White... Corbu' (architecture with light) - (I)

Quite little has been written about light and the transformations of the architectural object under its influence. In general, when we refer to the contribution of light in relation to the built environment, we cannot help but think of the well-known phrase "the skillful play of volumes in light", a definition attributed to Le Corbusier and later taken up in architectural theory to justify an answer to the question of what is architecture? Would it not be justified to ask, rather, what is architecture(?), given the complex spatially differentiated determinations by which we are surrounded?

If we were to approximate as architecture at least 10% of the product of the last decade, beyond the social order and the strictly utilitarian aspect, we would note the relatively insignificant number of constructions under which the incidence of light could determine the drama of a sensorial scenographic spectacle of light and shadow. Whether clever or not, the play of light, attenuated in the post-modern period by the presence of multiple perforated veils, often metallized, or screens with apparently cultural projections of a manipulative advertising nature, gives rise to a state of profound anxiety. A temporal, cultural, metaphysical anxiety, personalized in the creations of recent decades. The ex-treme technology of contemporary society incapable of developing the subtle no longer perceives beyond the pixel of the LCD screen or multiple perforations...

The "dressing of architecture" betrays the inability to understand the principles related to the complexity of the architectural object, which would ultimately transform it into architecture. The confusion, caused by the neuronal inability to process the technologized information, turns into the object's lack of relating to essential physical principles. The information gap that past generations used as a pretext to justify the constancy of the evolutionary process is overcome by the problems generated by the information influx of post-modernity. "The 'orbiting' and fragmentary retrieval of operating elements in the creative process transposes the minimal capacity that defines modern society. Contaminated, in general, by what is not architecture, we evolve towards the general flattening and forced mechanization of the architectural gesture. Fashion in architecture, as seen on Bustler or Archdaily, is no longer the result of a process, be it innovation, creation, the search for complexity, etc. The trend transposes the mimetic takeover of meaningless elements pasted over the pronounced acculturated de-personalized background. For example, the age of embalming facades in glass is over in some parts of the world. The fashion, however, is still for mummification in wire mesh. Redundant, sequential multiplication is unfortunately becoming the working tool of new generations. Existential flatness translates into the awkwardness of intellectual transference in relation to the conceptual approach of a banalized finality. The contemporary period, however, can argue in any direction, just as past generations have (re)evaluated any architectural approach in a similar way. The Eiffel Tower, Crystal Palace, New York skyscrapers, etc. were vehemently criticized in the period in which they were built.

Read the full text in Arhitectura 3/2012.