“There are no rules of architecture for a castle in the clouds.” (Gilbert K. Chesterton, English writer) This quote is somehow strike me at the very first time I saw it. We can dream what ever we want, think of anything we can build, but can we build it? Can our technology serve what we draw in our imagination? Imagine if the marble stone is as light and strong as concrete, will the Pyramid be in the shape we all see today? Will the arch and dome of Hagias Sophia sits there if the steel framing is invented in that era? Think further, imagine if we can have a surface material that covers with a material that look just like nature, will Robert Venturi’s duck look like it is now? (Will it quack?)
What I’m saying is that we as human always dream of building the great architecture, however, we usually limit our self to the reality, which is the possibility that the building won’t collapse and eventually, subtract our design to the basic shape like square, circle, and triangle. Of cause, it’s not our false to design something that will stand straight, but on the opposite side of our idea, just because we want it to sell. It may not be the form that follows function or something that we got from our proportion, but it’s build to served the customers need. As we look back to the history of architecture, and questioning, how and why are they did that? The true reason is unknown and we can only guess what is the purpose of designing that particular part. So how does the technology affect the way we design things? Simple reason, because we “can”. To define the word “can,” I mean that with the technology, we use it to decrease the possibility of building to collapse. So with some courage, we start to think “different”, and in the end, breaking the rule and challenging the previous movement.
To be more precise, I’ll divide the movement into two groups, the teacher and the student. The teacher represent as the one who made the rule, whether the building will be decorative or to be symmetry, and the student as the one who try to challenge the rules and try to make the things in their own way. In history, Renaissance and Modernism are the teacher, which means Baroque and Post-modern are the student. Teacher, as the word means, have to teach their student the right and wrong, he will show the way and proclaim that “this” is the only way to do it right! However, with a better technology like notebook and AutoCAD, the student comes up and starts to question his master about the optional path he can take, which is of cause rejected by his master. So they decide to get off that school and start the new one, which have totally opposite way of thinking in their old school. This isn’t just happening once, it happen in a lot of time in Architect history when one is trying to questing the right from their master. Renaissance is setting their design to be symmetry and proportion, Baroque come in and question what if we make the axi-line, oval and add on enormous decorative will that be wrong? Since they have a newer and better technology to do so! Same concept apply to the Modernism, the rule is set to be non-decorative, and as pure as it should. And so Post-modern comes and ask why this boring black and white situation? How can people live without any uniqueness in their architecture? Why should the form follow function? Why not take both? And so the situation happens again and again.
These question start to appear once they are sure what they are capable of doing, If they’re unsure, of cause this revolution won’t happen. So with the outcome of post-modern ruling the world right now, will there be any other –ism to come up and challenge the way they think or not? I truly believe that one-day we’ll have our new –isms that will over take the post-modern, but that “day” will not come in the present era. Since the post-modern is very wide and their rule is very adjustable, clearly see the recent announcement that they accept constructivism in to one of their branches. Constructivism, as we expect from the rapid technology growth, is very wild and crazy, too crazy that our ancestor won’t never ever dreamt about it. Now that the Constructivism is here, with the use of best technology “now”, they will be boom for sometime. After all, as the technology developed, we may think of something different, and from that we may have courage to start and questioning the post-modern whether they build things the right way. After all, this phenomenon happen because the word imagination that is a gift for human. And with a huge help from our knowledge and technology, we got our self one nice architecture.
