Embed Size (px)
DESCRIPTION
Together we stand, divided we fall.
Citation preview
architecturemetu | ankara
*CONGESTION - An excessive or abnormal accumulation of blood or other fluid in a body part or blood vessel. An excessive or abnormal accumulation of … or other … in a …
By altering key words here it is possible to apply the word of congestion almost into all fields.
From architectural point of view (which is my own interpretation) - An excessive or abnormal accumulation of BUILDINGS or other VOLUMES in an URBAN CONTEXT. In my opinion this is one of the main PROBLEMs, which is the cities are becoming commercial exhibition areas for egos and investors rather than being homogenous space living for residents.
For a particular city: Baku“An interesting short-story:2014 August, Republic of South Africa, Durban, Congress of UIA (Union of International Architects). I have just met a man from there.Man : Where are you from ?I : Azerbaijan, BakuMan : Aaa, that’s where Zaha Hadid’s curvy building is! (He referred to Haydar Aliyev Cultural Center)I : (was a little bit shocked)”
The thing that the small conversation of four lines shows is the way a building affects an urban context and becoming an identification bias, even for a country. Yes, from a country and city, which have already been identified with Haydar Aliyev Cultural Center or “Zaha Hadid’s curvy building”, EXPECTATIONs were to build and create an Architectural Butterfly Effect - Bilbao effect to enhance a life in the city and establish a new identity for Baku.
What happened? Naive struggle between a ‘spectator’ and a ‘choreographer’. Newly Baku is perceived by spectators as a radically changing city from numerous aspects, including architecture. BUT, is it possible to put Zaha’s alienated sculpture properly, and simultanously covering the city with neoclassical buildings? Choreographer staged the ballet in an inaccurate way. It is obvious that the building become a landmark for Baku, but currently it’s empty because of its disregard by people who are not ready for such a building and program. Consequently it is seen as a sizable space is for a massive sculpture - like an object in a museum.
From my point of view, bringing community together can play an enormous role in order to RESOLVE the situation. Buildings are no longer needed to be designed only by architects, but also by their users. How? ARCHITECTURAL STUDIO is an immaculate space for establishing that kind of a relation, by welcoming and relating with local people, by asking their intentions in a trustful way. That method can also help to residents start understanding the process of architectural design, as architecture is an absolute abstraction.
I FEEL good.
Arche | Deconstructing the Architect Architectural Educationsubhan [email protected]
Arche, is a Greek word, primarily corresponds to ‘beginning’, ‘origin’ or ‘source of action’.1 This concept had appeared in ancient Greek philosophy, whose one of the main issues was exploring “the main element” that rules everything in nature; in other words the “first principle” of existing things. The basis of that way of thought was
Thales, ancient Greek philosopher, or actually cosmologist of that time. Aristotlementions about Thales in his book “Metaphysics” as: “That from which is everything that exists and from which it first becomes and into which it is rendered at last, its substance remaining under it, but transforming in qualities, that they say is the element and principle of things that are. […] Thales the founder of this type of philosophy says that it is water. “2
Even after Thales, philosophers of ancient Greek internalized Thales’s principles;they believed there is a main source or “arche” of everything and speculated about it, tried to explain nature, cosmos and existence of humanity. Although ancient man’s capability of deduction cannot be compared by using today’s scientific methodology, curiosity and philosophy had pioneered the eagerness of questioning the meaning and the source of the cosmos. Since then on, everything has changed; first we hadnelements, atoms, and then subatomic particles, quarks, bosons and so on. These shifts are the subject of another time.
With an articulated interpretation, the word “arche” extents its meaning into “ultimate underlying substance”, “ultimate indemonstrable principle”, then even to “power, governor, authority”. The word “archetype” [arche-type], borrows this concept to represent “the prototype that shows fundamental, basicproperties of an object or a product”. Furthermore, political philosophy also borrows this concept and uses it to express “authoritarian power”; by propounding the concept “anarchism” [an-arch-ism] referring to the idea of “rejection of authoritarian power”. Eventually, “architect”, or in ancient Greek language “arkhitekton” [archi-tecton] borrows the “arche” to express “master, director, chef of the carpenters, or builders”3 , in brief, chef builder.
