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The Dialectics of Sketching
Article in Creativity Research Journal · January 1991
DOI: 10.1080/10400419109534381

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The dialectics of sketching

Gabriela Goldschmidt aaArchitecture and Town Planning, Technion—Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel

To cite this Article Goldschmidt, Gabriela(1991) 'The dialectics of sketching', Creativity Research Journal, 4: 2, 123 — 143
To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1080/10400419109534381
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Creativity Research Journal
Volume 4 (2)123-143 (1991)

The Dialectics of Sketching
Gabriela Goldschmidt

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Technion - Israel Institute of Technology

ABSTRACT: The generation of architecturalform is by definition a creative activity. As arule, architects engage in intensive, fast, freehand sketching when they first tackle a designtask. This study investigated the process ofsketching and revealed that by sketching, thedesigner does not represent images held in themind, as is often the case in lay sketching,but creates visual displays which help induce
images of the entity that is being designed.
Sketching partakes in design reasoning andit does so through a special kind of visual imagery. A pattern of pictorial reasoning is revealed which displays regular shifts between
two modalities of arguments, pertaining toboth figural and nonfigural aspects of candidate forms at the time they are being generated, as part of the design search. The
dialectics of sketching is the oscillation of arguments which brings about gradual transformation of images, ending when the designer judges that sufficient coherence has
been achieved.

Freehand sketching is a common humanactivity, almost like writing. In everyday life,
most adults and certainly almost all children are at least occasionally involved in
the production of various kinds of sketchessuch as road-maps and plans, diagrams andabstract patterns as well as depictions ofCreativity Research Journal

people, animals, and objects, real or imaginary. Most such sketches should be classified as 'drawings' which are representations of either direct percepts, or ideas andimages held in the mind. Artists and designers are among the most ardent makers
of drawings: In their professional capacity,
they execute a great number of drawings asa matter of standard practice. Among thesedrawings, there is a special category of study
sketches which architects have the habit ofmaking in the very early stages of the handling of a task. These sketches, often scribbled on lightweight, transparent tracing
paper, are usually made very fast and aresometimes so idiosyncratic that they are
only comprehensible to their maker.
The purpose of the study reported inthis article is to explore the process ofmaking such study sketches. The practice of sketching is universal and dates
back hundreds of years (ever since
paper became a readily available commodity toward the end of the 15th century). If architects use the sketchingtool so persistently, it must be very helpful to their thinking. The questions thisstudy tries to answer are, What kind of
reasoning does sketching represent?

Correspondence and requests for reprints should be sent toGabriela Goldschmidt, Architecture and Town Planning, Technion— Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, 32000, Israel.

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G. Goldschmidt

Why is it so indispensable as a designthinking aid? In the context of a design
search, sketching is taken to be an a priori, inherently creative process, in thatthrough it new artifacts are brought
into being. To use common classifications of approaches to creativity research, it is the creative process that ishere under scrutiny, not the creative
product or the creative person (e.g.,
Gardner, 1988; MacKinnon 1970, O'Quin& Besemer, 1989). No measurement or
quantification of manifestations of creativity are attempted. The intent is topoint out what seem to be the inherent
reasoning patterns in a domain-specificactivity, namely the practice of sketching at the front edge of architecturaldesigning.
Sketches as products have received
exposure as steps leading to finishedworks of art or design, as illustrated by
Arnheim's (1962) study of Picasso's
Guernica. But the process of sketchinghas commanded little attention: Even
the psychology of art has concentrated
more on cognitive aspects of art viewing
than on those of art making (e.g.,
Gombrich, 1960). Arnheim (1986)
wrote about transformations in visual
representation in the course of concept
formation, but the making of sketches
has interested researchers mainly as adevelopmental topic, and children's
drawings are indeed the subject of manyin-depth studies. Some of these works
are of interest from the point of view ofartistic development (Arnheim, 1975;
Gardner, 1980); others look at graphic
representation from a wider cognitive
or developmental perspective (e.g.,
Beittel, 1972; de Bono, 1972; Goodnow,
1977; Karmiloff-Smith, 1990; Smith,
1979; Van Sommers, 1984). On rare occasions, methodological questions re124

garding architectural sketching havebeen addressed (Herbert, 1988), butlittle is known about the underlying specialized cognitive operations which go"beyond universals," to borrow Feldman's (1980) terminology. An exception
is Fish and Scrivener's (1990) theoretical treatment of the cognitive mechanisms that are believed to enable sketching to induce artistic inventiveness.
The present study of sketching waspart of a larger research project held at
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in which designers participated in"thinking aloud" sessions. These wererecorded and then transcribed. The
transcriptions, along with the sketches
made by the participants (cross referenced with the verbalizations) comprisethe protocols which served as data forthe present studies. In the first round of
exercises, seven experienced architects
and one student of architecture workedon the design of a branch library. A"footprint" (contour drawing) of a onestory, suburban library with six possible
entry positions was presented to the designers, and they were asked to work on
the entries and their consequences forthe design of the library. Each individual session lasted between one and twohours, with the designers talking to an
investigator, who only answered technical questions and prompted speechwhen silence lasted over several seconds. The data present a true challenge
as protocols are usually and essentially1

The study was partially supported by a National Science
Foundation grant #8611357-DMC. A first version of this article
was submitted to the NSF as a technical research report under
the title "Architectural Sketching: Seeing As and Seeing That"(1989).
2
The 'Branch Library' design exercise was developed byWilliam Porter of the MIT Department of Architecture. The
designers' names in this article are all fictitious.

