Peter Eisenman, the architect and theorist, who has -imo- built a career out of a contrary disposition recently published an interesting series of proclamations denouncing contemporary architectural culture in bdOnline. Predictably he critiqued several issues and positions that he previously endorsed.
But my favorite part of the rant was a simple sentence in the first section, “If architecture is a form of media it is a weak one.” I’d like to think that if Eisenman would stop wasting his later years pining for the old days, he’d see this statement as an opportunity rather than a cultural disaster. Perhaps the rest of the article would have turned out differently.
I do agree that architecture as a discipline is in a late style and as such, not a particularly interesting pursuit at this point in history. Not to say that architecture is as ruined as Eisenman insists, it’s just that there are too many more interesting things happening right now. Rewind 75 years to the 1930’s and there’s no doubt that I’d be an architect - I mean, if you were interested in culture, history, art, making things, etc. - what else were you supposed to do? But today’s business, technological and cultural contexts offer so many more mediums for expression that address these same themes and issues. As one of my old professors used to say, “Architects thought Modernism would change the world. They were wrong. The internet changed the world;” Even the activist, socialist component of Modernism that American architects have all but forgotten today has been better addressed through other media.
If architecture is a weak form of media, that’s okay with me.
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May 22nd, 2008
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“…architects don’t actually make architectural space: they simply invent within the graphic space (of drawings, notations, animations and other media) through which their ideas are conceived, developed, recorded and communicated to a world—of clients, builders, inhabitants, and most especially, other engaged architects.”
Brett Steele, Forward to Forms of Inquiry: The Architecture of Critical Graphic Design
A collection of architecture-related and architecture-inspired graphic design projects by several contemporary graphic designers. I find the projects a bit disappointing in terms of rigor, but am inspired by the idea of mining the history, theory and modes of production of architecture for generating design ideas and intentions outside of the context of architectural practice. I’m also usually looking at the polished world of swiss graphic design and contemporary advertising graphics, so I’m particularly enjoying the rough, artsy, and indie character of the work. There are also some great snippets about the relationships between graphic design and architecture, such as the quote above, to be found throughout the book.
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March 1st, 2008
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What’s in a name? We need something to balance our ultra cool name, sparkynino, with a subheading that balances its playful ways and offers up some semblance of an explanation of who we are. Check these subheadings out for sparkynino options:
sparkynino: visual language workshop
sparkynino: serious no nonsense design
sparkynino: serious work all the time
sparkynino: we don’t laugh, we draw laughing
sparkynino: we’ll blow your mind
sparkynino: visual language design
sparkynino: lines and shapes and stuff
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December 9th, 2007
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I’m pretty obsessed with maps. I can stare at them endlessly, tracing every last line, dreaming about traveling far away and musing about the strange juxtapositions and adjacencies that I had never realized existed.
Here’s a good map story—from a former professor of mine who shared it with me a few years ago.
…In that empire, the craft of Cartography attained such Perfection that the Map of a Single province covered the space of an entire City, and the Map of the Empire itself an entire Province. In the course of Time, these Extensive maps were found somehow wanting, and so the College of Cartographers evolved a Map of the Empire that was of the same Scale as the Empire and that coincided with it point for point. Less attentive to the Study of Catrography, succeeding Generations came to judge a map of such Magnitude cumbersome, and, not without Irreverence, they abandoned it to the Rigors of sun and Rain. In the western Deserts, tattered Fragments of the Map are still to be found, Sheltering an occasional Beast or beggar; in the whole Nation, no other relic is left of the Discipline of Geography.
From Travels of Praiseworthy Men (1658)
by J.A. Suarez Miranda
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November 26th, 2007
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sparkynino recently designed a proposal for courtyard housing in Portland, Oregon. The project consists of an eclectic mix of unit types (to serve a variety of family sizes and changing needs) organized around a shared, woonerf-like street. It was a great opportunity for us to further develop our working methods and graphic language. With some luck, maybe we’ll find a way to build one of these someday.
Click here to download a higher resolution PDF of our proposal (3.3 MB).
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November 18th, 2007
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For better or worse, this diagram pretty much sums it up. This is what happens when you study architecture, become obsessed with graphic design and spend more time writing text messages than prose.
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October 30th, 2007
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After over four years of hard work, The Regional Equity Atlas: Metropolitan Portland’s Geography of Opportunity is finished! Ryan served as the graphic designer for this 160-page book, jointly published by the Coalition for a Livable Future and Portland State University.
Click the photo above to view more images.
The publication uses census data and GIS maps to analyze the quality of life in the Portland region, specifically focusing on access to resources such as transportation, housing, schools, parks and food. This approach is especially ground-breaking because rather than simply analyzing livability metrics, the authors and map-makers actually dig deeper to see if the region’s resources are distributed equitably among the population. As such, this Atlas is another innovative step in Portland’s continuing transformation into one of the world’s most livable cities.
The design of the publication uses a minimalist palette and several compositional strategies to help readers easily navigate the study’s complex data, maps and conclusions.
Click on the photo above to view a slideshow of the finished document! (Once you begin, hover over the right-hand side of the photos to advance the slideshow).
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October 6th, 2007
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sparkynino recently completed a website for the Boston-based artist Sheila Gallagher. The site’s design is intended to provide a simple, minimalist environment for experiencing Sheila’s amazing work.
Click here to give it a spin!
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September 6th, 2007
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We’re hard at work on a competition for urban housing and shared courtyards in Portland, Oregon. It’s a great opportunity to apply insights from Ryan’s Fulbright research on the topic of shared outdoor space to a specific site.
As you can see in the picture above, we decided to kick things off sparkynino-style with a 3-hour brainstorm session.
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August 19th, 2007
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A few months ago, I discovered that my graduate thesis project inspired a Washington Post article calling for intense transformations of suburban strip malls. The article is part of architect Roger Lewis’ on-going Shaping the City column.
My project proposed transforming aging strip shopping malls into vibrant, mixed-use neighborhood centers. Check it out!
To learn more about the project itself, click here.
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August 14th, 2007
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