RELATED EXPLORATIONS
IN
ARCHITECTURAL
AND
MUSICAL
COMPOSITION
by
NICCOLO WERNER CASEWIT
Bachelor of Environmental Design
University of Colorado, Boulder
1983
SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE
IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE
DEGREE
MASTER OF ARCHITECTURE
AT THE
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
FEBRUARY 1987
Q
NICCOLO WERNER CASEWIT 1987
The author hereby grants to M.I.T.
Dermission to reproduce and to distribute publicly
copies of this thesis document in whole or in part.
Signature of the author
Certified by
7
Niccolo Werner Casewit
Department of Architecture
January 15, 1985
Will'ia Lyman Porter
Professor of Architectur and Planning
Thesis Supervisor
Accepted by
Chairperson
MASSACHUS
Departmfndb
Vi
ittee for Graduate Students
FEB 25 1987
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RELATED EXPLORATIONS IN
ARCHITECTURAL AND MUSICAL COMPOSITION
by
NICCOLO WERNER CASEWIT
SUBMITTED TO
THE DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE ON JANUARY 15, 1987
IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE
DEGREE
MASTER OF ARCHITECTURE
AT THE
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
ABSTRACT
Architecture has been described as "frozen music."
To be
sure, architecture has many physically static features,
yet it can best be understood as a process in motion and
as motion. Both architecture and music share attributes
of qualitative movement.
A composition unfolds in phases
of tension and repose, extension, and arrival.
Explicit
patterns of organization are defined by proportions,
gradients of texture and intensity, and always through
the experience of space in time.
RELATED EXPLORATIONS ...
is an inquiry and a proposed
demonstration of a parallel process of composition.
A
landscape, a sonata, and a building design are "composed"
synesthetically with respect to their temporal qualities.
An agricultural site in Northern Massachusetts is chosen
for a new community of artists.
The project accommodates
artist housing, studios, workshops, and facilities for
performances and exhibitions.
Perceptual qualities of the
site, programs, and formal strategies are illustrated with
diagrams, notations, and original photography.
Musical scores and design drawings are presented together
to aid direct comparison of the mediums.
A cassette
recording of the sonata for violin in D-major is included
with this submission (30 minutes).
The cassette will be
shelved with the thesis manuscript in Rotch Library.
Thesis Supervisor:
William Lyman Porter
Title:
Professor of Architecture
and Planning
ii
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
1
INTRODUCTION,
3
THE LANDSCAPE
--
19A
20
THE VIOLIN SONATA
36
THE LIVING MUSEUM
47
ABOUT COMPOSING
55
CONCLUSION
67
BIBLIOGRAPHY
APPENDIX
I
71
77
iii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The MIT community has given me freedom to explore ideas
about composing and composition and I am indebted to many
individuals for inspiring my curiosity and intrigue with
interdisciplinary thinking and making.
First, I would like to thank Professor Bill Porter who has
helped me all along with the difficult task of organizing
my flourishes and whose knowledge and criticisms of both
the music and the architecture were invaluable while I have
been at MIT.
To Professors Shun Kanda and Fernando Domeyko-Perez
for their interest in this project as it relates to the
sensual qualities of experience.
Professor Alan Fleisher
and Judy Dayton Mitchell encouraged me with comments about
both music and architecture. David Epstein graciously
welcomed my participation in his music analysis course and
introduced me to the concepts of structural hearing.
To Ralph and Doris Thut whose support and examples of
"processual architecture" have been important in my music.
And to Dean John de Monchaux who introduced me to Brooksby
Farm, the site for this project.
Special thanks to my
typist Stuart Stephens.
To my personal friends, Laurie Friedman, Kevin Thornton,
Randy Snow, Erland Ortiz, Billie Hall, Josef Ehrenfellner,
Sabine Kluger, and Cathrine Verhulst who have all
contributed so warmly-over the years.
And finally to my family, Dr. Renate Grumach, Jutta Meinel,
Curtis Casewit, and Charlotte Casewit, for their support
and encouragement.
NICCOLO WERNER CASEWIT, January 1987
1
The Muse
She slips in behind the curtain on opening night.
Strings are tuned, reeds adjusted, the light dimmed.
We take a breath and raise our bows.
The opening chord is sounded.
She has no time to ask questions.
Her mind is ours too.
Sonority unfolds.
Abandoning ourselves to her instinctual breath,
we are transported,
beginnings reflect endings;
excursion invites return.
Gone again, she'll be back.
2
INTRODUCTION
Music shows us that movement can communicate ideas through
our own physical perception.
Music is an elegant means of
presenting ideas as experience.
Music has the capacity to
arouse within us the most sublime associative content.
Music is a deliberate construct.
A composition in music starts as an interpretative act by
the composer.
The "act" of composing may be inspired and
influenced by natural laws, but the "message" is finally an
abstraction.
An "artificial" act:
the composer gives us
something we did not have before.
Architecture can be experienced in movement and as
movement.
Having abstract content like music, it is also
relayed through physical mediums:
into materials.
ideas are transformed
When self-reflection occurs, the materials
can then be interpreted back to ideas.
These "ideas" are
expressed in mediums, but they have a life of their own.
Architecture is not music, nor are the two translatable
mediums.
But their relationships to physical principles
and their "artificial content" have many qualities in
common.
3
Music and architecture are not the same:
1. Music is durationally condensed experience.
and instantaneous:
Momentary
a compact emotional analogue.