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Dialectics of Sketching

verbal, whereas in this case they aredensely sprinkled with sketches. Although this raises certain methodological difficulties in the submission of the
protocols to informal analysis (Ericcson& Simon, 1984), it is a worthwhile struggle, as it permits us to deal with "a realrather than a toy task," to quote Hayes(1989, p. 209), in his examination of another creative activity, that of writing.
Informal analyses of creative endeavors
have been carried out in other fields,such as poetry editing (Perkins, 1977).
In architectural research there has been
an effort to apply formal protocol analysis to the process of designing as awhole (Akin, 1986). That work is guided
by Newell and Simon's (1972) information processing theory and looks atdesigning from a problem-solving perspective. The objective of the present
study was to isolate the activity of sketching and use visual thinking and imagery
as a conceptual framework for investigation. The entire process of designing,
and its front edge especially, is not necessarily seen as a case of problem solving. A discussion of the difference between problem solving and othermodels of designing is, however, beyond
the scope of the present discourse.
Designing: Moves and Arguments

To design is to plan for the making ofsomething new. In the case of architecture,
this "something" is an artifact of the physical environment. Designing entails generating, transforming, and refining images ofdifferent aspects of that still non-existentartifact and making representations of it
which enable communication and examination of the ideas involved. The ultimate
objective of the process of designing is the
production of visual representations of theCreativity Research Journal

designed entity with enough completionand coherence to allow its construction or
the construction of a visual simulation of it,
physically or mentally. The questions we areconcerned with pertain to the kind of reasoning that is employed in the course ofexperimentation and transformation, thatis, the initial design search. To discover patterns of reasoning, if they exist, we must
isolate and analyze the smallest units of design reasoning. This we do through parsing
the protocols into design moves, and at aneven finer grain, into design arguments.
Moves are the basic coherent operations detectable in designing, and arguments are the smallest sensible statements which go into the making ofmoves. Both move and argument are idiosyncratic terms. The notion of a movehas acquired somewhat different meanings in different design studies (Habraken, 1985). In the present study, adesign move is defined as an act of reasoning which presents a coherent proposition pertaining to an entity that isbeing designed. Argument stands for arational utterance made by a designer,and bears on the designed entity or on an
aspect thereof. The notion of moves andarguments is crucial to this study, and it istherefore important to clarify it. This canbe done through an example.
Glenda is one of the designers who
participated in the branch-library exercise. At a certain point in the process
she assumed an urban setting with abutting buildings on either side of the library and divided the library site andbuilding into a series of 9, and then 12
squares, which she identified as built
and unbuilt areas. She darkened andleft squares white respectively in her
sketch (Figure 1). What she said next
was assigned three moves in the analysisof the protocol:
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G. Goldschmidt

Figure1. Glenda's Sketch:(White) and Enclosed (Black) Spaces

Open

1. What you could do then is work on thosesquares as your basic element.
2. You could treat this as a puzzle sort ofthing.
3. This does not seem to suggest any context for how it could get along with
what's around it. For example, I can imagine this as a casbah [residential neighborhood of a traditional North African town,
often a grid pattern of houses and theirprivate courtyards. A common architectural reference] situation — not in Massachusetts... [but] where you have territories, confined territories.

The first and second moves contain one argument each. The third move is more elaborate and it was assigned three different arguments as follows:
3.i This does not seem to suggest any context for how it could get along with
what's around it.
3.ii For example, I can imagine this as a casbah situation (-not in Massachusetts)...
3.iii where you have territories, confined territories.

126

The move advances the proposition
that a casbah, with its confined (walledin) territories, might be a suitable analogy capable of creating a context for
tying the library to its surroundings.
Subdividing the move into argumentsshows that the proposition is graduallybuilt up, in an additive sequence. Firstthe designer observes that the patternof squares previously established does
not in itself suggest a unifying context
that would facilitate the anchorage ofthe library to its built environment.
Then the casbah image is brought up,
with the reservation that Massachusetts
is not where one would expect a casbah.
Finally, the rationale for the analogy isspelled out: At the present state of thelibrary design, its organization is basedon a series of interconnected built andopen (but enclosed) spaces, reminiscentof the organizational pattern of the casbah. Several moves earlier, the designer
proposed to "treat it [the library] verymuch like a town-house" and after trying one town-house like concept she
entertained the idea that "you could use
the Chermayeff scheme for townhouses... with enclosed and open spaces
as per need...." Thus the casbah organization is made to fit in with town-houses
which presumably would surround thelibrary, if they happen to be based on
the 'Chermayeff scheme' [Serge Chermayeff, a well known architectural theoretician during the 1960's and '70's]
which used an organizational principle
similar to that found in a casbah.
We learn from this example how intricate design reasoning is, as the trajectory the designer follows is not n.ecessarily linear or hierarchical. There is no
logical sequence of decisions which
stem from one another, nor are concepts firm or even consistent at an early
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Dialectics of Sketchingphase (as the forced marriage between
town-houses and casbah). Propositions
may be uni-argumentative or multiargumentative, and it seems that the sequence of arguments within a complex
move is not critical. In well prepared
protocols it is possible to indicate howeach argument is associated to sketching (sketches are cross-referenced toverbalizations in the protocol). For the
analysis of sketching, moves were classified as follows: moves made while actively sketching, moves made while contemplating sketches and reading off
them, and moves with no graphic input.
The three moves above were all madewhile Glenda contemplated the sketch
depicted in Figure 1.
The protocols used in the present
study were submitted to a structural
analysis at the level of moves (Goldschmidt, 1989, 1990, in press). That
analysis showed how much can be discerned regarding the systematic structure of design reasoning if relationships
among moves are adequately identified
and notated. The present study is a firstattempt to work at the level of arguments, concentrating on the structureof visual reasoning while sketching.
Visual Thinking and Imagery

