what the f**k: what the form

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What the F**k: What the Form

Patrick M. Dey

Architecture in Theory

ARCH 5140

Amir Ameri

University of

Colorado

College of Architecture and Planning

Midterm



Gandelsonas and Morton frame the reading of Graves’ and Eisenman’s work through a lens of

comparison between meaning and form in architecture. Their means of contriving this reading of

architecture is achieved through how Graves uses opposition to create meaning via cultural vocabulary,

while Eisenman uses a vocabulary that is autonomous to architecture to convey a process, a

methodology of creating meaning through process of creating form. In this Graves is mythologizing his

architecture by using mythic and cultural vocabulary, while Eisenman is resisting the mythologization of

his architecture by using a morphology that neglects any vocabulary, except that of a strictly

architectural vocabulary. While there is a resistance to theory for Graves and Eisenman, the resistance

to myth is much more prevalent.1

Graves’ work is framed by the authors as generating meaning by using opposition. Essentially, using two

dichotomous elements of cultural vocabulary, Graves is able to generate some sort of meaning in his

work. Graves

is

“quoting”

the

vocabulary

(i.e.

forms)

and

grammar

(i.e.

architectonic

rules)

built

up

over

the generations to establish signification in architectural context, what is called the “double program.”

For instance, “the opposition between horizontal plane and vertical plane represents the opposition of

architect and user.”2 This is absolute fiction, and entirely arbitrary in the distinction between the

signified and signifier. In what way does the horizontal “represent” the architect? It is merely a frame to

read a horizontal plane, so when the orientations of surfaces are analyzed the oppositions are taken into

account. If the horizontal plane is read as the attributes of the architect, then naturally the user will be

read into the vertical planes.

Here, in the case of “this represents that,” the signified is, as always, arbitrarily attached to a signifier.3

There is no natural relationship between horizontal (images) and the architect (concept). As opposed to

the pyramid, which is an entirely meaningless geometric shape, but achieves a meaning that appears

obvious once the frame of theory is constructed: it looks like a mountain. From here the mind can go

wild with this frame of reference. The mountain is the place of the gods (why the gods are on

mountaintops is arbitrary), and the pyramid is a tomb for the Solar God Horus incarnated as the Pharaoh

1 I will here be synthesizing the arguments of De Man’s The Resistance to Theory (Minneapolis, MN: University of

Minnesota Press). 1986. Pg. 3‐20) and Barthes’ Myth Today . In that the resistance to theory entails theory

attempting to end theory and make theory fact, but theory will never end, then resistance to mythologization

attempts to eradicate metalanguage in an autonomous language, which inevitably leads to a contextually

enframed metalanguage built upon the ashes of the preceding language. 2 Gandelsonas, Mario and David Morton. “On Reading Architecture,” Signs, Symbols, and Architecture. New York,

NY: John Wiley Inc. 1980. Pg. 248. 3 Saussure, Ferdinand de. Course in General Linguistics. New York, NY: Philosophical Library. 1959. Pg. 67.



(why the Pharaoh is Horus incarnate is arbitrary as well). Thus, the tomb‐mountain is the gate for which

the dead solar king transcends to the gods and becomes Osiris. The link is, of course, arbitrary between

pyramid and mountain‐gate, which is constructed through the myths of the Egyptians. But it is

undeniable that the pyramid does resemble a mountain. In the case of the pyramid and mountain, the

relation between signified and signifier is seemingly less arbitrary than horizontal and architect. Each

must undergo a mountain of rhetoric and theoretical justification to link their respective signified and

signifier.

Apart from this arbitrary “representations” of one thing to another, there is always the quality of what

divides the opposites. At what point is a thing still its own ontological thing? And at what point does the

thing become its opposite? Take for instance the dichotomy in reading Graves’ work of the natural and

the artificial, the “in” and the “out.”4 At what point does architecture become natural? By logical

analysis, if

humans

are

a product

of

nature,

then

all

things

done

by

humans

are

natural,

and

built

into

the natural order (of course, this is an informal fallacy, but is a frame to interpret with). Is there an

actual delineation between inside and outside, the artificial and the natural? Or are the two extensions

of each other? As Levi‐Strauss defines with a traffic light, why does green mean “go” and red mean

“stop?” While “go” and “stop” are in opposition to each other, how is red and green opposed? How is

the signification of the stop and go duality created in the signifier red and green, which are without

opposition?5 There isn’t one. The two are only different.

6 Likewise, the opposition of inside and outside

as signifiers are arbitrarily attached to the weak opposition between artificial and natural as the

signified.

The authors further this frame of opposition by presenting Eisenman as the contrary to Graves’ theory

and work. This construct of Eisenman versus Graves is simply another arbitrary opposition, but gives a

reading of the two actually being opposites. Though the reading of the two appear to be opposites,

visually the relation between Graves’ Benacerraf House and Eisenman’s House II is slim. The two

residences look very similar with a very similar architectonic vocabulary. The two houses both utilize

autonomous and “artistic” uses of the wall, window, column, beam, door, and so forth. The different

reading of these two houses lies not in how they look (in which they are actually similar), but in how the

two are read through opposing theories.