Architecture is durationally prolonged because it
accompanies the real-time experience of life.
2. Their materials are not interchangeable.
Visual and
aural materials make space in different ways.
visual stimulation -explicit space.
Tacit
like the trunk of a tree --
makes
On the other hand, aural stimulation is
found in music which can only imply space.
All artistic
mediums seem affected by the space during transmission.
Transmission is a natural phenomenon, while artistic
content is artificial.
Their configurations can refer
to that which is to be "codified" natural phenomena.
The transmission of artistic materials is "carried" by
the physical medium.
J.S. BACH
3.
The sequence of "composed" information in music is
rigorously controlled, while in the "open" architecture
we are proposing sequence is improvisational.
Said
another way, music programs the order in which materials
are revealed, while in a multivalued architecture
sequence is only suggested.*
*In painting order of observation is also variable,
but, unlike architecture and music, the elements in
painting can be perceived in simultaneous combinations
of its materials.
Thus, the "real-time" experience of
painting is free of imposed observational order.
4
Methods, Materials, and Procedure in Composition
Artistic creation is a very elusive subject;
it is
difficult to discuss synthesis occuring when we make
compositions.
We can show and evaluate successive stages
of artistic development through sketches and recordings,
but this is only the evidence of the story, not the process
itself.
In fact,
the mystery of synthesis is what
motivates us because we love being surprised by what we
have made!
Procedures are more easily discussed, but unfortunately
many artists refrain from being rigorously analytical about
their creations; musical composition theory is an
extraordinary exception:
(though healthy dissent is
rampant) music theorists have developed a shared
nomenclature for describing the elusive --
perhaps because
music composition has always been so closely tied to the
disciplines of mathematics and philosophy.
Our theory for analyzing
architecture and even the
"natural landscape" is
partly based on current
theories of structural
perception
in
music.
The
concepts of prolongation
and "continuance" are
taken from music analysis
sources and applied to
architecture in an effort
to find a descriptive
methodology identifying
factors which cortribute
to a sensual
architecture.
ASPLUND
5
The comparison of architecture and music has -been made
throughout history with the aid of geometry and
mathematics.
Music was thought to be the primary "voice"
of the universe and therefore a source of truth explained
with geometry and philosophy.
For Pythagoreans, musical phenomena reflected the natural
order which was essentially metaphysical.
Musical
proportions 1:2:3:4:... were quantifiable terms which
belonged to a sublime organization of the cosmos.
"Music of the spheres" was later demonstrated empirically
by J. Kepler who showed that the ratios of the furthest and
closets points along the natural orbits of the planets
conformed to the consonant musical harmonies.
Thus, the
physical phenomena of sound and vibration were shown to
explain other physical phenomena through a shared system of
ratios.
Renaissance architects Alberti, Serlio, and Palladio took
heart and began writing various treatises on a rational
architecture based on absolute ratios of musical
consonance.
This was called and is still misleadingly
called "architectural composition."
The concentration of
their efforts seemed to be focused on the harmonious
"static" presence of their buildings.
We argue that "musical architecture" is not a single static
"chord" composing a facade but is a further development of
many ratios which are layered in all directions to make
moving space.
The "composition" of Alberti
is a process of
division, while the "musical composition" we are proposing
is a process of addition and elaboration fundamentally
derived from proportional ratios, but also generated from
explicit patterns of registration, alternation, and
direction.
6
The comparison of musical
"objects" and built
"objects" can only lead
to an analysis which
extracts abstractions
from abstractions.
Such
a comparison cannot bring
our inquiry to any truly
useful conclusions.
(We
can compare abstractions
ALBERTI, PALAZZO RUCELLAI
without results until the
ultimate abstraction of
death concludes our
discussion!)
Then why
are we proceeding?
If we
can avoid trying to
answer the question,
"Why
do we interpret the way
we do?" --
a strictly
rhetorical question -and get onto talking
about the process of
making and experiencing
architecture and music,
BRIDGE IN TESSIN, BY BLASER
OBJEKTIVE ARCH. 1970
useful comparisons
between the two might be
revealed.
EGYPTIAN LABYRINTH
7
Procedure and Process
When we reflect on compositional form, we often reduce it
selectively into particular parts:
the elements of the
Sometimes this process of reflection is
composition.
confused with the design process itself.
Reflective
process can be analytical and reductive.
It requires the
interpreter to overlook some information in order to make
sense of the rest.
Once defined, these
elements can be deployed
in a procedure
"reenactment"
a
---
but they
are not complete ideas.
These principles can be
considered more or less
like diagrams.
They are
powerful because they are
transformable and self-,
organizing.
PROCESS
PROCEDURE
Procedure is an
analytical prerequisite
to process.
In other
words, procedure
initiates a cognitive
process which in turn
activates the next
procedure.
Process must be
understood as sentience
or feeling as
distinguished from
communicates dynamic.
reflective thought or
ideas, while procedure
perception.
8
Process
clarifies these ideas.
Surfaces (Foregr.ound)
A combination of
procedures can be used to
evaluate a given
completed composition or
a composition in
progress. The first
inclination is to note
instances of change of
dimension, texture, and
rhythm in the "melodic"
lines (design or land
topography).
This gives
us an understanding of
BROOKSBY FARM FOREST
positions and sequences
of surface materials only
--
like the "facade" of a
great building. The next
steps are to identify the
sequential order of
interruptions and
continuities and to
classify the melodic
themes, as climbing,
falling, or constant.