The importance of visual displays for performance in many tasks is widely recognized. Visual displays are not necessarily
pictures: For example, it is easier to spell acomplicated word when we see it written in
front of us. The written word is a visual display though not a picture, in the sense thatits meaning (and spelling) remains thesame regardless of pictorial differences ofstyle, color, or size of characters. Three dimensional models are frequently used invarious design disciplines: They are not picCreativity Research Journaltures either, but they certainly qualify as visual displays. In this study the discussion
will be limited to actual pictures, or rather
drawings.
Visual displays are particularly helpful in certain kinds of reasoning. In addition to providing direct access to explicit information contained in them,
we may also see in them things which
are not explicitly there. This may lead
us to infer what we might otherwise not
be able to tap. Following the footstepsof Gestalt psychologists, Arnheim(1969) argued that perception processes
the information it gathers in a conceptual way, and as far as shape goes, perception is "the grasping of genericstructural features" (p. 29). Elsewhere
Arnheim (1986) elaborated: "Seeing afire is always seeing fireness, and seeinga circle is seeing roundness" (p. 143).
The ability to visually abstract from particulars and to typify information is useful in certain kinds of problem solving.
A beautiful example is provided in
Wertheimer's (1959) account of finding
the area of a parallelogram. He presented a parallelogram to young children who did not know how to calculate
its area, but who knew how to find thearea of a rectangle. Children who saw a
way to transform the parallelogram intoa rectangle (Figure 2) succeeded in solving the problem. Visual strategies used
to identify the relationship between theparallelogram and the rectangle whichequals it in area differed slightly, but es-

Figure 2. Parallelogram Transformed
into Rectangle (after Wertheimer, 1959)
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G. Goldschmidt

sentially they all hinged on an imagined
subdivision of the parallelogram shape
into smaller shapes that could be rearranged to create a rectangle.
The prallelogram problem differsfrom a design task in that problems areusually not prespecified in designing, atleast not in a precise manner. They mustbe formulated by the designer. In defining problems, designers often use visualdisplays and their strategies are quite similar to those employed by Wertheimer's
youngsters. Consider an example fromour design protocols. Ben, an experienced designer, was trying to make senseof the shape he was given (the libraryfootprint). Ben thought about organizational principles for the plan and for the
better part of the session he treated it as acentral area with three spaces, which hecalled 'pods,' attached to it. At one point
he made these two consecutive moves:
1. Which is in fact the relationship that one
would try to set up between all of those,
between all of the three pods and the
middle space? It seems reasonable toread it that way... hard not to.
2. What's funny is that I haven't been reading it as two L's back to back, which it
also is. And you might read it that way if
this were an office building... maybe Ishould anyway.

Figure 3 illustrates the two 'readings'of the shape that Ben generated: 3a isthe footprint divided into a middle
space with three surrounding 'pods'
and 3b shows the configuration as two
L's back to back. As in the case of theparallelogram, the moves made in orderto get a handle on the problem or thetask, consisted of adding imaginarylines which transformed a given meaningless or unresolvable shape into rec128

1

——

(a)

(b)

Figure 3. Ben's 'readings' of the Library
Footprint: ( a ) . Central Space and 3 "Pods"( b ) . Two L's Back to Backognizable parts that were relevant, or
promised to carry relevance, for the
problem or task at hand. To be able to"see" the imaginary lines which subdivided the footprint and the parallelogram, Ben and the children had to employ mental imagery. Likewise, Glenda
used imagery to 'see' the same footprint, and the rectangle in which it wasbound when she had added site-lines, as
subdivided into 12 squares (Figure 1).
Imagery is central to visual thinking inall of its manifestations and is thereforeof great importance to the study of designing. Without entering the questionof neuro-activity of the brain at the timeof image processing, it is important toclarify the philosophical difference between seeing and imagining. Wittgenstein's definition (from Anscombe & vonWrite, 1970) can be used as a guideline:
I learn the concept 'seeing' along with the description of what I see. I learn to observe and todescribe what I observe. I learn the concept 'to
have an image' in a different context. The descriptions of what is seen and what is imaged areindeed of the same kind, and a description might
be of the one just as much as of the other; but
otherwise the concepts are thoroughly different.
The concept of imaging is rather like one ofdoing than of receiving.... (Note 637, p. I l l )Wittgenstein's emphasis on doing inimagery versus receiving in seeing is ofCreativity Research Journal

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Dialectics of Sketchingfundamental importance. Imagistic reasoning is based on recall of images previously perceived, and this capacity wasused in the cases of the footprint and parallelogram: The rectangles and triangles
into which these shapes were subdivided
were recalled from inventories, in memory, of available and manageable shapes(squares, rectangles, triangles). For theparallelogram problem, this act of recall
was sufficient to lead to a solution. Not sofor the far more complex library footprint
task: One or another set of adjacencies
among rectangles did not directly lead toa concept that could be translated into aplan for the library. Complex tasks require a step-by-step generation of images.
Indeed, Kosslyn, Pinker, Smith, andShwartz (1981) asserted that images are
not retrieved 'in to to' but are constructedfrom organized units. They are transformed in small steps, passing intermediate stages in the process. When first confronting a design task, in pursuit ofcoherent ideas, imagery is called on to assist in thinking, as is the case in other domains. Werner and Kaplan (1984) asserted that "... those who have reported
on the process of giving form to new ideas
and those who have reported on the
struggles to make thoughts clear havegenerally mentioned the role of imagery
in the initial phases of rendering thought
explicit" (pp. 425-426). To generate aplan, even a simple one, and even when ashape is provided, as in the case of thelibrary, is a complex task. Rather complex
imagistic reasoning is likely to be required. This is where sketching comes
into play.
Glenda's case demonstrates the complexity of the process. She came muchcloser to a plan than did Ben (as subsequent sections of their protocols assert),
and getting there required several steps
Creativity Research Journal

in which various images had to be represented and examined (puzzle, casbah,
town-house), then interlinked (casbah
and town-house), before a clear concept
emerged. It is hard to imagine that she
would have reached that point had she
not employed sketching. Ben did not
engage in sketching, but only contemplated a drawing while suggesting backto back L's. What is it that happens
when one sketches, and why is it so
helpful to sketch when starting to design? Let us first listen to perceptions
offered by another two of our designers(the commentaries were made as part ofon-line verbalizations: No direct questions were asked):
When I sit down to work, it's hard... to have a sortof steady stream because oftentimes... it takes youa while to isolate enough of the pieces a way thatyou can actually work on some piece of it. When I
first start, I make a lot of drawings. I don't understand what I'm doing until I draw it a few times,
and then it becomes clear to me what I'm trying
to do, and then I can begin to work on it... It is
important as a designer to perceive the form inspace while you are trying to get at the ideas.
I can't get very far with just thinking about it without drawing something... I tend to overlay when I
use pencil... they [overlays] are usually pretty similar... these drawings are usually worthless as products so I am not very attached to them... I also do a
lot of erasing. I like to erase because I like to have a
lot of lines on the page. I like fuzzy stuff. I can see
things in it more than I can in harder-lined things.
So, sometimes I just get a lot of lines out and then I
start to see things in it. A lot of times I pick up
things I think are important. I put down potentials
and then erase down to them... I'm learning toerase less and just overlay....

