In recent past postings I have developed a vocabulary to help me explain, principally to myself, that which I see emerging in my drawings. Terms such as transparency, superimposition, interpenetration, overlap, viewing from a number of viewpoints simultaneously, spatiality, ambiguity, innuendo, and others, I have frequently used.
Now, it has been brought to my attention, or at least I have been reminded, that these and similar words are familiar in the literature of contemporary architecture. A random finding of two papers has explained to me so much about my present pre-occupations. The first of these papers is
Transparency II: Layering of Planes/Layering of Spaces, in Architecturality, which is based on the work of Rowe & Slutzsky which is the second paper entitled
Transparency: Literal and Phenomenal, written 1955-6 by Rowe & Slutzsky, first published in Perspecta 1963.
Paintings and buildings by Picasso and Le Corbusier, and bringing in the work of Duchamp, Moholy Nagy, Leger, Delaunay, Cezanne, Braque, Gris, Giedion, and all these brought into the discussion with Cubism as its central and unifying theme, has suddenly provided me with a rational context for my otherwise individual, intuitive and explorative enquiry that is my life-drawing. To this list I would add Francis Picabia from around the same time, and I have also regularly referenced Hans Bellmer and David Hockney whose work has helped me gain an understating of my own approach and to which I have referred to as 'my own cubisme'.
I should not be surprised to discover that I have been using such fundamental 'architectural' terminology. But, I think I am surprised, to some extent. OK, I am an Architect, but I have tended, though not completely, taken the view that life-drawing has sufficient differences to designing buildings: perhaps a different way of thinking, a different way of looking, a different way of responding. Also, many years have elapsed since I was in direct contact with the above vocabulary (mainly as a student and in practice in the 1960's) where being immersed and utilising concepts of the Modern Movement was on a day to day basis. Since then my work as an architect and academic has been deeply involved in the social processes of creating the built environment and in developing an ecological and ethical framework for building design, each of which had its own particular and different vocabulary, somewhat distant from my earlier life.
The following two drawings are my latest, and are a fairly conscious attempt to put into practice some of the ideas in my recent thinking. But they are not 'designed' drawings in any way at all. I have no idea what the outcome will be. I just start with the part which excites, fascinates, grabs my attention, stares me in the face, looks interesting to draw, and then away I go, on to the next part. I suppose that gradually a narrative might emerge, but there is little or no attempt at 'composition', no concern that different scales are used, in fact I rather relish the potential of conflicting scales, of diverse viewpoints, of more than one vanishing point. And I am loving the challenge of drawing one or more parts on top of another whist attempting to retain a control in the clarity of each part.
Rowe & Slutzky quote the following from: Gyorgy Kepes,
Language of Vision, Chicago, 1944, p.77
"If one sees two or more figures overlapping one another, and each of them claims for itself the common overlapped part, then one is confronted with a contradiction of spatial dimensions. To resolve this contradiction one must assume the presence of a new optical quality. The figures are endowed with transparency: that is, they are able to interpenetrate without an optical destruction of each other. Transparency however implies more than an optical characteristic, it implies a broader spatial order. Transparency means a simultaneous perception of different spatial locations. Space not only recedes but fluctuates in a continuous activity. The position of the transparent figures has equivocal meaning as one sees each figure now as the closer, now as the further one."
As well as the re-emergence to a useful level of relevance of my former (and clearly fundamental) architectural vocabulary I am also enjoying my discussions with Paul Fowler at 'Extreme Poses' in Stroud his recognition that in my work I am displaying a significant spatial ability and spatial creativity. Again, not a surprise. I have always been aware of this and have always seen spatial appreciation and spatial ingenuity as part of my make-up, but the re-introduction of the vocabulary described above is a kind of renaissance for me.
Postscript: I suppose I never abandoned Modern Movement architectural concepts, even when working in the depths of my participatory and ecological visions for the future of architecture. There were frequent reminders and moments of re-engagement. There was one memorable event which brought home to me the role of 'transparency' and 'spatial interpenetration'. It was in the mid 1980's and I was visiting Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye at Poissy on the outskirts of Paris, an iconic architectural creation of the Modern Movement. I was on the first floor inside and looking out through towards the sunlit terrace. I was drawn from being inside by the uninterrupted spatial flow from inside to outside. I headed off across the floor and abruptly crashed into the glass wall, both a psychological shock and physically painful. I suffered a sore nose and bruised forehead for a number of days afterwards.
In recalling this incident I have highlighted for myself the bringing together of the essence and complexities held within the above quote from Kepes and overlapping this with the similarities with my fundamental concepts in architecture together with that which is happening in my recent engagements through explorations on paper of my dialogue with the nude.
