SikkimRex Posted April 13, 2006 Hi doods Have recently had the good fortune to go to Barcelona for work, and while I was there I visited some recent architecture, one project of which I thought I would mention, because it seemed "psychedelic" to me.. Herzog and de Meuron are a Swiss firm of architects who are now pretty big internationally. Barcelona collects world class architecture, and a new part of the city, the Forum, contains a range of interesting projects (even though they are packed in together too tightly) by name architects (including FOA and Abelos and Harera). The building itself is located on the triangular intersection of three major roads, including the Ronda Littoral and the termination of the Diagonal. THe buildings triangular form results from this. The building is level on the top and then meets a sloping podium, with a space between the podium and the base of the building that you can walk under. The surface of the building is a spray-crete with a blue oxide added, that has the vibrancy of Yves Klein blue. The windows are jagged slots cutting vertically through this surface. This type of geometry (jagged) will be familiar now through the work of Daniel Liebeskind and his progeny, LAB architects who did Federation Square in Melbourne. Hz & dM are well known for their interest and handling of materials. I did nit get into this building, but walked under and all around it. The undercroft (or the underside of the building) is clad with a reflective (aluminium?) metallic material that is embossed with a drop like pattern. THe doors are covered in a gold material of a similar pattern. There are penetrations through the building where light can come though. I have been thinking a lot about psychedelic art since the Hoffman thing in Basel, and the lecture by Christian Raetsch' partner (whose name escapes me right now). It seems to me that the term "psychedelic" is about the experience of the mind. In contrast, much psychedelic art attempts a kind of realism, or the use of particular signature techniques or patterns. They are trying to demonstrate a graphic of being on psychedelics. Yet we all know that in this stuff, you had to be there.. You can never come back from having been tripping. It is the quintessence of what an experience is. To freeze it, or represent it realistically is, for me, to waste time either preaching to the converted or preaching to those who will never be converted. This is a waste of energy for the psychedelic community, it wasted a lot of time for Leary, et al, and its why McKenna is so attractive - he talks from the logic and experience of the inside, to other insiders. So what is psychedelic about this building. Primarily it is that it offers in the physical realm an experience with many characteristics similar to the psychedlic. It is not that it LOOKS psychedlic (though it does a bit to me too). Its experience is at once completely unique at any point under or around it, and it does not clearly define itself as architecture in terms of a function. It is completely ambiguous. It also has aspects of visual richness and saturation that are psychedlic. Finally, I suppose it is both fundamentally confusing and then, at another moment, beautifully clear. I love it. Its a f'cken ripper. Below are some pictures, as well as a PDF of a whole lot. Check out the pics and see if you could be bothered downloading the PDF. All is copyright me, by the way. HzDm_Barcelona_Forum_JR_lr.pdf ps. I should also note that in Barcelona, all the ferals hang out in Placa George Orwell, which the locals refer to as "Placa Trippy"! HzDm_Barcelona_Forum_JR_lr.pdf HzDm_Barcelona_Forum_JR_lr.pdf Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
botanika Posted April 13, 2006 Good to see someone interested in the built environment from a psychedelic angle! Im very interested in architecture that blurs the lines between outdoor and indoor spaces, creating a transparency or inspiring transition between private indoor living and outdoor civic lifestyles. I like organic buildings, buildings that have personality - buildings that are extentions of the environment and social fabric. Unfortunately most of the professionals doing this are not actually architects but urban designers and landscape architects because they often have a richer knowledge of how those elements can be fused together into a composition that breathes life and reconnects cities with nature and our senses. cheers, I'll have to research this building more. