HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: dwharper@eos.ncsu.edu (DANTE WILLIAM HARPER)
Subject: Mass Hallucination?
Originator: dwharper@c00093-100lez.eos.ncsu.edu
Reply-To: dwharper@eos.ncsu.edu (DANTE WILLIAM HARPER)
Organization: North Carolina State University, Project Eos
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1992 19:47:36 GMT


 Basically, "establishing a symbol-system" need only be as hard
as making a building that YOU would like to build, and demanding that it be
built.  We are all in symbol-systems that will be easy to see in a few years;
the systems that we are unable to percieve are our symbol-systems, our only
"modern problem" is that we mass-hallucinate that we move laterally to s.s.'s,
that we wear them like clothes, when in fact, we are only in a larger,
unknowable, deeply complex symbol system that has taken a metalogical step away
from those of our fathers' fathers.  This is not any reason to attempt a new
systematization (well, perhaps this IS our cultural sum at the moment...)
when the real problem is one of capital and economy.  Call it what you want;
architecture is what it is because economy is what it is -- ask yourself
why more people work more today than ever before -- ask yourself why everyone
has cultural hangover -- ask why social/political revolution is impossible.
Get real depressed.  Ooops.  Rave at compter nets endlessly.  Entertain?
Diatribe.  Responses?




ps.  IO pan.  (Heh.)
-- 
+][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][+

"Did it seem that long ago?                           Dante W Harper
It was when you still thought                         dwharper@eos.ncsu.edu
you thought, and still believed                       429-a S Boylan Ave
that part of you still managed                        Raleigh, NC 27603
to believe."  -bright                                 919 856 9250

      (in hopes that some sharp might get a laugh out of my credit history)

+][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][+
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Thursday, 5 Nov 1992 17:31:14 CST
From: Laura Boutwell <U58100@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Subject: Fractal Addendum

Forgive me if the subject title has mislead you into such a banal text...

but

does anyone out there know how to write a program to add onto CAD so that
i may generate fractals (particularly a Lorenz Attractor?)   I'm using Auto
cad Rel. 11.


Incidentally, is Kent Bloomer related to Jennifer Bloomer, about whom
i recently posted a somewhat inchorent note?  I was very interested to hear
about your experience at Yale and in fact am in total agreement with you-
"ornament," whatever that is, is in defininte need of reappraisal, and in
fact I cannot throughly address the problem on the Net at the moment, since
I have a jury TOMORROW in which i have to present a theorectical investigation
into ornament.  I am using a system based on LeCorbusier's Modolor
translated into a proportional system of Hair.

My only caveat about your ornament post is that i believe the expressive
possiblities need not look to historical themes that could easily generate
into kitsch.

I believe in was Jeff Kipnes who said "architectural graduate students are
eloquent to the point of nausea."  Sorry I am not living up to accusation
at the moment - i'd love to have that fractal program though! (Now, Mr. Com-
puter architect, would that be an ornament to the Autocad program?)

ciao
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Laura Bootsy Boutwell                    at my back i always hear
                                         Time's winged chariot drawing near
                                                 -Alexander Pope
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
From: london@vova.arc.ab.ca (Mike London)
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Subject: Re: architecture is not art (!)
Date: 6 Nov 92 17:35:54 GMT

What exactly is ornament? It seems that in merely using the
term we submit to the same myopic views that our institutions
put forth. Nietzsche said something to the effect that nothing
has caused so much grief as the failure to recognize that
differences are always a matter of degree, and not absolute.
What good design is without aesthetic appeal, regardless of
the inclination of the designer?

But governments and universities categorize in order to deal
with things in their mechanistic way. So Art is art, and
Science is science, and Architecture is forced to straddle
the vanishing space in between, instead of being celebrated
as the champion of that rich middle ground. The wonderful
irony is that Architecture continues to thrive and map out
that middle ground. Others will certainly disagree, but I
think Wright's greatest talent was his ability to cut a swath
through all this, to give himself enough room to work.