A novice designer (first year architecture
student), added her perspective:
I don't know [whether an experienced architect
would approach the task differently], because I
don't know if he [experienced architect! would

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look at this and immediately see these andwouldn't even have to draw it for himself because
he can see it. I felt I had to stop and... actually
draw out for myself what I'm saying in words.

What is it that we must infer fromthese insightful remarks? And how can
we relate them to imagery?
Given that an entity to be designed orthat is being designed does not yet exist
and therefore was never perceived, itcannot, in its entirety or its parts, be recalled or imaged in the normal sense.
How then does a designer start? He or
she starts by generating partial images oftentative aspects of the designed entity.
Such images may follow recollections ofexisting buildings or artifacts which serve
as references; they may find their origins
in precedents derived from metaphors,analogous cases, or entities belonging toa similar type. To elicit a suitable image
or a range of images to choose from andto build on is so complex that it canhardly be done all at once and must be
undertaken in stages. Through sketching
one prepares an array of displays ofshapes and relationships among shapesthat enrich the designer's search-spacebecause they harbor both expected andunexpected images. Beittel (1972) reported a similar process in artistic endeavors: "In the on-going artistic dialogue, the line which creates on apregnant ground gives way to the remaining ground opposite it, whichevokes a new contrasting figure" (p. 26).
Almost any display may provide clues
that could lead to potentially useful images, as testified by the above quote fromone of our designers: "I like fuzzy stuff. I
can see in it more than I can in hardlined things." An appropriate display
goes a long way, as demonstrated by
Wertheimer's parallelogram. The advan130

tage of sketching is its dynamic nature: A
sketch may be transformed by adding toit, by deleting parts or by drawing over it.
The designer is not confined to a single
sketch: He or she may generate as manysketches as required before satisfactory
images emerge, and thus "When I firststart, I make a lot of drawings. I don't
understand what I'm doing until I draw
it a few times, and then it becomes clear
to me what I'm trying to do... " A seriesof sketches may be produced as a continuum or as a spotty collection of diverse
images. Either way, the designer
searches, as the quotations above cogently express, sufficient relevance andcoherence of images to permit the maturation of a plausible representation of
the designed entity or, more likely, aspects of it. In relating his experience as
an inventor, de Bono (19*71) told about adeliberate 'hunt' for clues in relatively
random visual displays until something
was perceived that triggered an idea.
Sketching achieves a similar goal, but
the search is not random and it does notstop when the idea is triggered but continues in order to develop, test, and refine it. The old Italian name pensierithat was given to sketches when sketching first became a common practice inthe art and design world of the Renaissance, means 'thoughts' (Olszweski,1981). The name most appropriately describes sketches, which are indeed
thoughts. Accordingly, sketching is
thinking. The search cycle ends when
the designer is ready to attempt a 'hardline' drawing (more or less accurate,true to dimensions scale drawing, often
executed with drafting devices such as
rulers and triangles). Its purpose is totest and verify a concept through a communicable representation.
Not all designers sketch extensively,
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Dialectics of Sketchingand some refrain from sketching altogether. According to his own testimony,Frank Lloyd Wright processed images in
his mind and never touched paper before they were brought to completion
entirely in his head; he also recommended that other designers follow
suit (Kaufman, 1955). Most designers,
however, seem to ignore Wright's recommendation and practice extensive
sketching (likewise, most composers
write and rewrite their scores with many
revisions and transformations, unlike
Mozart who claimed to be hearing anentire composition in his 'mind's ear'before he put down the notes in one
spell, with no gaps and no revisions).
What most designers do is to draw andre-draw lines, shapes, objects, and "fuzzy
stuff," until they can 'read' in, or off
what had been drawn, something useful.
We call this operation interactive imagery:the simultaneous or almost simultaneous production of a display and thegeneration of an image that it triggers.
Sketching, then, is not merely an actof representation of a preformulated
image; in the context we deal with, it is,more often than not, a search for suchan image.
Seeing As and Seeing That
In the controversy over the nature ofmental-visual imagery, pictorialists hold theview that images represent the way pictures
do. In this view, imagery is pictorial, or analog (nondigital). Descriptionalists, on theother hand, believe that mental images represent in the mode of language rather thanpictures. Hence imagery is discursive or
descriptional or propositional (Block,1981). There have been voices that claimed
pictorial and discursive imagery to be impossible to separate. Fodor (1975) referred
Creativity Research Journal

to "images under description" and Kosslyn
et al. (1981) concluded that image construction can exploit nonpictorial as well as
pictorial information. Recently an experiment in metal rotation led Takano (1989,
p. 20) to assert:
It is impossible to decide strictly whether a given
representation is 'analog' or 'propositional*.
What could be done would be, at best, to judge
whether the given representation would look
more similar to certain prototypical 'analog' representations or to certain typical 'propositional'
representations... [but] even a prototypical'analog' representation would be able to behave
just like a prototypical 'propositional' representation if coupled with appropriate processors
Andersen (1978).

