Здесь диванов нет!

Did it ever happen to you when in the morning, after a late party night, when you talk to your friend on the phone, you feel that the space between you two doesn't really exist and the geographical placement starts to loose its meaning for at least some time before you hang up and (so) slowly go listen to ABBA, which for some reason you start liking again?..

It happened to me... and sill happening while I'm working on this thesis. Because for my case study I'm looking back to the 1980's and trying to relive those fragmented moments I remember only from my childhood memories.

Well, to be more precise, I look at the period around June 23-August 30,1988. Здесь диванов нет! но есть Deconstructivist Architecture - an exhibition at MoMA, NY, curated by Philip Johnson and Mark Wigley. The exhibition presented a series of projects; to be more precise, some works by very well-known architects today: Frank Gehry, Daniel Libeskind, Rem Koolhaas, Peter Eisenman, Zaha Hadid, Coop Himmelbau, Bernard Tschumi. Despite the fact that these (seven) architects worked in different parts of the world, on different projects, and had quite different and even sometimes conflicting conceptual frameworks for the designs they've produced, their work looked incredibly similar. Some say, it looked like an "alien climbing from within," or a "reminence of a shipwreck with some bodies floating here and there..." others said that one of the buildings was so spatially disorienting that it caused one of the visiors to vomit... There was no notion of Classical Proportion, order, rhythm. Everything we thought about architecture didn't seem quite fitting into this new explosive expression of lines, planes, volumes, which are even not easily distinguishable one from another anymore. And to say more, this [new] type of architecture hasn't been practiced exclusively by mentioned above architects - many others have been doing similar things but for some reason did not attract the attention of the exhibition curators.

So, what this [new?] architecture is about?

Before answering that question, let's look at the 1980's in general and see what else was happening then...

in the beginning

So, what am I doing.

The hypothesis of my thesis (at least at this given moment) is that Marshall McLuhan's ideas can be applied not only to art, as he discusses in his writings, but also to architecture.

McLuhan claims that technological innovations change the way we perceive the world. For example, Montreal is roughly 200km away from Ottawa. About 100 years ago, the journey from one city to another would take one or even a few days, depending on what you would take. Now it's 2 hours by car. And so what? Ha! and so now if you take a car, the space between the two cities colapses, while the geographic distance remains the same, and for you as a person using the medium known as 'car', Montreal is actually only 2 hours away (which is not that far, and you take that as a great oppotrunity to go see the city from time to time... and for students it's only $40 bus ride!) Another example. You're at home and really want to wish "good night" to your girlfriend (or boyfriend, just to be politically corect) who moved to another town. What do you do? Most likely you will call... to collapse the acoustic space between you two for at least the length of the words "good night" or even longer if you feel like it, which would probably happen anyway... or you can use MSN and even express your yellow emotions!.. Now, she is just a click away from you.
I remember in the 2dn year of undergad talking to my prof. Suddenly he froze. I asked if he's ok. He slowly raised his head, looked straight ahaid and quietly said: "I'm taking a message." My first thought: my prof is wacked! and right now he's talking to the spirits from my studio chair, opening his chakra and probably is about to send a message himself somewhere into the cosmos, and when he does, I'd rather be somewhere else. And then he actually did! Right in front of me! I saw that! If this hapened some years ago, I surely would've been fueling the fire on the main square just for witnessing something like that... but I'm ok, so far.

I guess, the idea is getting somewhat clearer but you would ask: what does all that have to do with art or architecture?

Valid question. McLuhan would say that this new [changed] perception results in the new way of... making of the world! In his opinion, artists are the people capable to feel this new perception change and project it in their work. And in my opinion, architects are also capable of projecting that in their works; furthermore, I would say that all the people are projecting that in whatever they are doing! But McLuhan was talking about art. He saw cubism with its spatial distortions and multi-perspectival views as a reflection of the spatial condition which has been affected by new technologies of its time, like telegraph, radio, airplane, and so on. Looking at a larger scale, we can trace similar approaches to spatial productions not only in painting but also sculpture, film, photgraphy, architecture.

So, assuming that McLuhan was right, I propose a cese study to explore the relation between technologically affected spatial perception and the space we actually produce as architects.

About the Thesis v.0.1.

Currently I'm working on my Masters Thesis at Carleton University School of Architecture, (Ottawa, Canada).

so what the hell is the thesis?..

thesis (n) [thee-sis] or [vee-sis] (as one of my friends likes to say.)
in achitecture, this is a thing you need to do (or go through) to graduate (get your masters, at least at Carleton U). This 'thing' essentially consists of two major components: (1) written component, and (2) design component.

Both components supposed to be interrelated, interconnected, interinfluential, etc., in other words, they are equal and essential parts of the 'thing' which can not exist without either one of the compnents... in other words, they're equally important! no hierarchies, at least this seems to be the vision promoted by the school but not always fulfilled by the students...

... before starting, select a topic, or at least define your area of interest. This should be framed in a form of a question (like: Why in North America traditional raw houses have flat roofs?) or hypothesis (like: Haussman was more driven not by Napoleon the Third but by the young daughter of the local baker who didn't even know that his little joint is to be cut by a boulevard in the very near future...) Actually, it doesn't really matter what theme you gonna explore - it should be something to keep you excited or just not too bored for at least 8 month, that's all.

then, select your thesis advisor (probably you can guess who that is) and begin!

Stage 1. Define the space...

ok, now the purpose of this blog has been defined.

For now, this is my
Official Thesis Blog!

PS: Thanks to Cwangdom for the innovative idea!

divanoff net

So, this is my first Blog posting!

Feels pretty good. Especially feels good if you're actually reading these lines right now :)

Just a reminder:

divanoff net!
и временно не будет...