Mike London
london@oil.arc.ab.ca
From: pwestlak@eoe.co.uk (Peter Westlake)
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Subject: Re: On meaning and Ornament
Date: 12 Nov 92 18:44:09 GMT
Organization: EO Europe Limited, Cambridge, UK
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]

Randolph Fritz (randolph@cognito.ebay.Sun.COM) wrote:
: At the risk of repeating myself, Christopher Alexander et al have
: extended the idea of univeral symbols into a theory embracing the
: whole of design.  The place to read about their ideas are the books
: *The Timeless Way of Building* (the theoretical book) and *A Pattern
: Language* (the symbology).  I am surprised that no-one else has
: mentioned them.
: 
I was surprised too. In those books ornament takes its proper place
as a functional part of the building - but the function is social,
not structural. It is very often forgotten that a building has to do
more than just stand up and keep off the rain, that people have to live
and work in it, and that if it does not enhance their lives to some
degree it has failed. From this point of view, Notre Dame and the Taj
Mahal could be said to follow the Bauhaus dictum: their forms follow
their functions!

Peter.
-- 
Peter M Westlake                        EO Computer Ltd.,
Tel: +223-843131                        Abberley House,  Granhams Road,
Fax: +223-843032                        Great Shelford,
email:  pwestlak@eoe.co.uk              Cambridge CB2 5LQ,   England
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
From: churayj@yalevm.edu (raymond Chung)
Subject: Re: automotive design and architecture
Followup-To: alt.architecture
Organization: overrated Yale University
Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1992 22:41:49 GMT

olasov@cs.columbia.edu (Ben Olasov) wrote:
> I could imagine a car with boxy, Jeepish shaped chassis with
> 'industrial' detailing such as exposed, finely machined rivets
> on the surface that would be interesting and something like beautiful,
> yet not based on an aerodynamic image.

Not aerodynamic, but still completely derived from
function/material/structure, and not from an external vocabulary.  For
example, a hood ornament can literally express how a car is to be
understood as a jaguar (extra-referential).  Rivets do not bring the Jeep
into the level of metaphor or allegory.  It's still a machine.
 
> The cultural expectations of architecture are substantial, maybe
> greater than that for automobiles, partially because architecture has
> to exist by public consensus in some limited way.  Architecture is
> specifically designed to support the things we do and reflect the
> things we value, both of which are continuously changing.  In that
> sense, architecture is a way of defining culture, which is why it's an
> essential way we analyze the condition of a society at a given moment
> in history.

I've heard it said over and over again that architecture represents a
culture's mores, etc, and I've never accepted it.  If anything,
architecture represents an architect's values and fits a client's function.

How is it justifiable to inflate the practice of architecture to such a
heroic, important scale?  Sure, building involves many people from all
different areas of society (construction, community, business, government,
et al.) but ultimately, this mass of people is nothing more than a handful
of individuals arguing in a bubble.  Do such individuals automatically
represent a culture?  I think they more represent the state of architecture
as being determined by an architect's trained aesthetic values and a
client's ability to resist the ugly.

I have found that many people today when they see a new building go up do
not feel that they are in a position to judge the architecture, for they
feel uneducated in the language of building.  So they accept it as
architecture, an esoteric, highly intellectual issue left to architects and
their clients.  Out here in our art school world, how can we even pretend
that we have the responsibility to represent a society's values, whatever
they may be?  Architects have always forced aesthetics on their society,
never the other way around.  We only claim that our designs succeed in
representing contemporary social values, and who's to argue with the
arbiters of taste themselves?

Perhaps there is no such thing as being able to "represent a culture's
values" and it is only a phrase architects have fabricated in order to
ambush complaints of ugliness.  After all, the history of architecture is
marked by the architect's egomaniacal urge to design anew, and not to
serve.

                                 ? = ! > .
                              raymond  Chung
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
From: churayj@yalevm.edu (raymond Chung)
Subject: Re: The Bloomers
Followup-To: alt.architecture
Organization: Yale University, junior in architecture, bored
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1992 22:29:36 GMT

Laura Boutwell <U58100@uicvm.uic.edu> wrote:
 
> Incidentally, is Kent Bloomer related to Jennifer Bloomer, about whom
> i recently posted a somewhat inchorent note?

I don't know, but I remember that somewhat incoherent note of few
punctuation marks...  They sound like the same person, don't they?  Oooh,
spooky.  If someone knows, please post.  Maybe they're long lost twins and
need to find each other!

