Theory of Architecture II

SPACE
Protagonist of Architecture
Bruno Zevi
‘ A house is a machine for living in…’
Le Corbusier (1923)

‘ But I thought that all that functional stuff had been

refuted. Buildings aren’t machines.’
A Student

‘ You haven’t understood. The building isn’t the

machine. Space is the machine.’
Nick Dalton, Computer Programmer at University
College London (1994)
“We join spokes together in a wheel, but it is the
center hole that makes the wagon move.
We shape clay into a pot, but it is the emptiness
inside that holds whatever we want.
We hammer wood for a house, but it is the inner
space that makes it livable.
We cut doors and windows from a room, but it is
the openness which makes them useful
We work with being, but non-being is what we
use.”
Therefore value comes from what is
there, .......... usefulness from what is not
there.“
Lao-Tse
Space as language

We often need space to tell us how to behave, it

is just that often space is needed in order to
prepare us for a change of mood, to establish
relationships, to separate activities, and to
suggest or invite appropriate behavior.
Space as language

Space is the essential stuff of a very fundamental and

universal form of communication.

Architecture organizes and structures space for us,

and its interiors and the objects enclosing and
inhabiting its rooms can facilitate or inhibit our
activities by the way they use this language.
Space protagonist of architecture
“A satisfactory history of architecture has not yet been written,
because we are still not accustomed to thinking in terms of space,…”
Space protagonist of architecture
Painting functions in two dimensions, even if it can suggest
three or four.
Space protagonist of architecture
Sculpture works in three
dimensions, but man remains
apart, looking on from the
outside .
Space protagonist of architecture
Architecture, however, is like a great hollowed-out
sculpture which man enters and apprehends by moving
about within it.
Space protagonist of architecture

• “Internal space, that space which, can not be

completely represented in any form, which can
be grasped and felt only through direct
experience, is the protagonist of architecture.”
• To grasp space, to know how to see it, is the
key to the understanding of building.
Space protagonist of architecture

• What is architecture?
• What is non architecture?
• Beautiful building = architecture?
• Ugly building = non architecture?
Space protagonist of architecture

• How many dimension does space have?

• The container vs. the contained
• Façade and walls of a building are only containers.
The internal space is the content.
• The value of the box?
• The value of what the box contains?
• Container and contained are mutually
interdependent.
Space protagonist of architecture

Architecture does not consist in the sum of the width,

length and height of the structural elements which
enclose space, but in the void itself, the enclosed space
in which man lives and moves.

A poem is something more than just a sum of fine

verses, architecture is also something more than just a
sum of beautiful walls.
“አይወጣም ደረጃ ቢፈጥን ሴቼንቶ
እንደኔ ካልወጣ በ ፍቅር ተገፍቶ”

“ፍቅሬ ስትመጣ በበሬ

በመስኮት ወጣ ችግሬ”
Space protagonist of architecture
Time – the fourth dimension?
Space protagonist of architecture
“… in every physical structure there is not only an external
form, there is also an internal organism; besides the skin,
there are the muscles and the skeleton, the internal
constitution.” cubists
Space protagonist of architecture
No work of architecture can be experienced and understood
without the fourth dimension, without the time needed for
our walk of discovery within it.
Space protagonist of architecture
Factor of time in architecture…painting…and sculpture…
Space protagonist of architecture
In painting, the fourth dimension is a quality inherent in
the representation of an object, an element of its reality
which a painter may choose to project on a flat surface
without requiring physical participation on the part of the
observer.
Space protagonist of architecture
In sculpture the “movement” of a form is a quality inherent
in the statue we are looking at, which we most relive
visually and psychologically.
David by….

Bramante Michelangelo Bernini

Space protagonist of architecture
In architecture, man moving about within the building,
studying it from successive points of views, himself creates,
so to speak the fourth dimension, giving the space an
integrated reality.
Space protagonist of architecture
Beautiful architecture, is architecture in which the
interior space attracts us, elevates us, and dominates us
spiritually; ugly architecture would be that in which the
interior space disgusts and repels us.
Space protagonist of architecture
Two Misunderstandings about space
1. Architectural space can be experienced only in the
interior of a building, … urban or city-planned space,
for all practical purposes, does not exist or have any
value.
2. Space is not only the protagonist of architecture, but
represents the whole of architectural experience, and
that consequently the interpretation of a building in
terms of space is the only critical tool required in
judging architecture.
Space protagonist of architecture
The experience of space has its extension in the city, the
streets, squares alleys and parks, in the playgrounds and in
the gardens…

In a building space is defined by six planes…

Space protagonist of architecture
Since every architectural volume, every structure of walls,
constitutes a boundary, a pause in the continuity of space, it
is clear that every building functions in the creation of two
kinds of space.
Internal space External space
Space protagonist of architecture
Four beautifully decorated walls do not in themselves create a beautiful
environment, so a group of excellent houses can define a poor urban
space, and vise versa.
Space protagonist of architecture
To maintain that internal space is the essence of architecture
does not mean that the value of an architectural work rests
entirely on its spatial value. Every building can be
characterized by a plurality of values; economic, social,
technical, functional, aesthetic, spatial and decorative…
Space protagonist of architecture
In conclusion, even if the other arts contribute to
architecture, it is interior space, the space which surrounds
and includes us, which is the basis for our judgment of a
building, which determines the “yea” or “nay” of aesthetic
pronouncement on architecture. All the rest is important in a
subordinate relation to the spatial idea.

“Judgment of architecture is fundamentally judgment of the

internal space of buildings.”
Space protagonist of architecture

“Architecture is not art alone, it is not merely a

reflection of conceptions of life or a portrait of
systems of living. Architecture is environment, the
stage on which our lives unfold.”
Bruno Zevi