow, Kenneth; Dasgupta, Partha; Goulder, Lawrence, et al. “Sustainability and the Measurement of Wealth” (NBER Working Paper 16599) Cambridge: National Bureau of Economic Research, 2010, accessible at http://www.nber.org/papers/w16599; Partha Dasgupta. “Natural Wealth.” Anglican Theological Review 92, no. 4 (Fall 2010): 637–647; Moritz C. Remig “Unraveling the veil of fuzziness: A thick description of sustainability economics.” Ecological Economics 109 (2015): 194–202.
- 38.
Hannah Arendt. “The Crisis in Culture”, in Between Past and Future. op. cit., especially pp. 205–210.
- 39.
Aristotle. Poetics 1449b, 24–28.
- 40.
“[T]he ‘idea of modernity’ as consisting in ‘a desire to wipe out whatever came earlier, in the hope of reaching at last a point that would be called a true present, a point of origin that marks a new departure. This combined interplay of deliberate forgetting with an action that is also a new origin reaches the full power of the idea of modernity’” P. de Man. “Literary History and Literary Modernity.” Daedalus 99 (1970): 384–404, as cited in Paul Connerton. How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989, p. 61.
- 41.
See, for instance, Pope Francis. Laudato Si (passim, but especially Chapter 4).
- 42.
Pedro Abreu. “Arquitectura Monumento e Morada” Arquitextos 04 (July 2007): 11–20.
- 43.
Monument is the present participle of the Latin verb moneo, which means to remember, in an imperative fashion.
- 44.
Jacques Le Goff—“Documento/Monumento” in Enciclopédia Einaudi, vol. 1—Memória-História. Lisboa: INCM, 1984; pp. 46–47.
- 45.
Martin Heidegger—“Building, Dwelling, Thinking”, in Poetry, Language and Thought. New York: Harper Collins, 2001.
- 46.
Hannah Arendt. “The Crisis in Culture” in Between Past and Future. op. cit. p. 204.
- 47.
A paradoxical example: the utmost improbable sphere to be affected was academics—which is supposed to be driven by the research of truth, not by the search for novelty—but even here, most of the times, only publications recently done are considered to be relevant. (George Steiner. Real Presences: Is There Anything in What We Say? London: Faber and Faber, p. 198 (portuguese edition: pp. 40–43).
- 48.
Augusto del Noce. Civiltà tecnológica e cristianesimo in L’epoca dela secolarizzazione. Milano: Giuffrè, 1970, pp. 85–87.
- 49.
Witthold Rybczynsky. How Architecture Works: a Humanist Toolkit. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013, p. 48. At present Eero Saarinen has been awarded six times and the architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merril also. Nevertheless it seems possible to draw from Kahn writings, in which his attitude towards design is described, grounds for this recurrent award, which is somewhat summarized in the jury comment to the 2005 prize (cited above). See about this subject Portoghesi, Paolo. After Modern Architecture. New York: Rizzoli, 1982, the chapter that relates to Louis Kahn.
- 50.
Paul Connerton, op. cit., passim, but especially pp. 3–4.
- 51.
Romano Guardini. Lettere dal lago di Como, II. Brescia: Morcelliana, 1959, pp. 17 ss.
- 52.
Romano Guardini. Lettere dal lago di Como, II. Brescia: Morcelliana, 1959, p. 20.
- 53.
Immanuel Kant. Crítica da Faculdade do Juízo. Lisboa: INCM, 1992, paragraphs 23–29.
- 54.
Alain Roger—“Nature et culture. La double artialisation”, in Court traité du paysage, Paris: Éditions Gallimard, 1997, pp. 11–30.
- 55.
Martin Heidegger—“La questione della técnica” in: G. Vattimo (curator) Saggi e Discorsi. Milano: Mursia, 1991, pp. 5–27.
- 56.
Martin Heidegger—“La questione della técnica” in: G. Vattimo (curator) Saggi e Discorsi. Milano: Mursia, 1991, pp. 14–17.
- 57.
“Design must also become more compassionate. Old-school design was defined for certainties, as you would expect of a culture that was fired by modernist fervour and intend on improving the lives of millions of people by dint and standardization. All its best, this culture was plucky and optimistic, but it also erred towards arrogance, obduracy and boosterism. Those qualities will prove even more damaging in the future. Design needs to become more empathetic, and better attuned to the frailties that defy rational analysis yet determine so many elements of our lives, such as making half of us prone to muddling up something as simple and important as taking prescription medicine correctly” (Alice Rawsthorn, op. cit. p. 223).
- 58.
Popper returns repeatedly to this argument. To my knowledge one of his most synthetic texts about the concepts of conjecture and refutations is the following: “Science: Conjectures and Refutations” in Karl Popper. Conjectures and Refutations. London & New York: Routledge, 2008, pp. 43–78 (first edition: London & New York: Routledge, 1963).
- 59.
The key idea of Popper is that a scientific theory must be stated in such a way that enables specific research in order to refute it. See (other than the work cited in the previous note) Karl Popper. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. London & New York: Routledge, 2008 (first edition: Vienna, 1934), in particular Chapter 3: Theories (pp. 37–56), Chapter 4: Falsifiability (pp. 57–73) and Chapter 6: Degrees of Testability (pp. 95–120).
- 60.
Martin Heidegger—“Building, Dwelling, Thinking”, op. cit.
- 61.
For a more circumstanced presentation of this understanding of architecture consider my paper: Pedro Abreu—“The Vitruvian Crisis or Architecture, the Expected Experience, on aesthetical appraisal of architecture” in Proceedings (ed. Kenneth S. Bordens), XX Congress, International Association of Empirical Aesthetics, Chicago, 19–22nd August 2008.
- 62.
- 63.
Vittorio Gregotti, in respect to the origin of architecture, set forth this opinion: “The origin of architecture is not the primitive hut, the cave, or the mythical Adam’s house in Paradise. Before transforming a support into a column, a roof into a tympanum, before placing stone on stone, man placed the stone on the ground to recognize a site in the midst of an unknown universe; in order to take account of it and modify it” (apud Kenneth Frampton. Introdução ao estudo da cultura tectónica. Lisboa: AAP e Contemporânea Editora, 1998, p. 29).
- 64.
Romano Guardini. Lettere dal lago di Como, II. Brescia: Morcelliana, 1959, p. 99.
- 65.
By the way, artefacts developed for these activities usually reveal, despite their highly technological features, a strong influence of Nature in their forms, and some individual character. (Many athletes use artefacts—surfboards, skis, shoes—which are not standard and are individually made.)
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de Abreu, P.M. (2018). Sustainable Aesthetic in Architecture. In: Leal Filho, W., Mifsud, M., Pace, P. (eds) Handbook of Lifelong Learning for Sustainable Development. World Sustainability Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-63534-7_22
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