                                 ? = ! > .

                                                   r a y m o n d  C h u n g
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
From: dkboyd@convex1.tcs.tulane.edu (david boyd)
Subject: Re: architecture is not art (!)
Nntp-Posting-Host-[nntpd-15595]: convex1.tcs.tulane.edu
Organization: Tulane University, New Orleans, LA
Date: Sat, 7 Nov 1992 16:14:17 GMT


Gord McGonigal writes:

>How well are some of these FLW creations still functioning as buildings?
>Sitting in my armchair, I heard a rumor that some of them are crumbling
>due to unsound construction.  No doubt this happens when art is more
>imperative than science (engineering and proper testing).


For the most part, Wright's buildings are functioning as well as buildings 
as they ever did.  This is not to say that any/all of his buildings were 
perfect.  In fact the building mentioned in the post to which YOU
responded, the Guggenheim Museum, has a great many shortcomings as a museum
space.  He was rather smug about building houses and buildings on HIS scale
of things (Mr. Wright was not a tall man).  Much of his furniture was
uncomfortable.

However, to say that Wright bypassed engineering in his designs is simply
wrong.  In some cases, Wright's understanding of the structures he proposed
and later built exceeded that of the so-called experts.  As examples, the
administration building at S. C. Johnson in Racine, WI and the
quintessential Wright house, Fallingwater in western PA.  Structural
engineers were worse than skeptical about these designs, because they did
not understand them.  Nothing had been built quite like that before, and few
people possessed Wright's knowledge of the potential of concrete, and in 
both cases Wright's stubborn nature forced the issue, and he proved correct.

Wright's buildings do require maintenance, perhaps moreso than conventional
buildings of similar age.  Still, find me a 35-year-old (or older) building
that has never required a new roof, or work on the heating plant, or some
other sort of maintenance or repair.

David K. Boyd


Newsgroups: alt.architecture
From: dwharper@eos.ncsu.edu (DANTE WILLIAM HARPER)
Subject: SymbolSystem(tm)
Originator: dwharper@c00093-100lez.eos.ncsu.edu
Reply-To: dwharper@eos.ncsu.edu (DANTE WILLIAM HARPER)
Organization: North Carolina State University, Project Eos
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1992 20:14:28 GMT


THIS GOES BEFORE THE PREVIOUS TWO...



How can we establish a symbol-system? Isn't the act of creating a symbol-system
ultimately reductionist and proto-deconstructionist?  The symbologies inherent
in pre-victorian architecture, which I'm assuming is what everyone here is
lamenting to some degree, were not systematized; they were a physical side-
effect of pre-industrial age ideology systems, which certainly no-one was able
to systematize because they were unaware of ideology in the reified sense.


ps. personalize architecture now!
-- 
+][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][+

"Did it seem that long ago?                           Dante W Harper
It was when you still thought                         dwharper@eos.ncsu.edu
you thought, and still believed                       429-a S Boylan Ave
that part of you still managed                        Raleigh, NC 27603
to believe."  -bright                                 919 856 9250

      (in hopes that some sharp might get a laugh out of my credit history)

+][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][++++[]++++][+
   
Organization: Sophomore, Architecture, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Date: Sat,  7 Nov 1992 23:47:26 -0500 
From: Paul M Mcelwee <pm3w+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: On meaning and Ornament (
	<churayj-061192194848@morse-college-kstar-node.net.yale.edu>

A few things, 

Ray Chung writes:
>global.  Think of universal motifs as verbs and adjectives, the images as
>nouns.  Incidentally, I suggest that from now on any discussion of "symbol"
>be limited to representations of real-world things (the flower), while
>"form" be used for abstract shapes (the wave or the spiral).  It's a

I agree, there is a distinction between form and symbol.  True
architecture orchestrates both to create meaningful and beautiful
structures.