RALPH AND DORIS THUT, PASING SQUASH
9
Large Groupings
(Background)
The third way of
hearing/seeing is to
extract an apparent
"Ursatz" which could be
linked to the global
unity of the movement,
and might anticipate both
anomalies and thematic
developments which occur
independent of sequential
time.
VIENNA
ALLISION
Connections and Overlaps
(Middle Ground)
The second approach is
more closely detailed
observation of local
intervals, harmonies, and
transitional "passing"
references:
connectors
and extenders within
local and sub-reg.ional
domains.
We then
identify the significant
volumetric references
occurring sequentially.
THE DESIGN
10
At some point, just
feeling and experiencing
an artistic work is not
enough.
Questions arise:
What moves a composition?
What defines and
constitutes the
ingredients of an
What
experience?
supports the sublime
content of experience?
And finally, what
connects and sustains the
superimposition of
sequential
(through
memory) and simultaneous
(real-time) experiences?
Preliminary observations
reveal that experience
and perception which have
GOETHE LIBRARY WEIMAR
any complexity at all are
made intelligible through
structurally significant
Motion in architecture
progressions which can be
and music is'either
readily abstracted from
continuous or fragmented,
sign events.
Material
the quality of a
patterns of gesture,
particular sequence is
shape, volume, and
either direct or
duration are the
indirect.
constituent elements of
differences between
the sign-event which are
direct and indirect
formed by the maker.
movement give
The
compositions their
dynamic characteristics.
11
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THE PERFORMANCE AND EXHIBITION BUILDINGS
12
Prolongations extend a
Prolongation and
composition through
Continuance
thematic variations of
the essential materials
If a sequence is too
that the composer has
direct it is monotonous,
chosen to explore.
A
predictable, and even
composer may start with
boring --
very simple ideas or
If a sequence is indirect
"basic shapes" which
to the extreme, we may
embody the components of
feel lost or disoriented.
his themes.
Prolongation
we go to sleep!
Prolongation and
is experienced as
continuance are
elaboration and layering
compositional principles
gradients of one space
which mediate the order
into the next.
Sometimes
of a sequence to insure
prolongations become so
tension which holds our
intense that they
attention and sparks our
literally lead the
expectations of what may
composition into totally
follow.
unexpected "aleatory"
situations.
In music
harmony and in
architecture,
prolongation is the tacit
urge to resist "closure"
or an ending.
Prolongation is
excitement which actually
"prepares" a return to
I
known territory.
13
In the fall, the leaves
of trees surrounding the
pond drop upon the water.
They seem to migrate back
to the shoreline from
which they came.
They
are different now.
The
leaves still seem to
belong to the land.
They are merely on the
water....
I~'~:~ '1
We could see through a
series of rooms.
We knew
where we were going,
because it was made for
NORTH POND
14
Us-..
Continuance is closely
associated with
prolongation, but has an
entirely different
compositional function.
Continuance is made
evident by economy of
means, repetition of
motifs, density of
articulation, and
thematic returns.
In
architecture, for
example, continuance is'
experienced in the
repetition of details,
spacial moves, and like
configurations of
materials.
It asserts a
unity even in a highly
differentiated design.
In music, continuance
WEIMAR, ST. PAUL
takes us on a sensual
"trip" which happens in a
time-sequence, but this
sequence actually folds
back onto itself.
One
aspect of continuance is
rhythm, another is the
use of like-forms and
spacial dimensions.
Continuance is
continuation of a natural
cycle of tension and
release.
Temporally
speaking, it is breath.
NYMPHENBURG,
MUNICH
15
The Context of the Thesis
The philosophical context
is a point of departure
for this study.
We take
the position that all
artistic mediums share a
common relationship to,
and incorporate the
fundamental
principles of
unity and qualitative
difference within their
particular compositional
frameworks.
The musical context gives
us a model of dynamic
process which demarcates
psycho-physical time.
It
is also a tacit example
THE NORTH ORCHARD BIRCH
of emotional expression
through constructive
means.
Architecture creates
Music fills the
silence with significant
space with significant
form.
form.
Architecture tells
us about how to make our
C.E. MILLER
time; day to day and
historically.
Architecture gives us
references to position
ourselves between sky and
ground, and from here to
there.
We see
architecture as a
commitment to discussion,
because it is the most
public art of humankind.
16
SOUTH SIDE
The natural context
is our primary means
of transmission
and reception of
compositional
information.
Nature
is the realm of our
senses, and our bodies.
Humankind is essentially
an "instrument" of
nature, and though our
creations may alter
nature, we must still
abide by the natural laws
of metabolism, growth,
and other physical
principles.
Nature is
our primary constraint
but also our only means
to share ideas and
feeling.
F. d. MARTINI
17
The Experiment
this study is to show
that clarity of
The purpose of this study
is to determine a new
procedure in architecture
modification of basic
based on temporal
explicit control of
organization in musical
composition. Music and
directed tension result
architecture are similar
art forms, in that
they share qualities
of sequence and
artistic expression,
materials, consistent
spacial shapes, and the
in a high level of
which has dynamic length
and includes
the natural
and constructive context
simultaneity. They
both order experience
of events and the
which is disciplined
by time and the
composer and the
physiological limitations
of human perception and
artistic work.
memory.
imaginations of both the
interpreters of the
_____________
'4.-
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Our intent is to
demonstrate a theory of
structural temporality by
composing a sonata and a
building in a parallel
process. The goal of
NORTH FIELD
18
The Composition
The design investigations consist of three parts which were
looked at separately and then combined.