1. Lidell and Scott Lexicon, [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/t?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aalphabetic+letter%3D*a%3Aentry+group%3D318%3Aentry%3Da%29rxh%2F2. Aristotles, Metaphysics3. Douglas Harper , architect. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=architect&allowed_in_frame=0
EditorialPost’ure News is a student-based publication group, aiming to spread personalized words on issues related to architecture, city, arts and society.
from Post’ure News Manifest*
Hello world. We are Post’ure News editorial group and we hope to meet you once in a month via a news bulletin.
Our primary concern is to build a common ground which aims to create opportunities for sharing among students, by means of personal experiences, thoughts and events, improving the awareness on the necessity of communication. We believe that documenting and sharing those systematically, for people who want to benefit in future, is essential.
The reason to choose “architectural education” as a theme for issue_01 is to share our personal experiences originating from the problems that we have been dealing with throughout our education process. It can be the congestion resulting from lack of time before deadlines, the assignments that we need to cover, the bittersweet feelings that we derived from these experiences, the possible solutions that we thought about the problems observed, and the expectations about architectural studios and other issues.
Apart form those, we want to underline that the news bulletin you are holding is just a medium for specified contents, majorly covered collected around a specific theme. Post’ure News also continues with various blog entries and social media sharings, and will pursue periodical events arranged in the faculty, such as film screenings, roundtable discussions, conferences, meetings and so on.
The more you contribute, the more we can do. Together we stand, divided we fall.
*Thanks to Aslıhan Günhan for her courtesy.
illustration: Ozan Yetkin
illustration: Merve Şahin
Upcoming!
23.02.2015 Post’ure Launch: “Archiculture”
26.02.2015Post’ure RED05.03.2015
Post’ure Talk_01: City&Chaos09.03.2015
Deadline for submissions for Issue_02:City&Chaosillustrations: Merve Şahin
POST’February 19, 2015
P.2 “Together we stand, divided we fall.”
EditorialPost’ure News
P.3 “Arche | Deconstructing the Architect”
EditorialPost’ure News
P.4 “I feel good.”
Architectural EducationSubhan Manafzade
P.5 “How much of us are happy?”
Therapy of Architectural EducationÇağda Türkmen
P.6 “[...] finding your own way is what does count.”
Notes after the ColloquiumMerve Şahin
P.7 “Thinking that architectural education is laborious...”
Imagery & ObservationMert Erdem
Editorial BoardEmre CoşkunerCem DedekargınoğluHayri DörtdivanlıoğluAslıhan GünhanBuse Ezgi SökülmezMerve ŞahinÇağda TürkmenMelek Pınar Uz
Graphic DesignHayri DörtdivanlıoğluMerve Şahin
PrintingMETU Faculty of Architecture Press
ContactPOST’ure Student Bulletin Department of ArchitectureMiddle East Technical University06800 Çankaya|Ankara|TURKEY
+90 312 210 7287
[email protected]@posturenews/posturenews
The term therapy may seem weird, exaggerated, or unrelated with our profession. Yet, here and now, what we need is a successful therapy on our weird lifestyle. We are always talking about the fallacy of it, in the canteen courtyard, in philosophy classes1 , or that UMÖB2 thing, trying to find a solution – as if nobody tried before us! The handicap is, unfortunately, we cannot change a fish tank while flowing inside. We need to “climb up the fine hairs of the fur in order to stare right into the magician’s eyes”3 . Cliché student complaints mean nothing when no solution is offered. At this point, in order to answer, we need to ask, and I will try to ask the right questions here.
Let’s start with a simple one [simple is our key word], here is the question we discussed last night with my lovely Erasmus friend4 on our monthly video-talking session: Why they didn’t tell us? While dealing with pop-up assignments, sleepless nights, and lack of time management, why on the earth anybody didn’t tell us what we are doing is drawing our future? Why were we unconscious during the first studio classes? Experimental education5 - oh, it is fascinating! - but why we shouldn’t know that any adhesive we used, any paper we cut, any critics we took, is something to build the after-graduate scene of our life play?