>shared symbols), I think there are certain symbols and forms that are
>already universally shared AND understood.  Across the world and without
>any regard to history, cultures have developed ornamental systems which
>commonly make use of the spiral, the wave, and the flower, among others. 
>They each speak of energy, related to growth or movement, and they each can
>be understood internally, without relation to the community.  It may take

--Add to this list the human form.  Paul Tesar (not very popular, but
worth looking up) recently lectured here at CMU.  He discussed how
people subconciously seek out human forms in abstract shapes.  The
example he gave which I found most striking was how people found human
(and animal) forms in Rorshach (sp?) inkblot tests over 90 percent of
the time.  The origin of "facade" is "face" etc. etc.  Examine Gaudi's
use of human forms in Casa Batallo. or the Carytids in the Erecthion.  I
would like to experiment sometime with the abstraction of nude figure
drawings (and sculptures) to generate architectural motifs.  Any ideas?
   Also..
>the use of ornament, for it not only can speak, but it can speak with
>emotion, something structural details cannot do (unless you believe that
>people can see by a carefully constructed joint that the architect thought
>long and hard about it, and so they appreciate the joint for the amount of
>work involved.  Still, in this case, the range of emotions is limited.)

   A valid point, yet I would keep in mind the ideas of Ruskin and the
arts and crafts movement.  In 'Stones of Venice' Ruskin describes detail
in terms of time spent and craft.  When an occupant sees craft and
quality in ornament (as opposed to tack-on siding, etc.) he is comforted
in knowing that the space he is in was carefully and thoughtfully
developed.  Craft is focusing on the 'means' rather than the 'ends'.  I
agree, however that craft cannot really stand alone to communicate
meaning outside of itself (although there's something to be said for
this as well..)

More to come.. 

-PAUL
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
From: smith@sctc.com (Rick Smith)
Subject: Re: automotive design and architecture
Organization: SCTC
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 22:37:17 GMT

pirone@milton.u.washington.edu (cocteau) writes:

>I suppose the full question is 
>    Why do humans allow the association of ideas through symbology
>    in architecture and not in car design (and hammer and cooking ware
>    disign for that matter)?

In other words, why do people spend lots of effort trying to embed and/or
interpret the symbology behind decoration in buildings but not in other
crafted objects? (well, excepting sculpture, etc, etc, etc).

I think it is because there are far more architecture professors than
there are industrial design professors, and that the notion of design
as being an elaborate symbolic language never caught on in industrial
design the way it has in the more traditionally "artistic" disciplines.
This may sound cynical, but I think there is a lot of truth to it.
It's not that a well crafted carving knife can't exhibit an expressive
decorative style, just that it's less likely to be "interpreted" by
professors unless, of course, a recognized architect or artist designed
it. Otherwise, it's treated like mass produced garbage.

I don't know _why_ the high ceilings and the 130 year old mahogany
banister in our house says "home" to me in such an unequivocal manner.
I never lived in such a house as a child, nor did any of my relatives,
so it's probably not some psychbabble imprinting thing. No one
architect built that house, and the ornamentation follows a
distinctive local style. What, if anything, does this have to do with
languages of symbology? Nothing? Why not? What of the truli in
souteastern Italy?

Rick.
smith@sctc.com          arden hills, minnesota
From: randolph@cognito.ebay.Sun.COM (Randolph Fritz)
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Subject: Re: automotive design and architecture
Date: 7 Nov 92 21:40:38 GMT
	<RANDOLPH.92Oct30174432@cognito.ebay.Sun.COM>
	<churayj-011192145205@morse-college-kstar-node.net.yale.edu>
	<RANDOLPH.92Nov5223326@cognito.ebay.Sun.COM>
Followup-To: alt.architecture
Organization: St. Dismas Infirmary for the Incurably Informed
NNTP-Posting-Host: cognito.ebay.sun.com
In-reply-to: randolph@cognito.ebay.Sun.COM's message of 5 Nov 92 22:33:26

In reviewing that post, I find I didn't cover two of my original
points.  Here's a short followup:

1. Wright ornamented his buildings.  He attempted to achieve artistic
   quality with mass-manufactured materials and elements.  He took
   advantage of the natural qualities of materials, machine worked to
   show them off, he used easily formed materials like concrete and
   soft stone in mass-manufactured forms, which he then integrated
   into patterned structures, and he designed interior elements.
   Wright felt that everything put into a structure was ornament and
   he designed textiles, furniture, lighting, and even table settings
   to that end.