These parts are:
--
The existing landscape.
--
A sonata for violin.
--
The buildings which comprise a new artist community.
Each part of the total composition was analyzed on its own
terms, but most importantly they were viewed in
relationship to each other.
In the following pages we will
present and describe each element, and then proceed with
a discussion o-f their interrelationships and how
understanding each element of the total composition as a
quasi-analogue for the others helped bring out the most in
our compositional process.
19
THE
LANDSCAPE
FELTON ROAD, PEABODY
20
The Landscape
The site is an extraordinary expanse of land near Peabody,
Massachusetts, about thirty minutes north of Boston.
Currently a protected greenspace surrounded by suburban
subdivisions and light industry, it functions as a large
park for the towns of Peabody and Danvers.
The land
consists of over 250 acres of agricultural land.
"Brooksby
Farm" is one of the oldest farms in New England.
The
Feltons started the farm in the 1650's, cultivating a
variety of crops, including predominantly over 90 acres of
Much of the terrain is very subtly sloping
apple orchards.
with recurrent waves which gently lead to thickly forested
catchments to the north.
The rows of apple trees are
planted about 30' on center parallel to the contours,
making for uninterrupted views of the open parts of the
site.
The orchards are on high land which affords the
visitor significant views of the land surrounding the farm
to the north.
We get a sense that the farm is almost
scaleless because of its expansive character.
In contrast
to this, we feel very far away from the hustle of the city,
even though the North Shore Shopping Mall is only a mile
away.
The immediate neighborhoods, industry, and
commercial districts which border the site are conveniently
hidden by the thick climax forests which border the edges
of the site.
The site was studied for a complete year during all four
seasons.
It goes through considerable seasonal
transformations:
views tend to open up when the trees lose
their leaves; the textural surfaces of the trees become
more frame-like while expansive ground "waves" become even
more apparent during the winter.
The site ponds are full
during spring and early summer, while being almost empty by
the time winter arrives.
21
THE FELTON FARM 1650
THE SEA OF GRASS
22
The study of the site was primarily focused on how one
moves through it following its natural gravity, the sense
of passage and enclosure, and identifiable qualities of
light which contribute to its cohesiveness and variety.
A
summary of principles and patterns which are relevant to
our compositional theories of continuance and prolongation
were identified:
1. Despite its expansive, scaleless nature, the site can
be reduced to foreground:
particular isolated places.
These places tend to occur at the bottom of the hills
near the forest or actually within forest paths which
open up intermediately near the main north pond, areas
of water runoff, and low places between land "wave
peaks."
Middleground areas were identified as places of
transition which are part of both larger perceptual
catchments and more intimate places defined above as
foreground.
Middleground portions tended to be like
larger (120'
x 40')
outdoor districts with views
limited on one side by the planar edges of the forest.
Sometimes these places are occupied by roads or
footpaths.
Certain middleground districts function as
entrances from larger background regions to other
background regions.
A good example of this is the area
around the two large maple trees which form a dominant
gate between the main orchard and the small north
orchard at the bottom of the hill.
PEAR TREES
23
Larger background districts tend to be defined
exclusively by the forest's edge perimeter and
connections with views beyond the boundaries of the
site proper.
Quite often they are the higher places on
the land and rarely have any particularized features
which one can focus on.
The background is affected
mostly by topology and the thematic of the apple
orchards.
2. The apple orchards follow the contours of the site
along a general east-west axis.
The trees are planted
very regularly, and if the channels between the trees
are followed they tend to mark the public access to the
whole site because there is little change of elevation
along these paths.
If one follows a diagonal path
between successive rows of trees one quickly and
comfortably enters into more remote areas of the site
that are less public and soon dissolve into the nooks
and crannies at the edge of the forest at the bottom of
the hill.
Thus, the relationship of paths taken with
respect to the hill and the apple trees is crucial to
the qualitative change of the land as.it is perceived.
3. Because the site is north-sloping, the trees almost
always become intermediate filters between the sun and
the observer.
This is one way in which the trees and
the sunlight reinforce each other's dramatic presence.
There are a variety of light intensities and textures.
Light falls upon the wavy terrain in soft patterns, or
in highly contrasting frame-like patterns from behind
angling tree trunks and branches.
The general lack of
light in the forest makes the brief openings or light
"slots" extremely vivid.
light is stronger.
Higher up on the plateau the
There is a continuous sense of
transparent textural variety to be found here.
24
RUNOFF
DISTRICTS
25
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BROOKSBT FARM
26
An Excursion through the Existing Site
1
Arrival at the top of a plateau along Felton St.
2
The Felton Farm.
3
Along the gardens of the Felton residence.
4
Panorama at the east ridge.
5
Easing down to a notch between two forests.
6
Young apple tree and a staccato of conifers.
7
The gate between two maple trees.
8
Willows and shrubs at the edge of the forest.
9
Strawberry fields to the right of a small hill.
10
An ocean of grass.
11
Another orchard, only two long rows of pear trees.
12
Slip down a small opening into the forest.
13
Arrival at a long meadow.
14
The north pond lit by the bright sun emerges on the
left.
27
15
Follow the meadow to its end marked by a birch.
16
Enter another orchard.
17
Exit into a winding path that opens and closes.
18
Go down to the left to an opening, a small brook.
19
Continue over a slight rise as the path opens up again.
20
Arrival at steep orchard in the shade.