I was burning the midnight oil again, suddenly realized the fact that what I will do for the rest of my life is the product of 1st and 2nd year studios. No, I don’t mean only the studio classes – I mean my understanding about myself, my life, my architecture. The education here was only waiting for me to find a way, and it should be found in these two years.Because we didn’t give decisions only on our design paths, we gave decisions on our life paths. We sacrifice, our jealous lover takes everything from our hands, we change, all of our habits from the past 19 years disappear while new ones [mostly bad ones] takes place, and we melt in this new type of living – a weird one.
The most tragic fact is – we are doing all of them willingly! We skipped rules and regulations page without reading, all we want is to be architects, as soon as possible, to be accepted to that owl society, we accepted everything blindfolded!6 The second question may be – Seriously, is this all we can do? This doesn’t refer to the work-over-load we’re dealing with; actually, this refers to the quality of our education. Supposing that education is the common product of the educator and the educated, two independent people, how similar is what we do here to the “learning together” principle of Bauhaus?7 All of the instructors advise us to attend cultural and artistic activities; graduate programs expect completed organizations from us, and we face with the GPA requirements everywhere – is it possible to satisfy all these desires at the same time, in just four academic years?
Meanwhile, a lot of theoretical discussions continue on architectural education, extremely valuable ones, but as a mere student, they are not talking to me. They are not talking even about me. Some precious subjects are being studied by some precious people, and we have no place there! We, the laborers of this factory-faculty, the base of the triangle, the 99%, have no word to be heard. Just obeying the procedure, acting like one of them, we begin to think like everybody: This is the best architectural school in the country. The only way to be an architect is this. The evaluations are fair. This psychological violence is normal. Not everybody needs to be an architect.
Actually, when met with architecture students from other universities, I saw that the only difference between them and us is the understanding, the knowledge. We are full of knowledge, which is never valued in our system! The knowledge, which doesn’t show itself is nothing. The knowledge, which the lecturer didn’t ask is nothing. The knowledge, which we cannot use to represent ourselves, is nothing. And while we are dealing with this knowledge, in other schools students learn how to be an architect– in a relatively active social life, free summertime, workshops, competitions, travels, and with the political responsibility coming with the profession.
The last question is a short one: How many of us are happy? How many of us continue to fight just because it is too late to give up? How many of us believe that another world is possible – even in our world?
1. 2012 Summer School, METU, Ahmet İnam, Philosophical Practice. 2. Ulusal Mimarlık Öğrencileri Buluşması 12.5 Diyarbakır & 13 Balıkesir. 3. A passage from the book Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder. 4. Hamide Rıhtım, grass-philosopher, senior student of METU ARCH. 5. Have a look at the book The Therapy of Education: Philosophy, Happiness, and Personal Growth by Smeyers, Smith and Standish. 6. A research of Çiğdem Belgin Dikmen [Mimarlık Eğitiminde Stüdyo Çalışmalarının Önemi: Temel Eğitim Stüdyoları] shows that the hardest year for both the students and the members is the first year of architectural education. It is also the most significant reason to discuss a therapy need for architectural education. Is it really the hardest year, or is it the election year of the students obeying the existent paradigms of the faculty? 7. Master’s thesis by Yüksel Yeşim Uysal with the title of A survey on the system of education at the Middle East Technical University Department of Architecture, 1956-1980 is a beneficial source for this manner in detail.
This writing will be about one of the topics that I knew I should write about, since, during the semester I could not stop talking about my school-oriented problems. My aim is not to praise or dispraise any approach or style of teaching, I will only try to reflect my opinions based on the notes taken during the colloquium and the observations in the faculty.
The main problem that is discussed in the colloquium was the process management. Time, communication between students and instructors, critic sessions and the way critics were conducted are the subtopics that go with the process. The importance of time management, being aware of our era, international and local values, social and political environment and finding the balance between lectures were the most outstanding advices that instructors mentioned. Now, I would like to point out a few things about the process in the studio.
