ARCHITECTURAL COMPOSITION II
cod. 13146

Academic year 2007/08
2° year of course - Second semester
Professor
Academic discipline
Composizione architettonica e urbana (ICAR/14)
Field
Architettura e urbanistica
Type of training activity
Characterising
120 hours
of face-to-face activities
8 credits
hub: -
course unit
in - - -

Integrated course unit module: LABORATORY FOR ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN II

Learning objectives

Type and place, typical features and uniqueness, are terms in a dialectic process through which architecture takes shape. It is from the place that architecture takes its specific characteristics: the topography, climate, typological and building traditions, the genius loci – all these together form the distinctive characteristics that comprise the solid basis onto which the project experiment is directed. The urban context with its own, concrete, physical features produced by altimetric deviations and adaptations, structural, dimensional and spatial developments, and materials, comprise the limited, restricted context onto which we set our individual design strategies. The aim is to train the student right from the first years to use the context as an active and formative part in the process of devising architecture. "Building is acting with a sense of order". L. Kahn Each experiment in design, aimed at training the student, can only spring from trying out a distinct possibility, by means of continuously questioning the mutual relationships between reasons for form, utility and support. While making these trials, one gradually discovers the way in which the form must be made, and in this continuous study of rules, order, measurement and organisation, the construction – as an exercise in putting together and opposing gravity – takes on a determining role in training the architect. The constructional and technical dimension, the typological structure, the organisation of activities, in other words the relationship between spatial configuration and the tectonic principles which produce it, constitute, in their essential interpenetration, the other aim of the design exercise. "..I do not attack form but form as an end in itself. And I attack it on the basis of my experience. Form as an end in itself inevitably results in formalism. Because it only deals with the external aspect of things. But only what has life inside can have a living exterior. Only what has an intense life can have an intense form

Prerequisites

Laboratory for architectural design I

Course unit content

The planning of an empty urban space within a historical context is the goal of this Laboratory. The historic city is conceived of as a great architectural unit, as a great structure. A “place” in which the opposition between specific and universal, individual and group, public sphere and private sphere, exception and rule, are combined to create a single “body” that is hierarchically structured against the blurred background of the landscape. Current architectural debate, which is increasingly defined within the limited setting of linguistic protagonism, in an academic context is important as a general way of stimulating the personal creativity of each student in search of aesthetic excellence often lacking in fundamental bases of the field. The exaggerated “personalisation” of the architectural product of the architectural object and architectural form, increasingly “isolated”, pathologically self-referencing and autistic, cannot help but lead towards an inability to share reciprocal and tangible relationships between elements, between elements and the context in which they are found, as well as between the primary components themselves that determine the reality and concreteness of architecture. Therefore, the decision to work within a consolidated context with definite typological and morphological connotative traits, is dependent on the belief that the architecture of the city is an indispensable phase in developing proper planning methodology, and not just a nostalgic return to the old and idealised past: it is the qualitative and quantitative intensity of the information that these spaces, learning processes and techniques can conceptually and sensibly be of interest in a learning phase. Information that triggers observation—seeing as delving into the nature of how phenomena appear—which, above and beyond the linguistic connotations and myriad configurations, is able to grasp the original, essential nature of constituent principles, basic rules and that eternal present that constitutes architectural activity. To proceed from the complexity of the urban phenomenon towards the archetypical essence of basic elements. In this way, the city is seen as a field of application for a critical analysis aimed, within the learning environment, at identifying the mutual relationships between the parties and the component elements of the whole: from the countryside with its material, morphological and orographic elements, to the anonymous aggregate unit of the building fabric, up through the appearance of architectural structures. The goal is to identify within the complexity of the city those elements, structures, systems and organisms, i.e., its typo-morphological structure and the relationships it establishes with the environment.. Within this wider context of research, the laboratory will offer a planning exercise aimed at completing an empty urban space in an area heavily influenced by the architectural and spatial value of what surrounds it.

Full programme

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Bibliography

K.Frempton, "Tettonica e architettura. Poetica della forma architettonica nel XIX e XX secolo". Skira,Milano 1999. C.Martì Aris, "Le variazioni dell'identità." Clup, Milano 1990. A.Rossi , "L'architettura della città", Clup Milano 1978. R. Arnheim, "Arte e percezione visiva", Feltrinelli, Milano 1885. L. Pareyson, "Estetica", Fabbri Milano 1998. L. Di Pasquale, "L'arte del costruire", Marsilio, Venezia 1996, F. Cellini, "Manualetto", Cittàstudi 1991,M. Ridolfi, "Manuale dell'architetto", C.N.R. 1946, AA.VV, "Manuale dell'Architetto", C.N.R. 1963, E. Neufert, "Enciclopedia pratica per progettare e costruire", Hoepli, Milano 1996, Belz, Gosele, Hoffmann, Jenisch, "Atlante della muratura", UTET, Torino 1998.Kind, Barkauskas, Polony, "Atlante del cemento, UTET", Torino 1998.Schulits, Sobek, Habermann, "Atlante dell'Acciaio", Torino 1999. Natter,Herzog, Volz, "Atlante del legno", Torino 1998. Schittich,Staib, Balkow, "Atlante del vetro", Torino 1999. D. Chizzoniti e L. Monica (a cura di), Guido Canella. sulla composizione architettonica e sui progetti. Facoltà di Architettura civile Politecnico di Milano, Milano 2003 Carlo Quintelli (a cura di), Cittaemilia, Sperimentazioni architettoniche per un'idea di città, Abitare Segesta Milano 2000 Carlo Quintelli (a cura di), S.S.9 Via Emilia. Progetti architettonici e nuovi luoghi lungo la Via Emilia tra città e città, Abitare Segesta Milano 2001, Gruppo CITTAEMILIA - Dario Costi (a cura di), Architettura, città, territorio. Il sistema insediativo dell'Emilia occidentale, CD Multimediale, Mup 2003 in corso di pubblicazione

Teaching methods

The laboratory teaching activities are structured in such a way as to alternate theoretical contributions under the form of lectures with design exercises. To be admitted to the final laboratory examination, students must develop the following project topics representing them graphically through 4 A1 format tables and one three-dimensional model.

Assessment methods and criteria

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Other information

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