21
Climb up to the edge of a ridge back to the sun.
22
View the expansive orchard.
23
Follow the edge of the forest's highest trees.
Z4
Fifteen rows of apple trees.
25
Reach the top of the plateau, completing the excursion.
BROOKSBY EDGE
BROOKSBY
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36
The Violin Sonata
The initial layers of the sonata for violin were inspired
by the moods, contours, and temporal qualities of the
landscape.
Music was a method of getting directly at the
subjective experiences of the land.
Lengths, weights,
articulation, and texture actually came after the much
simpler and shorter "basic shapes" --
the motifs and
harmonies which comprised the first impressions of the
landscape as it was experienced in movement.
In essence a
"background" was abstracted and transformed through process
into the minimum musical materials of the sonata.
These
basic motifs have a few easily describable characteristics:
A$Jth2d7.
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37
SURFACES
MIDDLE GROUND
BACKGROUND
SITE SECTION
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The sonata is a tonal work, that is,
its system of
construction is always related to structural
references, such as
the triad of the "tonic" key
D-major.
~
?""
""
~--
-==
Typical progressions follow the natural tunings of the
violin up and down the scale symmetrically in a kind of
wave form:
I-III-V-II-III-V-I or I-IV-V-I.
What is
important to understand is that these are very typical
progressions for tonal music of all types and do not
limit a sonata's overall form or its style.
Harmony is
simply a series of related magnitudes that are
connected with ease -- the mortar and brick of tonal
music from rock and roll to Beethoven.
Themes are based on contrasting kinds of spaces:
such
as large slow themes which progress gradually by
sharping a note or flatting a note, creating a change
of direction with dissonant notes;
which descend
long flowing themes
(like the slope of the Brooksby Site);
and highly articulated themes which move moderately and
are highly repetitious.
a;
39
#- -
The motifs and their respective harmonic progressions
are just a starting point.
Through elaboration,
"stretching" inversions, mirrored themes, repeats and
reversals ---
all describable as procedural techniques
musical variation and contrast are made and the
sonata starts to grow durationally.
At this point the compositional process not only
interprets the landscape but begins to overlay new
extraneous references.
These are harmonies and shapes
which are not predicted by the initial themes.
They
start to define special places, much like architecture
when it begins to move beyond a given program of
functional
LA
organization.
120 e.
UP THE DIAGONAL
40
The Movements of the Sonata and Approximate Durations
I. "The Orchard" --
introduction
variations
development
recapitulation
1A &V04'Von: /j Ps0
4/4
largo
vivace
presto
vivace
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ir
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THE GATE
42
II.
"The Spinning Wheel" --
6/8 and 2/4
dolce-allegro
allegro
free composition
development
allegro
presto
canon
arpeggio
DOP.
L42/A4*G~4.1
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it
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III. "The Pond" --
6/8 and 3/4
exposition
andante
development
allegro
suite
moderato
recapitulation
presto
coda
ndt
66'
A-AC'
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46
THE LIVING MUSEUM
SITE
47
Program for a
"Living Museum"
The building complex is
seen as an invitation to
Brooksby Farm and as a
suburban extension of
Boston's existing artist
community.
The site is
huge, almost scaleless,
and seems to require manmade intervention and
demarcation of its
nuances.
The project is
a "living museum"
for
visual artists, dancers,
musicians, writers, and
others who seek the
spiritual reflection and
creative concentration
that can be found in such
a setting.
The project
is also a place to
view the products of
the semi-permanent
artist/residents;
a
multi-purpose facility
accommodates concerts,
and exhibitions.
48
The Architecture
The architecture of the artist community is closely tied to
The architecture is an
the nuances of the site as it is.
elaboration of characteristics already found in the
landscape --
in effect the architecture becomes simply
another voice accompanying the landscape. The architecture
follows and leads the landscape in several important ways:
The buildings are concentrated at places where overlap
already occurs in the landscape.
Buildings and the
paths between them occupy the edges between larger
"background" territories and the smaller "foreground"
territories.
This is particularly true of the
exhibition and performance spaces which introduce the
public to the artist retreat.
The public buildings are directionally aligned to the
natural public access down the slope of the hill and
perpendicular to Felton Road which is the main East-West
access into the entire site.
Felton Road is the primary
reference direction because it follows the dominant
ridge of Mount Pleasant.
Entrances to the main public
buildings occur in the same direction, at the troughs of
the wave contours.
Auxiliary buildings, such as the guest hostel, the
workshop, and the artist apartments, tend to follow the
given geometries of the forest-field edges which are at
relatively equal elevations.
This tends to connect
these more private buildings with one another while also
framing the forest and maximizing the sunlight into the
dwellings.
49
Site walls and ground forms are long continuous elements
which provide "background" definitions to the site as a
The most private and secluded buildings are positioned
deep in the forested areas of the site; the studios are
thus embedded into the small openings we call
"foreground."
whole.
slopes and give both lines of reference to structural
They are readily accessible from existing
goals in the landscape such as entries into more
paths which penetrate the forests and punctuate the
unarticulated textural hiss of the forest.
They generally follow the fall-line of the
secluded sections along the forest edges at the bottom
The studios
The site walls also.provide local
are highly dispersed within the site and are rather
of the main orchards.
self-contained "treehouses" which are lifted up into the
surfaces for the apple trees to be read, and stopping
air above the forest floor to exemplify the individual
places to view sculptures and rest while one climbs back
and meditative nature of the artistic work which will
out of more remote parts of the site to Felton Road.
transpire within them.
an artist community
HOUSING AND WORKSHOP
J310
:IPA .
i
I;a
I-
4pp
1 10 1 -
i
0
.