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SikkimRex Posted April 13, 2006 Thanks for the reply Botanica. I dont know how into landscape architecture you are, but if you are interested in the inside-out thing, then you should check out a book called "Modern Landscape Architecture: A Critical Review", edited by Marc Treib. It goes through a range of approaches to the inside outside relationship that were developed by American LA's between the 1940s - 1960's. LA's such as Garrett Eckbo, Thomas Church, Dan Kiley and James Rose really created this discussion with their projects, aswell as the idea of outdoor living. The book reprints articles of these guys from the 40's and 50's. You might remember the Sunset Garden Books from the 1970's? You can still find them in the Gardening section of second hand bookshops - the Western Landscape one includes a lot of the work of these LA's and the ways they designed around indoor-outdoor, outdoor living, etc. The question of how a building "harmonises" with the natural environment is an interesting one. Its about THE LOOK of sustainability. Two similar buildings could use the same amount of technology and provide the same environmental technology, yet look different. So I do not think there is a single aesthetic or look for an environmental builiding, but there is the look that we personally, subjectively like. For me, buildings that dont impact negatovely on the environment physically, but set up a contrast with nature are more interesting. SOme of the houses of Harry Seidler (RIP) in Sydney do this. I think nature is spectacular and culture is too and they are at their best when together what is special of each is revealed. This is not to say that designers should not be precise in what they do in relation to nature, but they should not nescessarily mimic nature. Finally, if you are interested in planning and landscape architecture in cities, Barcelona is the place to research and try to visit. In the lead up to the 92 Olympics (and after a fascist dictator, Franco) they created many new spaces that were very innovative. I revisited them on this recent trip and it was interesting to see how they have grown or been used or degraded in almost 20 years. Most were in terrible shape, but a few were much better than they were then, where the vegetation has grown. and transformed the whole design. This is what vegetation should do, but few of the projects there (in Barcelona) use much vegetatation, since they were all done by architects. Their new public spaces are also pretty interesting, such as this new park amphitheatre by Foreign Office Architects (or FOA), also at the Forum. Its pretty crazy too. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
botanika Posted April 14, 2006 Sikkemrex: i do all of this for a living, i work for the company of one of guys u mentioned in your post Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SikkimRex Posted April 14, 2006 (edited) Sikkemrex: i do all of this for a living, i work for the company of one of guys u mentioned in your post Botanica - was'nt meaning to be condescending - but its best not to assume too much with random punters. I am in the game too. Though I am out of practice right now (literally and metaphorically). I am writing now. Havent been in contact with any LA's into the entheogen thing yet, though there are a few ex-trippers I know, who regard it as "kids stuff". In the thing in Barcelona all the LA's were Dutch, yet they did not touch a thing - none of them! Again, they see it as for tourists or kids. When I visit them in Netherlands (those who I have known for a while), they always say to me "its safe to come back - we have regrown the mushrooms since you were last here".. Its just a payout - but they cant seem to conceive that this is serious stuff, deeply intellectual stuff - and as old as the world. I just laugh it off. So, well you must be in the states then. You must be an LA.. I should have got it from the reference to LA's being better than architects, though personally I dont beleive this, and there is ample evidence in Oz that often architects "do it better". So, to continue my investigation... Kiley is Dead. And Rose is Dead. And Treib is nostly academic these days. And Church is Dead. So you work for EDAW then.. though Eckbo is long off the scene for them. And EDAW in Brisvegas is the biggest nationally... So say Hi to Mark F. for me... I might even be working for your alma mater.. Send me a PM and I will introduce myself and we can industry gossip... Edited April 15, 2006 by SikkimRex Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ballzac Posted April 14, 2006 For me, psychedelics are about beauty. Classical, gothic, and in a style all his own, Gaudi. That's the sort of architecture that interests me whether I'm tripping or not. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
botanika Posted April 15, 2006 No offence taken sikkem and none intended back. actually i didnt mean to imply a particular discipline is better than another, rather designers that take an interest in, have skills or experience in other disciplines tend to have a wider scope of thinking. gaudi is certainly trippy and artistic - must get back to barcelona, some beautiful people there too! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
devance Posted April 19, 2006 (edited) As a surreal artistic experince theres the increable concrete form they use for building breakwaters. A tinkertoy shape, it gets more astonshing as its exact design is based in the small foot bone of a Ram [Goat]. I wonder how the guy how patented it 100 years ago would have figured out by looking at a Rams bone structure. Well beyond me. Edited April 19, 2006 by devance Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