Firstly, time is the hardest thing to deal with and the only thing that you cannot control. I believe that the source of time management problem is miscommunication. Between instructors and students there’s always a communication based on implications rather than direct instructions. After I could solve the encrypted messages [assignments, comments, critics etc.], I have recognized in time that this unclear instructions were not that unclear. The thing is, there is a collection of terms with which I was unfamiliar and there were words apparently “cooler” to use in architectural studio. However, even the situation got better after I created my own dictionary to get away with these instructions in the first year, I could not get away with the feeling that, the next step of the assignments always kept some kind of a secret and this situation sometimes prevents us from creating freely. As a result the given time is never enough since we spend most of it being unable to focus on the main problem.
Second thing is that I suffered a lot from is the conceptual confusion between giving a constructive criticism and stating a personal opinion. It gets harder when you can’t recognize the difference between these two and take everything said so seriously. In the end you get mad trying to make everything right rather than understanding the problem and solving it. It is again matter of time. It is essential to become deaf under some situations and it is essential to make the timing of it perfectly.
Before ending this writing I want to make a few more points. No matter how miserable I feel during the rush times of the year, I feel than the learning process of architecture, creating and designing enriches me and most of the time I feel satisfied. That is because luckily, I have amazing lectures. I have mentioned time management problems, miscommunications and the lack of quality of the critics. But I should point out that I never wanted more time because the thrill of solving the problem in a limited time is the thing that gets me every time. Actually, as the time passes by I have seen that the other problems that were mentioned makes me be more and more confident about myself; because in spite of all these obstacles, finding your own way is what does count.
There is a very basic and specific definition of architecture education in every student’s mind: ‘’HARD’’.
Architecture is a very different universe that students face, with a completely different Language. The style of education is the main reason of this condition, and it is complicated and difficult to understand. Do not misunderstand, I will not criticize the education style, perhaps this is the only style that can help to develop students’ imagination and encourage them to design something which expresses their identity directly. But in this case, the title of the architectural education does not change in one’s mind, it still stays as ‘’HARD’’.
Criteria, required to overcome these difficulties in a comfortable way, can be grouped under two headings: The first one is human’s innate abilities, namely imagery, phantasy and imagination; the second one is human behaviors which improves according to student’s life, such as observation, analysis, and experience… Actually there is no need to do something for human’s innate abilities, they are already there and people cannot learn them by education, on the contrary these are the features that are expected from an architect. However,the human behaviours which improve by observation can vary depending on the person’s working principles. In fact, this is the thing that creates the differentiation among the students.
Students who can develop good observation skills, to analyze everything and add them to their own libraries [we assume that all architectural students’ imagination skills are in sufficient level] would succeed in this educational process. So, in this context, the architectural education in universities is not a step that makes students an architect, it is neither a step that prepares students to their worklife; is a complementary and finishing part which reveals the students’ abilities and gives them last shape, to be used as their most important power helping to earn their life.
Briefly, thinking that architectural education is laborious and hard is an easy way to escape from it. That is the most appropriate method of architectural education for the selected students having potentials , which they had never used so far. We should not forget that the most difficult thing we assume also develops us. We always try to add something on it to improve ourselves. Because these things help us in final road to overcome the difficulties.
Therapy of Architectural Educationçağda tü[email protected]
Colloquium Notesmerve ş[email protected]
I love my faculty, especially when no one’s inside. After studio lucubrations, jurys and in semester breaks, without any people disrupting the blessed silence, our faculty’s supreme beings show their face and announce their “mew”s.
While jumping from table to table, sleeping on our precious models and scratching our costly posters, I question about the mutualist relation between “us and them”.
Imagery & Observationmert erdem [email protected]
POST’ure2015 Issue #1
NOTES TAKEN DURING
d e s i g n
ı s
a
t h ı n k ı n g
p r o c e s s
INTELLECTUALACCUMULATION
D O
RUSH
WHAT TO TRUST?SELF ASSESSMENT
et to knowE V E R Y T H I N G
Be the witness of your erapolitical | social
feeltry
observeexperiment
environment
cem dedekargınoğ[email protected]