4 Gandelsonas. On Reading Architecture. Pg. 249, 255. 5 Leach, Edmund. “Oysters, Smoked Salmon, and Stilton Cheese,” Claude Lévi ‐Strauss. New York, NY: Fontana‐

Collins Publishing. 1974. Pg. 16. 6 Saussure. Course in General Linguistics. Pg. 120.



Eisenman is presented as rejecting mythic vocabulary of architectural form. In other words, if the use of

Corbusier’s garden window is ideal, then it has certain connotation with the form of the window, and

therefore, a certain mythologization of the window. Eisenman is trying to eliminate the mythologization

of any form by reducing the architectural language back to the signified and the signifier, and trying to

not let the two form a meta‐signified that can be attached to another signifier.7 This is how Barthes

establishes myth as a metalanguage. Eisenman strives for this demythologization in his work by using a

language that is autonomous to architecture, namely the line, plane, and volume, and their

representations in architecture, which is, respectively, the column, wall, and volume (or space).8

In House II the wall is given an ambiguous reading by doubling its reading. Essentially, the wall can be

read as an extension of the column (i.e. a bunch of columns placed side by side, or an extrusion of the

column), or it can be read as a “reside” of the volume (e.g. using the law of conservation of information,

if the

volume

is

destroyed,

then

the

wall

remains

as

the

information

referring

to

the

existence

of

the

volume).9 Eisenman calls this sort of structuring of architectural form “double‐deep structure,”

10 which

is its own form of mythologization, as it is a metalanguage.

The use of column, wall, and volume are forms that are meant to be strictly architectural, so the

architect can create an autonomous architecture, an architecture of “positive terms.”11

In this way the

architecture is not supposed to reference anything outside of itself, as opposed to Graves’ architecture,

which references existing cultural vocabulary and grammar of architecture. Where Graves

communicates architecture

as

a myth,

Eisenman

communicates

an

architecture

of

process,

of

methodology.12

To clarify, Graves uses language that exists outside of the creation of the work, while

Eisenman is trying to “invent” a language for translation through the methods of creating the work.

Through this construction of language via methodology, a metalanguage, the “double‐deep structure” is

formed. To Eisenman the purpose of the double‐deep structure is “to provide in the object two

conceptual readings, so that the object can never be held in the mind as a single entity, but rather as in a

state of tension or as a dialect between two conceptual notions.”13

7 Barthes, Roland. “Myth Today,” Mythologies. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 1972. Pg. 115. 8 Gandelsonas. Pg. 264‐265. 9 Ibid . Pg. 266 10

Ibid . Pg. 268. 11

Saussure. Pg. 120. 12

Gandelsonas. Pg. 268‐269, 270. 13

Eisenman, Peter. Taken from Gandelsonas. Pg. 269.



Obviously there is a paradox here with an architecture of positive terms. Gandelsonas and Morton say

that Eisenman “…eliminate[s] all factors at the communication level except the message itself.”14

This

entails that nothing outside of the message is necessary for the communication of the concept.

Ultimately, this is a paradox. If communication is necessary – regardless of what is being communicated,

such as methodology for Eisenman – for one concept to be transmitted, then ultimately the “factors at

the communication level” cannot be eliminated. While this is a resistance to communication, that

resistance is really a subset of the resistance to mythologization, a resistance to metalanguage.

One cannot escape reading into what Eisenman says about the double‐deep structure as a form of

Newspeak for architecture, where the viewer (never the user or occupant, because these are contextual

to the architecture, and something that exists outside of an autonomous architect; to reference a user

makes the building incomplete without the user, so the user must be excluded)15 must “doublethink,”16

or process

one

interpretation

of

the

information,

while

consciously

being

aware

of,

but

ignoring,

another interpretation of the same information. In this sense, Eisenman is striving for an architecture

with a pared lexicon, which is to limit the readings of architecture; that is, to create architecture and to

read architecture under a limited vocabulary17

that is only meant to read the methodology of a building

design’s creation.

Can architecture have its own language in positive terms? Or is architecture simply stuck with the

vocabulary and grammar of its predecessors? Can architecture resist mythologization? Archi‐Newspeak

is a resistance

to

mythologization

of

architecture.

It

is

absolutely

paradoxical

that

architecture

can

be

autonomous, as it depends too much on context (i.e. site, users, client, construction methods, et

cetera). Tschumi prescribes an architecture of sensuality to correct, or, at the very least, to embrace the

paradox of autonomous architecture.18

But sensualizing architecture leaves it open to mythologization

as well. Certainly there is a problem to autonomous language in architecture, so the question must be

begged: can a language be autonomous? Or is it always subjected to arbitrary image‐concepts? Derrida

would claim that a “universal”, autonomous architecture is, indeed, arbitrary: “… a sort of ‘universal

tongue’. And once sounds no longer have any relation of natural representation with external sensible

things, they are more easily linked to the spontaneity of the understanding. Articulated, they furnish a

14 Gandelsonas. Pg. 258.

15 Ibid . Pg. 261.

16 Orwell, George. “The Principles of Newspeak,” 1984. New York, NY: Signet Classic. 1950. Pg. 309‐310.

17 Rowe, Colin and Fred Koetter. Collage City . Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 1978. Pg. 65.

18 Tschumi, Bernard. Architecture and Disjunction. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 1996. Pg. 27‐51.



language in agreement with its laws. Here indeed we have the arbitrary nature of the vocal signifier.”19

This is precisely what Eisenman is striving for, but the arbitrary meaning of autonomous language in

demythologized architecture ultimately ends in paradox.