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Ogqf!!4--
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1.4 1
F-..,OoL;l
50
VIA
in
Outlines of the Architectural Procedure
The working methods used to design the architecture were
Below is
very similar to those used to compose the sonata.
a brief outline of the typical procedures which were
deployed in the details and larger groupings of the design:
1. Identify the functions and relationships of the parts.
2. Quantify capacities and magnitudes of the parts.
3.
4.
Engage parts in a spacial sequence.
Modify parts to be continuous with neighboring elements.
5. Define large background themes and factors supporting
continuance.
6. Intensify and prolong individual elements.
7. Prolong connections and transitions.
8. Assert differences between parts through contrasting
structures and volumes.
9. Recycle through the procedure.
Preliminary Space Requirements
20 artist studio-apartments...............
1 sculpture workshop........................
20, 000 sq. ft.
1,600 sq. ft.
1 multi-purpose performance room
(seat 200).....................
........
2,000 sq. ft.
1 main kitchen and storage................
2,000 sq. ft.
1 common dining hall (seats 50)...........
1,200 sq. ft.
5 guest rooms.............................
1,500 sq. ft.
Visitor galleries.........................
2,000 sq. ft.
Restrooms.................................
1,000 sq. ft.
Outdoor sculpture/meditation zones........
Site walls, frames, stairs, and extensive
landscape intervention..,.......
........
Approximately 30,000 sq. ft.
52
2.'
2
SCULPTURE
0I...
-.
NK.
PERFORMANCE
ARTIST HOUSING
STUDIOS .IN THE TREES
V
K
N
jt~
-H
SOUTH
04
16
WORKSHOP
SITE PLAN
80
r020SOUTH
STUDIOS IN THE TREES
53
ECTION A-A
\
EXHIBITION
EFRFORMANCE
RESTRAURANT
0
-c--
7
-C-D
-
'I/B-
54
ABOUT COMPOSING
"Die Gottheit ist im
Werdenden und sich
Verwandelnden
aber nicht
im Gewordenen und
Erstarrten."
Goethe zu Ekermann
13.2.1829
55
ENTRANCE
56
Relations of Events
When an artistic work
-
has total coherence,
the work's capacity for
communication and
interpretation takes on
a profound character.
'
Our perceptions are
id*,
S-
continuously altered and
modified by our thought
and intuition.
Thus, it
is our psycho-physical
engagement with art which
enhances the work itself.
There is no subject or
object in the experience
of art, only "events"
which can be grouped in
relationship to each
other.
The makers, the
mediums, and the
interpreters play
5M
essential roles in the
generation of events.
C,
57
A most challenging possibility in composition is finding a
way to relate different, even contradictory "events" to
each other, and to make the overall experience of a
composition accessible to the interpreters.
Compositions of any type must somehow relate parts to
wholes.
This is a subjective activity and cannot be
objectified, though the content of composition might be
referring to objects like:
"the red apple."
Both music
and architecture are "sign events" that incorporate to
varying degrees the different types of signs as outlined by
Max Bense in Zeichen und Design.
Our study is not about
semiotics, but a brief consideration of this theory may
help define the general problems of intelligent groupings.
58
A Summary of Max Bense's
KOMMUNIKATION
(M)
Theory of Signs
(0)
Information
Semiotic/aesthetic schema
z
(I)
Transformation
SEMIOTISCHES SCHEMA
consist of three aspects
which make a sign as part
of a "communication
canal":
the object
(information) "O",
agent
the
(communicative
medium) "M",
Generativer Graph
thetischer Graph
and
degenerativer Graph
-M-O
M-0-1
1-0-M
the interpreter
(transformation) 'I".
0
0LI
The object is
semiotically related to
the interpreter as:
Sign
Type
Transformation
Symbol dicenti
Value
+ or -
Index
argument always +
Icon
rhema
4, + or -
Sign Examples
(a Rolls Royce !+ rich)
(a name, which is definite)
(the cross, which for some
means Christ)
There are three types of
sign processes:
M -> 0 ->
I
a generated
position
I -> M ->
0
a thetic
process
I -> 0 -> M a degenerative process
(rock becomes tool which is used
by "I")
("I" thinks, makes "M" to
mean "0")
("I"
sees
"O"11
as "M")
59
Bense's discussion differentiates components of a
communication system into specific roles and positions.
His theories demonstrate to us why artistic mediums are
different semiotically, and he categorically includes the
agent
"M" (means of transmission) as a viable member
between the traditional Aristotelian duality of "subjectobject."
Composition is accepted as a form of information,
as we see it;
what follows is that composition is a
Large signs can be
multiple-valued communicative process.
"over-determined" by a synthesis of many smaller signs as
transmitted through the agent and transformed by the
interpreter.
G. Guenther, an authority on cybernetic process, refers to
such over-determined systems as "poly-contextuality."
We
believe that music and open-ended architecture are vivid
examples of this type of complexity.
Guenther says,
that "if something is,
It implies, as
it must have order
and if it appears as chaos, it only means that we have not
yet found the code...."
Complexity in compositional terms
must not be misconstrued- as formal complexity, but rather
as a "nexus" of non-hierarchical relationships which can be
answered by different interpreters
and possibly!