Sketches are obviously pictorial, forthey refer to shape and orientation, andoften to approximate size even if they
maintain a varying degree of abstractness. Yet it is impossible to confirm that
there is a direct one-to-one correspondence between shapes and figures on
paper and the images they stand for. It
is therefore proposed to refer to the(pictorial) reasoning evident in interactive imagery at the time of sketching as
consisting of two modalities. The designer is 'seeing as' when he or she isusing figural, or 'gestalt' argumentation
while 'sketch-thinking'. When 'seeing
that', the designer advances nonfiguralarguments pertaining to the entity thatis being designed. The process ofsketching is a systematic dialectics between the 'seeing as' and 'seeing that'reasoning modalities. To examine this
proposition, design moves and arguments were inspected as they are established through protocol analysis. The
notion of 'seeing as' and 'seeing that'will be further elucidated as we proceed, so as to best exploit documenta131

G. Goldschmidt

Downloaded By: [Bibliotheek TU Delft] At: 15:28 20 April 2010tion from the protocols. Consider once
more the excerpt from Glenda's protocol quoted earlier. Each argument is
now coded, using the 'seeing as/seeing
that' classification. The arguments madeby Glenda are reprinted here with theircodings:
1. THAT What you could do then is workon those squares as your basic element.
2. AS
You could treat this as a puzzle sortof thing.
3.i THAT This does not seem to suggest
any context for how it could getalong with what's around it.
3.ii ASFor example, I can imagine this asa casbah situation (not in Massachusetts)...
3.iii THAT Where you have territories, confined territories.

Glenda sees that the squares could betreated as basic elements. The squareconfiguration could be seen as a puzzle.
She sees that this metaphor leads nowhere. She tries another metaphor: Seeing the square pattern as a casbah. She
sees that in a casbah there are confined
territories. In this short passage the designer alternates her reasoning modality
with every new argument she makes.
Figure 4 is a graphic notation of the argument sequence in terms of the 'seeing as' and 'seeing that' coding.
In the short sequence examined
Argum*nt

1

2

5

AS

THAT

I

Mov»

1

*

3

Figure 4. Seeing As and Seeing That
Arguments in Glenda's Protocol
132

Martin's Branch Library

Martin, a famous European architect andfrequent guest teacher and lecturer in the
U.S. , was uneasy with the task from the
beginning. He had two objections: First, hefound the library footprint quite appalling.
"I would come up with another plan, that's

5

J
2

above, a pattern of alternating as and thatarguments suggests itself. Whether thispattern is typical, and to what extent,
must be established on the basis of a more
extensive investigation. Sections fromthree other protocols of the library task,
all marked by intensive sketching, were selected for investigation. In two of thecases the analysis relates to several quick
sketches which the designers, Ronna andGilbert, produced sequentially. In thethird case a single sketch was developedby Martin for a longer period of time andbrought to fruition in terms of the design
task (seeing that we deal with the frontedge only). Because the data are extremely rich in this case, it is presented
in detail so as to obtain an anatomy of thedesign process through the activity ofsketching. As will be shown, a 'seeing as'
and 'seeing that' codification of the arguments in this case yields a pattern very
similar to that found for the cursory example above. The two other cases underinvestigation produce similar patterns, although they are not as unequivocal.

3
Martin,a brilliant architect, has the reputation of beinga particularly creative person. A certain bend toward the investigation of the creative personality must therefore be admitted. However, issues or data pertaining to Martin's personality
or design contributions over time are not discussed here.
Looking at his designing/sketching performance in isolationin the framework of the library exercise and comparing it tothat of other architects who have dealt with the same task, sets
the context of this investigation in the realm of the creative

process.

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Dialectics of Sketching

1 11 I \ \
(b)

(c)

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Figure 5. Martin's Diagrams Describing Spatial Organization: (a). Serial Elements, (b).
Central Organization, and (c). Linear Sequence
for sure," he said. Second, he thought it
impossible to work without a specific site.
He explained: "... I feel powerless, because
I think architecture is the organization of
space in three dimensions, but related to alocation, to a situation. ... I have to be in
confrontation with a site, with a situation... If I don't know the orientation, it's
very difficult... " He finally agreed 'to play
the game': "I would not make a plan like
that, but once it exists, I accept to organize
the thing... ". The analysis below covers apreliminary phase, then moves on to follow
his reasoning while producing his final
sketch. It is that later phase that is submitted to the as/that analysis.
Martin started by sketching and articulating in length various possible principles of spatial organization: Space as a series of elements, such as rooms, in somegeometrically coherent configuration(Figure 5a), a central organization, with astrong focal point (Figure 5b), and a linear sequence of repetitive elements, likehouses or rooms, elsewhere called 'adjoining cells' (Figure 5c).
How would such organizations beachieved? By way of introducing a center, an axis, a direction, an orientation.
The goal is to advance a spatial idea: "togive a spatial reference point" which
Creativity Research Journal

would serve as "a key for reading thespace." The given footprint, on theother hand, "is the opposite of space"; itis "like a labyrinth" (Figure 6).
Having expressed his reservations,
Martin was willing to approach the design exercise. Relating to the six possible entry points, he asserted that noentry is superior to another and no organizational rule is best a priori. For
each entry a suitable design solution
can be worked out. To prove it he madea few quick sketches of what the footprint would be like if one used either
one of three different entrances (Figure7). In all three instances Martin divided
the footprint into three zones. A central
part is accessed from the entry and continues across the structure, where acontrol point for the library is located(accommodating the librarian, for in-

