In this video Peter Zumthor offers seven personal observations on 'presence'
1. Childhood memory
Leopold 'presence is a gap in the flow of history'
2. ‘Like a tree’: The tree doesn’t have a message; it doesn’t want to sell anything: it does not say 'I'm more beautiful than the other tree'; it’s just a tree and it’s beautiful. Self-evident. Incredibly powerful. Image of unknown house - nothing special but incredibly powerful.
3. ‘Constructing presence in architecture: 1st attempt - pure construction’. Steilneset Memorial for holocaust. Constructed without interpretation / comment / added meaning.
4. ‘2nd attempt: The epitome of a kitchen - make it typical, then it will become special’. Talk about 'USE' rather than function.
5. ‘3rd attempt: form follows anything - or the body of architecture’. Image: Thermal bath in Vals. Architecture is not about form but can be about construction and the site and materials.
6. ‘4th attempt: the house without a form’. A house for someone you know; someone you have an emotional bond with; and give it a site that you feel a strong attachment to. Present design of house without plans, sections and models. Use your senses to understand it but don't use forms. Installations. One student verbal presentation of house using elements of the Mississippi. Another student used red earth. Image: Bruder Klaus Chapel entrance from inside. House without form = emotional space.
7. ‘5th attempt. Kim Kashkashian plays the sonata no 2 in E flat major for viola and piano by Johannes Brahms’. Being moved by art – first impressions
Can architecture create 'presence'? Slowing time down to a point when one feels present in the moment. PZ creates architecture without 'meaning'. Is that what gives his buildings a sense of presence? Is that what connects us emotionally to his buildings? Is that what makes them 'beautiful' to us?
Emotional Space. PZ
1. Childhood memory
Leopold 'presence is a gap in the flow of history'
2. ‘Like a tree’: The tree doesn’t have a message; it doesn’t want to sell anything: it does not say 'I'm more beautiful than the other tree'; it’s just a tree and it’s beautiful. Self-evident. Incredibly powerful. Image of unknown house - nothing special but incredibly powerful.
3. ‘Constructing presence in architecture: 1st attempt - pure construction’. Steilneset Memorial for holocaust. Constructed without interpretation / comment / added meaning.
4. ‘2nd attempt: The epitome of a kitchen - make it typical, then it will become special’. Talk about 'USE' rather than function.
5. ‘3rd attempt: form follows anything - or the body of architecture’. Image: Thermal bath in Vals. Architecture is not about form but can be about construction and the site and materials.
6. ‘4th attempt: the house without a form’. A house for someone you know; someone you have an emotional bond with; and give it a site that you feel a strong attachment to. Present design of house without plans, sections and models. Use your senses to understand it but don't use forms. Installations. One student verbal presentation of house using elements of the Mississippi. Another student used red earth. Image: Bruder Klaus Chapel entrance from inside. House without form = emotional space.
7. ‘5th attempt. Kim Kashkashian plays the sonata no 2 in E flat major for viola and piano by Johannes Brahms’. Being moved by art – first impressions
Can architecture create 'presence'? Slowing time down to a point when one feels present in the moment. PZ creates architecture without 'meaning'. Is that what gives his buildings a sense of presence? Is that what connects us emotionally to his buildings? Is that what makes them 'beautiful' to us?
Emotional Space. PZ