2. The labor most low-tech cultures put into ornament is astonishing.
   Think of hand-woven fabrics, hand-thrown pottery, handmade
   you-name-it.  People spend large pieces their lives on these
   things.  They regard them as very important indeed.

__Randolph Fritz  sun!cognito.ebay!randolph || randolph@ebay.sun.com
From: randolph@cognito.ebay.Sun.COM (Randolph Fritz)
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Subject: Re: architecture is not art (!)
Date: 7 Nov 92 21:51:23 GMT
	<1992Nov5.210459.9894@viewlogic.com> <BxBH1q.Fyt@ccu.umanitoba.ca>
	<1992Nov7.161417.15611@cs.tulane.edu>
Organization: St. Dismas Infirmary for the Incurably Informed
NNTP-Posting-Host: cognito.ebay.sun.com
In-reply-to: dkboyd@convex1.tcs.tulane.edu's message of Sat, 7 Nov 1992 16:14:17 GMT

Wright was a good engineer himself, as I believe a number of great
architects have been.  His structures stand--the Imperial Hotel in
Tokyo rode out an earthquake.  On the other hand, he had real problems
dealing with climate--a lot of those flat roofs leak and the openness
of the designs make them hard to climate control.

__Randolph Fritz  sun!cognito.ebay!randolph || randolph@ebay.sun.com
From: haynes@cats.ucsc.edu (Jim Haynes)
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Subject: Re: architecture is not art (!)
Date: 5 Nov 1992 07:15:11 GMT
Organization: University of California; Santa Cruz
NNTP-Posting-Host: hobbes.ucsc.edu


Well I'm not an architect (except a computer architect); but I believe
building architecture and computer architecture are alike in that
the activity is a combination of art and design of a utilitarian
object, in which a balance is necessary.  If art overpowers utility
then you get sculpture rather than architecture.  If utility overpowers
art then you get - well I don't know if we even have a name for it,
but it's boring.
-- 
haynes@cats.ucsc.edu
haynes@cats.bitnet

"Ya can argue all ya wanna, but it's dif'rent than it was!"
"No it aint!  But ya gotta know the territory!"
        Meredith Willson: "The Music Man"

Organization: Sophomore, Architecture, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: alt.architecture
Date: Fri,  6 Nov 1992 02:44:27 -0500 
From: Paul M Mcelwee <pm3w+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: On meaning and Ornament
	<1992Nov5.220232.27351@sctc.com>

>>    In any case, I agree that in spite of (or maybye in acccordance
>>with?) modern media, a universal basis of symbols must be found.
> 
>Back to architecture. Why must there be a universal basis of symbols?
>I admit that we're moving towards it due to the effects of global
>media, but I think this actually increases the value and significance
>of community and ethnic symbols, particularly since they are
>incorporated into buildings that exist in a community.

This is a very valid point.  Establishing local dialog, I believe, is
essential to alleviating the anonymity and impersonality in modern
culture.  By "universal" I was really stressing the need for symbols
that can be understood by all (or at least a sizable percentage) of the
occupancy -- either on a local or global level.  My argument is that we
should try to seek out symbols that ARE relevant to time and place,
context and location.  My example was the environmental crisis.  
    There are other issues that should affect the choice of symbology
that should be dictated by site (local or global) and use, rather than
arbitrary historical or abstract references.  I would applaud the use of
local imagery as a basis for symbols.  Many architects here in Pittsburg
are doing just that.  Architects Bruce Linsey and Paul Rosenblatt
utilize local landmarks such as the Three rivers, steel mills, bridges,
and inclines, to communicate architectural ideas which the public can
understand (and hopefully, the visitor to the "burg can gain some
insight as well).
    While this may do little to prevent the environmental crisis, this,
I believe is a highly sympathetic and intelligent way to build
architecture.  My point in bashing capitalism, then, is to point out how
capitalist intrests more often than not ignore the site (in favor of an
standarized unity) and the local customs (global and de-humanized).  
   I would love to hear other examples of how architecural symbols are
formed (or might better relate) to YOUR neighborhood (I don't mean to
sound patronizing -- after all, Pittsburgh is the home of Mr. Rogers).
I'm curious to learn more about local architecture in other cities.

More please,

PAUL

I'm sorry if my post seemed in any way preachy, I'm trying to figure
this mess out too.