Figure 6. Martin's Diagram Illustrating a Labyrinth
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(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 7. Alternative Library Plans Using Different Entry Points: (a). Long Entry Hall
Between Reading Rooms and Stacks, (b). Open Plan With Interior Court, and (c). Library
Elements Surrounding Atrium
stance). The two zones on either side of
the central space are to house stacks
and reading rooms respectively. Each
scheme offers a different spatial idea.
The scheme depicted in Figure 7c, forexample, was described as a central
atrium connected to several separate
sections, whereas in the plan in Figure
7b there would be a minimal number ofinterior elements, all of them open, so
as to sense the simplicity of the entire
space immediately upon entry.
It was not until much later that Martin undertook to 'really' design the library. But before we look at what he didthen, let us stop for a moment and ask
ourselves what he had done thus far.
He started by pointing out what thefootprint is not: It is not a good spacebecause it does not have a center, an axis
or a direction. What was it that Martin
perceived, and what did he see? The
form in front of him, he said, did nothave certain properties. Can one see negation of properties? The answer is yes
and no. One cannot see an entity as not
being something. One can only see what134

is there, which may or may not be as
something else that shares some of its
properties. But one can see that an entity
does not have those properties. For example, we can see this sheet of paper as
being white. We can also see it as being
pink (at sunset, say), but we cannot see it
as being nonwhite or nonpink because
this would yield endless possibilities,
whereas we only see it at a given time asa single display, which (in this case), has
one color to it. If we do not see the sheetof paper as white, we can neverthelesssay that we see that it is nonwhite, without committing ourselves to a color.
Martin saw that the footprint did nothave the qualities that in his view would
make it a good architectural space. He
also saw it as a labyrinth, an entity
which, because of its pronounced lackof center, direction, axis and so on, became a symbol of 'antispace' in Martin's
discourse. We may conclude that in thisfirst phase Martin reasoned about thefootprint by seeing it both as something
undesirable and by seeing that it does
not have certain positive properties.
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Dialectics of Sketching

Having criticized the given footprint,
Martin began to interact with it. In eachof the three schemes he drew, he saw it asdivided into three zones, conceived differently each time as open or contained
spaces. The central entry space in all
three sketches is spacious and reaches
from one face of the building to another.
Did Martin see that a central space or an
entry space, in a branch library, or in any
building type, should possess these characteristics? We do not know. But about theatrium (Figure 7c) he told us: "I should
get to know the functions better... Maybe
there is no need [for an atrium], in whichcase I couldn't make it; I would have tofind something else." We may say that
Martin sees that an atrium may be appropriate. However, he sees the footprint not
only as harboring an atrium, but as pos-(•)

sessing "an atrium like this." Like what
atrium? Like the one he drew. It would
have been difficult to imagine Martin reasoning about the library footprint the way
he did, had he not executed the threesketches of Figure 7. Unlike the previous
diagrams, they were not made just for theinvestigator. Through them he establishedwhat could be done with the footprint if itwere to be entered through various entry
points. What could be done hinged on
seeing that there should be three sections
and each section is seen as open or contained or as an atrium or as a reading
room and so on.
Following these sketches Martin discussed in great length some of his design values and beliefs in a most generaland abstract way, interspersing the discourse with examples from his experi-(b)Figure 8. (a). "Site plan" Given to Martin by Investigator, and (b). Reconstruction ofMartin's Design
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G. Goldschmidt

ence. He finally returned to the footprint, but not before the investigator
provided site conditions: orientation(an arrow indicating north), lot lines
with streets on two opposite sides, and a
few large trees on the site. A reconstruction of that plan is depicted in Figure
8a. Martin laid the 'site plan' over thefootprint drawing and within a few minutes accomplished a design, working ona single sketch. Figure 8b is a reconstruction of his drawing and the sketch
itself is reprinted in Figure 9. We shallwant to inspect Martin's sketching activity step by step so as to examine his reasoning closely. But in order to better un_— * _ . . ' ".

!>iFigure 9. Martin's Sketch (Cross Referenced to Verbalizations)136

derstand his moves and arguments, apostfactum analysis of the resultant design is presented first. The parsed protocol (see Appendix A) as well as the commentary below are cross referenced withthe sketch in Figure 9.
The scheme encompasses the entire
site and ties the building to its immediate surroundings in an inseparable manner. The site is accessed from the twostreets [H] via an internal driveway.
Along it are two parking lots [El, E2],
on either side of the building. The entrance to the library [D] is midway,
across the driveway. One enters along
an entry axis [F] which runs throughthe building and across an outdoor
space which is its extension [B, C]. That
outdoor space is enclosed by big,
shadow-casting trees [A] along the lotline. Some of these trees were on thesite drawing, others were added by Martin. Inside, the entrance space ismarked by a semidome [L]. Three similar spaces [I] contain the main libraryfunctions, one east of the entry space
and two west of it. A single spatial module further to the west is dedicated toservices [S], namely rest rooms and thelike. More large trees were added andshrubs are indicated along site features
like the driveway and the parking lots.
The integrity of this design and the
speed in which it was achieved are astonishing. No other designer in the library experiment has developed a plan
as comprehensive as this one, paying attention simultaneously to so many different design issues (eg., visibility andprominence of entrance, inside-outside
relationship, hierarchical space adjacencies, site development). How did Martin
do it? Having examined what preceded
this sketch, it is not difficult to explain
how things came together. Martin alCreativity Research Journal

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Dialectics of Sketchingable to use interactive imagery, throughsketching, to see that things fall into
place because they could be seen as familiar substances, desirable for his purposes.
Martin's protocol was analyzed byparsing it into moves and arguments
and by codifying the arguments according to the 'seeing as' and 'seeing that'modalities. The complete analysis canbe found in Appendix A. As in Glenda's
case, the results were graphically notated. Similar notations were preparedfor protocols of the two other designers,
Ronna and Gilbert. The notation, in
Figure 10, differentiates (at the level ofmoves) among active sketching, contemplation of a sketch and reading off it,
and acts of reasoning with no directgraphic input.

ready established that he wants a center,a direction, an axis. Adjoining cells arefine by him. He explained earlier thatthe organization of a building should
strongly depend on its relationship to
the site. It also became clear that in
Martin's immediate repertoire, a branchlibrary (or at least this one), seems toconsist mainly of a spacious entry-space
which runs across the building and twozones for library functions. All of thesethings are present in the new sketch; it
looks so self evident that we wonder why
he refused to puzzle the pieces together
into a whole before the site plan had
been handed to him. But this is exactly
the point: He needed to go through theclueing process which was made possible only once he confronted the display
provided by the site-plan. Then he was
Argument

