Юрий Погудин – Synthesis of Architectural Form. From Meaning to Concept (страница 3)

Let's highlight the bionic type of composition. It is characterized by imitative, stylizing, or literal copying of natural principles and/or forms, including the entire range of organisms from protozoa to humans. Modern architectural bionics is often particularly characterized by its seamless nature, as opposed to the centuries-old established composition, which was in use up to the second half of the 20^th century, and, as a rule, included orthogonally connected parts of the building that were articulated and clearly stood out as part of the whole.

So, the composition of a building can be created based on a system of certain artistic principles (such as order), on a function and/or structure, on intuitive artistic vision, on a variable field using the combinatorics of a few initial elements, on the basic properties of spatial form and the peculiarities of their perception (N. Ladovsky). Next, we will reveal another compositional type of form generation – dialectical, which derives compositions from the intrinsic geometric logic of the form in harmony with the purpose of the building.

The school of rationalism of N. Ladovsky – from architectural point of view – and the dialectical aesthetics of A. Losev – from philosophical point of view – play a crucial part in the creation of such compositional system. Let's give a brief overview of both systems.

On the concept of N. A. Ladovsky

The significance of Nikolai Ladovsky's system in architectural pedagogy still requires reflection and coming out of the shadow of other prominent creators of the Soviet avant-garde. It can be said with complete certainty that Ladovsky became the founder of Russian architectural propaedeutics, developed and framed into a system by his students and followers.

No matter how beautiful and harmonious the architectural classic works were and still are, the development of society, science, technology, and art at the turn of the 19^th and 20^th centuries led to a paradigm shift. The static beauty of a classic building, complete in its symmetry, has been replaced by a building whose form is derived from the concepts of movement, curved space, and the discrepancy between the outer shell and internal premises.

Ladovsky turned to the most fundamental concepts of architecture as a spatial art that cannot be reduced to civil engineering. Space, its finiteness and infinity, the clarity of its perception by people, the calmness and tension of the form, its dynamics reflecting modern history – these are the points and nodes around which the new architectural propaedeutics was formed, which is still relevant today. The system of rationalism is most fully and in great detail revealed in the works of S.O. Khan–Magomedov3.

The same 20s and 30s of the last century saw the birth of fruitful and integral concepts: the one by Nikolai Ladovsky in architecture and pedagogy, and the other by Aleksei Losev in aesthetics and philosophy. Architectural propaedeutics is dynamic and open to new syntheses with philosophical thought. Our task is to show how abstract thought can nourish concrete aesthetics, dialectical philosophy can become a generator of principles for architectural pedagogy, and, perhaps more importantly, to produce an emerging branch of the new architectural aesthetics based not on manifesto negations of past experience, but on the powerful message of the all-unity of Vladimir Solovyov and the supreme synthesis of Aleksei Losev.

Principles of dialectical philosophy of A. F. Losev

Aleksei Losev's philosophy amazes with a combination of depth of thought, simplicity and complexity, consistency and a minimum of special terms, integrity and completeness, boldness and academicism. In a brief digression, it is impossible to summarize and reveal the philosopher's dialectical system in any way completely. Therefore, I will focus on those of its principles that have particularly influenced the development of the proposed dialectic of architectural morphogenesis.

Let's highlight three such principles:

• Reconciliation of opposites in synthesis

• Expression of the whole in its parts

• Presentation of meaning in form

The principle of synthesis is one of Losev's key methodological guidelines, a kind of intrinsic logical leitmotif. Losev's entire philosophy and aesthetics can be called a synthetic one that builds an objective picture of existence as the highest synthesis. This approach opposes formal logic and binary thinking, which fix any semantic oppositions and do not seek their reconciliation in synthesis. So, the concept of "contrast" in the generally accepted compositional propaedeutics for designers and architects is binary, it means a juxtaposition of any parts or qualities of a form. In this point of view, integrity is revealed as a dyad, in which there is no unification of thesis and antithesis.

Let's look at it in details on the example of the specific geometric science. Any category of geometry, starting from a point, is both an abstract mathematical concept, and a verbally logical, and illustratively visual one. If the visual image of an octahedron is a certain combination of images of a square and a circle, then this is simultaneously beautiful in both logical and visual respects. If the dialectical construction shows the movement of categories and beauty in their semantic formation, then both visual and material geometry will be a cast, reflection and expression of this movement and this beauty. The geometric concept becomes the point of intersection of logic and aesthetics.

Thus, a single semantic root is found that unites philosophical thought and architectural and aesthetic pursuit.

Aleksei Losev explained his idea of synthesis using examples from various fields of science – geometry, chemistry, astronomy. Synthesis is such a unity of opposites when they form a new quality without losing itself. In this place, Hegel used such words as "sublation" and "negation of negation." The antithesis negates the thesis, and synthesis negates the antithesis. But Losev since his youth was inspired for creation – the highest synthesis.

So, following Losev, we will think of synthesis not as the "negation of negation," but as creation (1), as the creation of a new (2), as the creation of a fundamentally new (3). A fundamentally new thing is born from the combination of the opposites – as different as possible, or at least from different, dissimilar, non-identical. After all, why synthesize the identical, if it is the same anyway?

The second of the principles under consideration was discovered already in the ancient philosophy. The whole is an organism in which it is impossible to replace one part with another without damage, because all parts bear the stamp of their integrity. The whole connects the parts, and each part reveals the whole, highlights its important facet.

In modern architecture, Frank Lloyd Wright came closest to this understanding: "In the realm of organic architecture human imagination must render the harsh language of structure into becomingly humane expressions of form instead of devising inanimate facades or rattling the bones of construction. Poetry of form is as necessary to great architecture as foliage is to the tree, blossoms to the plant, or flesh to the body" [46, 177]. "The word organic in architecture does not mean belonging to the animal or plant world," Wright wrote. The word "organic", according to him, means that the whole is to the part as the part is to the whole [46, 181].

An organism is the opposite of a mechanism in which the scheme prevails over the "flesh" of the parts. The architectural composition, in turn, can be organic, or combinatorially mechanistic. An organic composition is born as a sculptural integrity, a sculpture that unfolds from its grain – an idea, and not as a result of spontaneous technical manipulations that can give the impression of being spectacular.

The third principle speaks about the disclosure of the inner in the outer, about the manifestation, germination of a semantic idea into a certain form, including a material one. The form expresses the meaning, but does not encode or encrypt it. Losev's aesthetic system can be called the aesthetics of expression. In this phenomenon of the greater in the lesser, the ideal in the material, or, in Losev's synonymous terminology, the eidetic in the meonal, symbols play a key role. Since the architectural form reveals meanings in three–dimensional shells–sculptures, it is also symbolic. A symbol is a meeting point of two realities – the semantic source and expressive elements. Their unity is revealed in the diverse figurative images of works of art and other human activities.

We will discuss the expressive semantic energy in architectural morphogenesis in a separate chapter below.

The author does not pretend to be exhaustive in covering the meaning-generating potentials of Losev's philosophy for the tasks of architectural composition, and considers all the proposed work to be a full-fledged beginning that can open up into something more, and hopes that the given vector will resonate with architects, educators and thinkers who develop the philosophy of creativity for applied purposes.