I.e.,
(subjects) as yes, no,
A > B, B > A, and A = B can be true
at the same time, because of a "poly-context," which is
defined as a multitude of interpretations by subjects
Thus, Aristotelian logic is
Sn.
expanded to include many subjects which take different
S1 , 32, S3 ,
...
,
positions with respect to an object(s).
In this study we
refer to "poly-contextuality" as one or more "events."
60
"The temporal processes
in much of Beethoven's
music are ones in which
revolution is possible if
'revolution' means
actualizing a future that
is not mechanically
determined by the past
and does not flow easily
from human decisions, but
that can be summoned only
through a momentous
struggle, yet is
nevertheless profoundly
related to the past.
In
many of his pieces, the
wealth of unusual
features makes continuity
as well as fulfillment
something that only an
enormous exertion can
achieve. The more the
future has previously
been unimagined and the
more profoundly and
comprehensively Beethoven
seeks to relate the
future to its past, the
more violent is this
struggle.
Without such a
struggle, continuity
would evidently not be
achieved, and events that
are surprising would also
seem arbitrary."
SONATE
9~j
-.p
P--
A Mii
Se
David B. Greene,
Temporal Process in
Beethoven's Music
p. 7
STEIN AM
RHEIN
61
"Bach's music is an aural
image of Newtonian time.
In the Newtonian worldview, the totality of
material entities
constitutes a universe in
the sense that they all
operate according to
the same laws which
exhaustively explain
their behavior. The
location, mass, and
velocity of every entity
at any given time is a
function of the location,
mass, and velocity of all
entities at the previous
If one.
instant of time.
knows the laws of motion,
as Isaac Newton believed
he did, and if one knew
the location, mass, and
velocity of all particles
at any one time, as
Newton did not believe he
did, then one could move
either forward or
backward in time and
describe definitively
these parameters at all
other times. Although
things may happen that
are not predicted,
nothing that is in
principle unpredictable,
if one had sufficient
The
data, can happen.
pattern of change is
fixed and constant.?
David B. Greene,
Temporal Process in
Beethoven's Music
p. 7
62
Music and architecture
have a lot in common.
They are both physically
perceived.
They both
order temporal sequence.
Most importantly they
reflect a sublime world;
both purposefully
organize sensual
experiences and inspire
human interpretation and
7
Le Corbuster ofoa -Mk.e
participation.
VJF
ViYI
willB
17 Z.
XVZ
7
1
LX I
42
1
z7
4(Z
"Architecture is judged
by eyes that see, by
the head that turns,
and the legs that walk.
Architecture is not a
synchronic phenomenon but
a successive one, made up
of pictures adding
themselves one to the
other, following each
other in time and space,
like music."
I4
F. GIORGI
Le Corbusier,
The Modulor
P. 73
MORTITZBURG,
G. MAHLER, 4TH SYMPHONY
63
"In the application of
form, music can achieve
results which are beyond
the reach of painting.
But painting is ahead
of music in several
particulars. Music, for
example, has at its
disposal duration of
time; while painting can
present to the spectator
the whole content of its
message at one moment.
Music, which is outwardly
unfettered by nature,
needs no external form
for its expression.
Painting is still almost
exclusively dependent on
natural forms and
Its business
phenomena.
is now to test its
strength and means, to
know itself, as music has
done for a long time, and
then to use its powers in
a truly painterly way, to
a creative end."
Sechs Bagatellen far Streichquartett
A~
eevdMuig
gt
I
(j.C0ao,
iieder.migd.c.o
Anton Webarn,
Op.
9
rit.
0
PA17-
-E
0r
by UnEvi
aw.ed 19-4
A~ylb
IBSZby Anl.n Wb...*
C-lg-
Ul.,.ta.
Wassily Kandinsky,
Concerning the Spiritual
in Art
p. 40
w
KANDINSKY
64
8
All* .ag...,s. vnrtwdrl
tsal
Erbe.
MinJ...
.
7575
-
"Repetition as Creator of
Form: The principle of
repetition, once
successfully applied to
the understanding of the
microcosm of musical
composition, now could be
applied on a larger scale
as well. For if the
significance of a small
series of tones results
clearly only after it has
been repeated, it should
seem plausible that a
series of such small
series would also
acquire individuality and
meaning by way of simple
repetition.
This is the
origin of the two-part
form a:a;
or,
more
exactly, a:a2."
Heinrich Schenker,
Harmony
p. 9
BERNINNI,
R + D THUT, MUNICH BY WOLFGANG
65
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iw~t
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k..
O vLWA
XAJ
SOUA.&s
/ 4..14 iLJA
Mi,
±sN '.ra
g 1. 3M
A44f~
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_h',
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PAczv1
-yG'$
.'CwrO
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ezxaOr
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krr
A~dC/-m4rnj
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66
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k
CONCLUSION
Translating and Combining Landscape, Music, and
Architecture
The literal translation from one medium to another is not
possible; even if it were it is not valuable or relevant
because their forms are different. Nonetheless we think
making descriptive comparisons is a fruitful working
method.
Composing in layers and with movement in mind is
useful because it illustrates and inspires a way of
thinking which is common to all art forms. Making
comparisons between different compositional processes has
helped us clarify and define our activities relative to the
specific discipline of compositions which we are working
in. Making connections between distinct forms of
expression is difficult and at times confusing, but a great
deal can be learned in the process....-
67
00
ftjui "
THE AUTHOR, BY C.W. CASEWIT
69
Architecture is
not
"frozen music"
In time
as they are received by
the instruments of our
senses,
space is made.