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Move

1 2

Active sketching

3

till

4

5 6

10 1 1 1 2 1 3 1 4 1 5 1617 1 8 1 9 2 0 2122 2 3 2 4 2 5 2627 2 8 2 9 3 0 3 1 3 27

Contemplating sketch

8

•

9

1011 1 2 1 3 1 4 1 5No griphfc input

Figure 10. Notation of As and That Arguments (Martin, Ronna, Gilbert)
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G. Goldschmidt

Figure 10 reveals a most coherent
pattern. Let us first look at Martin's notation. Half of the arguments (15) hemade qualify as 'seeing as' arguments,
the other half (15) are 'seeing that' arguments, and one (argument no. 5) is a'seeing as/that' argument (a joint coding, assigned when it was impossible totake the two modalities apart). For themost part, 'as' arguments are preceded
and followed by 'that' arguments andvice versa. All 'as' arguments, with a single exception, were made while sketching. 'That' arguments were made bothwhile sketching and while pausing tocontemplate on-line sketches.
In comparison to Martin's graph,
Ronna's graph displays less 'as-that'shifts of single arguments. Groups of arguments, though, do shift from the 'as'mode to the 'that' mode repeatedly. She
too made almost an equal number of'as' arguments (10) and 'that' arguments (13). Six more are mixed. Gilbert
made more 'that' arguments (14) than'as' ones (8) in addition to one mixed
argument. In his graph both individualarguments and groups shift modes between 'as' and 'that'. Based on theseresults it is proposed that design reasoning at the time of sketching is characterized by short sequences of arguments which shift between seeing as andseeing that modalities. Shifts occur bothwithin moves and across moves in a cyclic manner, which we call the dialectics
of sketching.

The Dialectics of Sketching
Two questions must now be asked. First,
what is significant in the pattern just outlined? Second, is this pattern of reasoning
modular (Fodor, 1983)? That is, is it
unique to designing while sketching only?
138

The regularity in which design arguments shift reasoning modalities, as depicted in Figure 10, is no coincidence.
In its purest manifestation, the oscillating pattern reveals itself in moves containing two arguments, one of each modality. There are two possible sequences:
first 'as' then 'that', or vice versa —'that' first, followed by 'as'. Let us examine two examples from Martin's protocol, move 10 and move 13 (seeAppendix A). In move 10 he tells us that
he wants an important element, then hestates that he sees the axis he had introduced earlier as such an element. In
move 13 he first sees some of the wallsof the library as being 'open' (e.g.,glazed), then he explains that thiswould achieve the prolongation of theaxis (into the outdoor space). In eachmove the two arguments are strongly interlinked and we can assume that thefirst led to the second, or at least contributed considerably to its generation.
In both cases, one of the arguments isdirectly extracted from Martin's genericdesign theory, or codex of design rules,
some of which he explicated earlier (thestrength of an axis as an organizing
principle, the importance of a relationship to the site and its features). But inboth cases these 'rules' are applied tothe task at hand in a unique way,
through making or transforming visualdisplays which were non-existent before
their creation by Martin during sketching. In the first case the rule (importantelement) led to a feature of the designed entity (axis); in the second casethe physical feature (glass walls) eliciteda rule (prolongation of axis) which justified it.
Hence, the order in which arguments switch modalities is not important. What is significant is the fact that
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Dialectics of Sketching

the shifts occur both ways. Arnheim(1986), following Wittgenstein's (1953)
discourse on this matter, recognized therole of 'seeing as' in visual thinking andformulated the underlying principle
which governs its role in reasoning:"... all perception is the perception ofqualities, and since all qualities are generic, perception always refers to generic properties" (pp. 142-143). What is
added here is that when we do morethan integrate information through perception, producing physical representations of something in the course of its
making, it is unlikely that results could
be achieved by inducing from particularproperties to generic qualities alone. Instead, a dialectic is suggested, a backand forth swaying movement whichhelps translate particulars of form into
generic qualities, and generic rules into
specific appearances. When these operations are iterative we can assume thatover a sufficient number of cycles,
enough transformations may take place
to facilitate a good fit between the components of what is being created. By no
stretch of the imagination can it be assumed that so many transformations canbe achieved without a constantly changing, self-updating display. Sketching exploits interactive imagery to provide
such displays. Fish and Scrivener (1990)
reached a similar conclusion in theiranalysis of sketching by artists. They
wrote: "We posit that sketches have theimportant function of assisting the mind
to translate descriptive propositional information into depiction. This descriptive information may then be scannedby attentional processes to extract new
and perhaps original descriptive information, which in turn can lead to new
depiction" (p. 118).
Irregularities such as uni-modal
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moves (i.e., in moves containing morethan one argument) and somewhat
longer sequences of same-type arguments across moves, are variations on
the basic regular 'pendulum' pattern
and may result from a number of reasons, such as differences in personalstyles of reasoning or the design phasein question. Small irregularities in otherwise regular reasoning patterns may
be expected at moments of discontinuity resulting from uncertainty, new inputs, and the like. Another major cause
for an inconsistent pattern may be thenature of the task. Different tasks may
require different strategies of confrontation with the material. Yet another important cause has to do with thedesigner's level of expertise. Less skilled
designers cannot 'ping-pong' arguments
across modalities as can experienced
and expert designers. In another study(based on the same protocols), a correlation was found between expertise andthe systematic structuring of design reasoning (Goldschmidt, 1989). It is notclear whether an unequivocal match canbe established between 'general' design
reasoning and the dialectical reasoning
manifest while sketching, but it is notunreasonable to assume that some correlation does indeed exist.
As to the question of modularity, or
uniqueness of the particular dialectics
of sketching, only a tentative answer canbe attempted here. A dialogue, or dialectic, is by no means specific todesigning. Likewise, 'seeing as' and 'seeing that' are not unique to sketching,nor to architectural or other kinds ofdesigning, as Wertheimer's parallelogram problem proves. As general concepts, these terms provide insight into
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ample, may illuminate the disparity between Catholicism with its taste for liturgical worship and Protestantism, with its
preference for preaching, by using theconcepts of 'seeing as' and 'seeing that'(M. Heyd, personal communication, December 16, 1989). The use of physicalmetaphors in all disciplines entails 'seeing as' and in design, in science and inart there are many examples of metaphors which led to new developments
and to important innovations, discoveries, and inventions. The question is oneof scope and scale. This investigation
did not attempt to elaborate on concepts and their evolution, but on smallscale creative cognitive operations inreasoning while fulfilling a domain specific task. Protocols reflecting reasoning
in the course of carrying out a taskother than designing were not yet analyzed, but design protocols with little orno sketching were inspected (such as
Ben's). In those protocols arguments ofboth kinds were found, but 'seeing as'arguments are by far a small minority
dispersed among a vast majority of 'seeing that' arguments. The extended'ping-pong' pattern between as and thatarguments that was discerned in the'sketching protocols' was detected nowhere else.
In conclusion, it is proposed thatsketching introduces a special kind of
dialectics into design reasoning that isindeed rather unique. It hinges on interactive imagery, by a continuous production of displays pregnant with clues, forthe purpose of visually reasoning notabout something previously perceived,
but about something to be composed,
the yet nonexistent entity which is being
designed. When working without sketching, or when generating abstract displays, such as diagrams or flow charts,
visual thinking takes place and the same
reasoning modalities come into play.
However, they are not organized in the
dialectical pattern we have unveiled, atleast not for any length of time. Suchvisual thinking is of course useful andproductive, but it is not typical of formmaking phases in designing or otherwise. The inherently creative process ofform-production, then, at least in architectural designing, seems to result froma special systematic, causal relationshipbetween two modalities of visual reasoning, induced by sketching.