Take Hofstadter’s

analogy

of

a string

of

dominos,

for

instance,

in

thinking

about

a string

of

neurons

firing. If the dominos are knocked over, then a chain reaction of the other dominos ensues. But if one of

the dominos did not fall down, though all other ones succeeding it did fall, then it must be asked: why

did that one not fall down? The simple, and entirely myopic (“nearsighted”) answer would be, “Because

it didn’t fall down.” In thinking about neurons, some neurons won’t fire in a chain, while the rest do.20

Why? Avoiding a narrow‐minded response, then a signification must be attributed to the signifier. If the

domino doesn’t fall, then an external image‐concept would have to be attributed to it. In Eisenman’s

work, the same question of communication and meaning in the architecture is subject to being asked

“why?” for

its

usage.

Why

is

that

column

there?

The

myopic

answer

is,

“Because

the

column

is

there.”

But the communication of “why the column” is brought back into mythologization, due to the

metalanguage of the process. “The column is there because it is a residue of the wall, which has been

deconstructed…” If an addition language is necessary for reading the process of how the column got

there, then the building is not complete, and therefore not autonomous. Obviously the message

(signified) cannot be translated without communicating some sort of theory (signifier). It is as if

Eisenman was constructing an architectural word salad, which is syntactically correct, but the

nonsensical semantics can be read through the construction of the sentence itself.21 If this can be done,

then, once again, myth has stolen the language that was meant to evade mythologization.22

Point in fact, the struggle for Archi‐Newspeak is paradoxical unto itself. To subject an architectural

language to a language without context is, in itself, creating a language, a metalanguage, and, therefore,

a mythologization of architectural language. If the Modernist agenda for architecture is to pare down

the vocabulary of architecture, then it is being subjected to a metalanguage that is based on the flowery

and superfluous (i.e. unnecessary words) language of its predecessor. If the goal is to reduce the

vocabulary and achieve an autonomous language, then that language must derive itself from the

language that gave it the foundation for enframing the contextual aspect of autonomous language.

Essentially, the autonomous language is a copy of a language that is also a copy of its predecessor; a

19 Derrida, Jacques. “Economimesis”, Diacritics, Vol 11. Baltimore, MA: John Hopkins University Press. 1981. Pg. 19.

20 Hofstadter, Douglas. I Am a Strange Loop. New York, NY: Basic Books. 2008. Pg. 37‐39.

21 Chomsky, Noam. Syntactic Structures. Boston, MA: Mouton & Co. 1957. Pg. 15.

22 Barthes. Mythologies. Pg. 131‐133.



copy of a copy of copy of a… Or a better way to put, take the mathematical paradox of Cantor Sets, in

which a set of numbers can be inside another set of numbers– that is inside a set inside of a set, even its

own set. Likewise, this metalanguage of autonomous architecture is a language within a language within

a language within... Thus, Archi‐Newspeak is a resistance to mythologization, while, paradoxically, being

mythologized in the process.

Ultimately, Gandelsonas and Morton’s On Reading Architecture is a dichotomous comparison of

structuring form in architecture from established syntax and semantics, as was the case with Graves,

and from autonomous syntax to invent semantics of form, as it was for Eisenman. In comparing both

methods of structuring image and meaning, the authors are framing the reading of architecture as

either “standing on the shoulders of giants” (if I may use the words of Sir Newton), or being the lone

genius who seeks to invent a vision of what architecture is in the image of Rand’s Howard Roark. In the

former case,

that

of

Graves,

mythologization

of

architecture

is

embraced.

In

the

latter,

that

of

Eisenman,

mythologization is resisted, but ultimately the architecture succumbs to the metalanguage of myth.

Ultimately, the only way for realized architectural form to be perfect, as well as exist autonomously

without being subjected to mythologization is a paradox unto itself: it must not exist. “Then, liberated

from physical being, [architecture] will become nothing but an idea, and at last it will be perfect.”23 24

23 Hollis, Edward. The Secret Lives of Buildings. New York, NY: Henry Hold & Co. 2009. Pg. 40. The original quote

reads, “Then, liberated from physical being, The Parthenon will become nothing but an idea, and at last it will be perfect.” 24

It occurs to me at the end of this paper that I have not discussed Alberti, but it has occurred to me that Alberti is

still present here. Alberti defines beauty as that which “… nothing could be added, diminished or altered, but for

the worse.” (On the Art of Building Ten Books. Trans. Joseph Rykwert. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. 1988. Pg. 156).

To add Alberti would only be for the worse. In that sense, Alberti is present in this paper in principle, though never

referenced, except in this footnote.

what the f**k: what the form

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