Article
Affective Indices
European Architectural History Network Conference
(2017)
Abstract
The widespread use of digital media in architecture makes them the primary set of tools through which architectural ideas find their ways into realizable forms. As with any new medium-over the past thirty years-tool- their spread has homogenized the mainstream architectural drawings to the point of utter monotony. However, new forms of drawing have emerged through individual practices that display unexpected results. While in the pre-digital world, one’s drawings were synchronous as one’s style, the post-digital brings forth built-in conditions, where the affective and atmospheric aura of drawings are multi-layered entities made of pre-existing forms and images as well as novel ones. Some architects and critics contend that the expressive potential of digital drawings is one of their most essential attributes. Identifying this facet of drawing as the fifth dimension of architecture and coining it “donegality”, Neil Spiller argues for drawing’s ability to convey a specific aura or create a unique atmosphere.[i] The paper investigates the role of digital media in maintaining or augmenting architectural drawings’ affective power by surpassing pervasive tools and methods. Since the affective facet of drawing is one that carries the most individual trace of the author, inevitably debates on this subject revolve around comparisons between analog and digital. Mark Garcia questions the premise of analog drawings being ‘the most intelligent, interesting, effective and efficient way of translating and communicating images and contents of our imagination” by suggesting that the invention of “new drawing and imaging technologies, materials and media” which are by nature more intelligent is bound to yield more imaginative drawings in the future.[ii] Garcia’s argument is plausible since the multiplicity of visual sources and new technologies offer a richer canvas for developing drawings in the first place. By looking into examples, the paper compares processes of superimposition, addition, fragmentation, and assemblage as strategies that have been at work pre and post digital to test the boundaries of architectural imagination and expression. Highlighting the nuances of drawing practices of pre and post digital, the work recognizes that drawings of today are more complex and mediated, calling for technical prowess and technological alacrity. New computational methods, embodied experiences, animated and simulated environments have filtered through the architectural scene, making the arena of drawing more expansive and the palette to work from more elaborate. Observing that a over a very long period of time simple analog drawing methods have showed enormous power in capturing the viewer’s attention and emotions, the work studies how the more complex digital processes fare in that regard. Looking into drawings that are in keeping with the tradition and those that confront it, the paper looks for signs of the indices of affective expressions as a potent and critical facet of drawing.
[ii] Mark Garcia, “Emerging Technologies and Drawings: the Future of Image in Architecture,” Drawing Architecture, AD Series (September/ October 2013): 33.
Disciplines
Publication Date
Fall November, 2017
Citation Information
Affective Indices, Paper Presented at the European Architectural History Network Conference, Tools of the Architect, TU Delft, November 2017