Experiencing Representation: Stimulating Corporal Sensation Through the Drawing Plane

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Experiencing Representation: Stimulating Corporal Sensation Through the Drawing Plane

Submitted to the Department of Architecture in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Architecture at the Wentworth Institute of Technology, April 2019

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title: Experiencing Representation: Stimulating Corporal Sensation Through the Drawing Plane

creator: Christian Summer Roidt

subject: Space (Architecture); Architecture, Human factors; Architecture, Psychological aspects; Senses and sensation in architecture; Wentworth Design Excellence Award winner (2019)

description: Human beings have emotions - one could say that they define us. Western rational thought, however, capitalizes on our intellectual abilities and marginalizes subjective and qualitative dimensions. In this Western tradition, architecture as a science also operates in a rational and quantifiable mode. It is understood as the sum of its physical components. Architecture as an art, on the other hand, acknowledges that emotional sensations are spatial. Yet, the primary architectural tool - drawing - remains biased towards the rational and quantifiable aspects of architecture. Drawings struggle to communicate sensations. Unsurprisingly, drawings are informed by our architectural attitudes and also serve to reinforce them. In much of the built work human sensation is therefore underrepresented. A shift towards the emotional capacity of architecture requires the primary tool of the trade to include sensation. If the true power of emotional sensation is to feature in architectural design we must resist the urge to rationalize it in representation. It is no good to intellectually understand a space if we lack a visceral knowledge of it. This investigation analyzes how representation can successfully evoke sensations analogue to the original. Furthermore it explores my own methods of representation that aim to expand the capacities of drawings to communicate feelings of spatial sensation. The goal is to allow for the viewer to become an occupant of the drawing. This thesis is not about sensory architecture - architecture that targets sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell. Although considering the five senses often makes architecture richer, it is not the focus of my work. Instead it looks beyond the five senses and assumes that we have the ability to perceive spatial conditions - that is depth, width, height, duration and location. This thesis aims for a greater understanding of the impact that changing spatial conditions has on our emotional experience.

publisher: The Douglas D. Schumann Library and Learning Commons, Wentworth Institute of Technology

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date: 2019

type: Thesis

format: .pdf

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language: eng

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rights: https://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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