Appendix A
Martin's Protocol- Seeing As and Seeing That Arguments•Move with active sketching © Move while contemplating sketch and reading off it(See Figure 9)1©
Trees mean shadows and that is important.
THAT "That [trees] means shadows [A]. It's important enough."2»
The importance lies in the space that this creates.
AS"It's important enough because there [B] one starts creating a space."
3»
Would attempt to make this space a prolongation of the building.
[AS]"I would try to make this [C] a prolongation element."
4*
People can approach the building by walking through car parks, from both sides of the site.
AS"I would make the entry [D], one can come through the cars [parking] here [Ei];AS/THAT it's the case of the other side as well [E2]."

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5«
AS

Give the entry area a more geometrical character, a reference point.
"So as to... Something more geometrical [E-D-E].

THAT
6*
AS
7»
AS
THAT

Create a point of reference."
The tree-enclosed space should be more organic.
"There [C], on the contrary, more organic, toward the exterior."
Would put the entrance here, coming from both sides, because it is easy to arrive from the two parking lots.
"Personally, I would put the entrance here [D].
[There is access] From both sides, because there is the parking there; the ordeal of parking. It's much easier to enter."

8» •
AS
9»
THAT
AS
10*

A hierarchy emerges: The large trees, the parking lots, pedestrian access and an entry axis.
We start creating a hierarchy:... The large trees, the parking lots, the pedestrians, an entry axis [F]."
Would look for a direct entry-outdoors relationship, because the real edge [of the building] is the trees.
"I would then look for a direct relationship between entrance and exterior,because here, the real edge is not this [G], for me it's that [H]."I would like an important element and would therefore create the afore mentioned axis.

THAT
AS
11 ©
AS
12 ©
THAT

"I would try to have an important element;
would therefore make the axis I mentioned before, this one [F]."
These elements [spaces in the footprint] begin to be 'adjoining cells'.
"These [I] begin to be elements of'adjoining cells'."
Would also start to lend importance to the exterior.
"... and I would try to make important also the exterior."

13 #
AS
THAT
14*
AS
AS
15
THAT
THAT
16 #

The walls toward the exterior space can be open, to prolong the axis.
"So these [J] can be open, here.
To prolong that axis, there."
Would organize the library with three niches and reserve the forth, remote one, for service only.
"And I would probably organize the library with these three niches [1]and I would keep that as a service-only element [S]."This is a way of letting elements of nature into the project; doesn't like isolated buildings.
"So this is a way of letting elements of nature into the project.
I don't like isolated buildings."
The building should extend from one edge of the site to the other. Through this organization space may reach theseboundaries. It would create tension, prolongation. This is not a little shed; it is a different approach: This organization isbeyond functions or interior organization.
AS"The building needs to reach from here [Ki] to here [K2].
THAT I would try through this organization to make space reach until there, so it has tension, it has a prolongation. It isn't asmall shed, it isn't a pavilion on the interior. There. This is a different approach, but already, these elements there havefound a different organization, and beyond functions, beyond, I would say, the interior organization."
17 ©
This building doesn't just have a door; its real elevation extends from street to street.
THAT "The building doesn'tjust have a door; its facade goes from here to here [E1-E2]. This is the real facade."
18
Would use the parking lot organization to reinforce this idea of incorporating the entire site.
THAT "So I will make the organization of the parking lots give force, with the trees, to this idea. 1 always want to take the entire,
all of the land."19 ©
Since there are two man-made roads, it is justified to structure the whole ensemble rather than let the pavilion float in
the midst of the site. The discourse becomes one of exterior considerations.
THAT "I think that if there are two roads, there is already something artificial... drawn by man. I find it justified to master thewhole. Not let the pavilion swim in the middle. So you see how the discourse becomes immediately one of exterior."
Inside, would now impose a hierarchy. The entry space could be domed; the side elements should be smaller so as tosense the hierarchy. It is a question of space rather than of mere dimensions.
THAT "... so I would give a hierarchy;
20»AS
this [L] could become a dome, these elements on the side [I] - a little smaller,
THAT so as to feel the hierarchy. Because it isn't just a dimension, but a space."

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