When we dwell on the land
music is released;
we feel motion and
change.
A conversation,
spinning curves
sliding lines
which we make together
Between Silence
You and Me
17
70
Q..
(C
0
H4
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74
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,
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Edgerton, Harold E., Moments of Vision, The MIT Press,
Cambridge, Mass., and London, England, 1979.
Kandinsky, Wassily, Concerning the Spiritual in Art,
Bauhaus Books, New York, 1966.
,
Point and Line to Plane, Bauhaus Books, Dessau,
1926.
Klee, P.,
Thinking Eye, Lund Humphries, London, 1957.
Kuhn, Thomas S., The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,
The Univ-ersity of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1970.
Malinowski, Bronislaw, A Scientific Theory of Culture, The
University of North Carolina Press, 1944, Sixth
Printing, 1973.
Maur, Karin V., Von Klang der Bilder, Prestel Verlag,
Munchen, 1985.
Preziosi, D., Architecture, Language and Meaning, MIT
Press, Cambridge, 1977.
Rossi, A., The Architecture of the City, MIT Press,
Cambridge, 1985.
Rowe, Colin, Collage City, MIT Press, Cambridge, 1970.
Scruton, R., The Aesthetics of Architecture, Princeton
Univ. Press, Princeton, 1979.
Weatley, P.,
Levels of Space Awareness, Ekistics 523, Dec.
1976.
Xenakis, I.,
Art/Science Alloys, Pendragon Press, N.Y.,
1983.
76
APPENDIX
The following pages illustrate significant features found
in all forms of composition and also natural phenomena
which apply to and describe kinetic compositional form.
By kinetic form we mean patterns which imply movement
or are experienced while moving through a composition.
Traditionally kinematics is defined as 3x/at -of a body changes with respect to time":
"position x
this is velocity.
We mean not only velocity of physical movement but also the
velocity of perception which is a psychological movement.
It was necessary to develop notation that resembles both
musical and architectural patterns.
Many aspects of
composition would best be illustrated by the actual
notations in scores and drawings used in the respective
fields.
But an attempt is made here to simply diagram what
these features are in order to aid comparison.
This is a
two-dimensional representation of what actually occurs in
many dimensions.
Mathematical equations describing the
physics and the geometry of compositional patterns are
included to aid further study.
77
Gestures
= A X
A--/\/ f(x)
shape
loudness
weight
density
texture
~_
I
W
~t
_
brightness
color and pitch
d\J\.N4
v
dB = 10
F = ma
d = m/V
t = uN
B = I/A
f =c A
+
A
1 Xn-1
+
o 10( 1)
Demarcations
upbeat
initiation
convergence
af(t)/at > 0
= at t o
f (t)
___
___
if
-
an
lim an = 0
n +-
and
0
divergence
allision
consonance
dissonance
closure
lim an *
and
I an
0
n +w
, b) and (c.d) and a < b,
b > c , d > c, d > b
1:2, 2:3, 3:4. 4:5
5:6, 6:7,U-an n - 1/n, n > 6
( t /at < 0
if
4
9
Sli =
9
p,-
-~~~
-af(t)
af
Layers
surface
fU f(xy) 3t
where
0
middle ground
background
sonority
78
_ V(xyz):f(t)
_______..____
V(x y za):f(t)
S:fft) U A = V
+
VM
A = (xy)
Registration
point
line
p(x)
L(xy),
(b
4
plane
f(x)
A(xy)
= mx
+ b
f(x) ax
=
a
b
V(xyz)
volume
Ax
=
ax
Voice Overlaps
imitation|
Va=
alternation
retrograde
--
3w
Vb
V = (-1 )Vb
sin Va = cos(Vb
inversion
-
nVa
n
+
7T)
n
00
-
ew
b
??? (field theories?)
stretto
Relative Proportions
arithmetic
geometric
harmonic
Note:
b = (a + c)/2
ac
b
b = 2ac/(a + b)
See relative scale and harmonic series, page 81_
79
The Correlation between Pitch and Relative Scale
Calculations based on human hearing thresholds reveal that
audible wavelengths are comparable to very significant
limits of human body sizes and also "social"* scales of
perception.
The normal human ear can hear a range of tones:
fr = 16 Hz to about 20,000 Hz
Calculating the wavelength:
Ar
[Al'Ah]
c/fr = Ar
(at 15 0 C)
c = speed of sound = 340 m/s
Al
=
340/16
=
21.25 m
69.7 ft
(long wave = low frequency)
Ah = 340/20,000 = 0.017 m
0.66 in.
(short wave = high frequency)
The long wavelength (69.7 ft) is a close approximation to
the upper limits of social transactional space:
it is
about the maximum distance from which we can recognize
a person's facial expression visually.
The shorter.
wavelength is an important but minimal hand-size dimension.
Another example is not quite as surprising but just as
significant.
Our most sensitive hearing response threshold
is about 3500 Hz.
Its wavelength is about 3.8 in. --
this
is about the distance between our eyes.
We conclude that sonic dimensions are equivalent to
intimate visual dimensions.
Longer "landscape-sized"
dimensions are of course still perceivable to our eyes,
while our ears can no longer hear such large wavelengths.
80
"Use size" --
Scale I
Melody!
- -A
I &F
I
"Room size"
parts!
Inner
--
Scale II
IZZ2dP
I
Xr
.42
"Building sizes"
I'
N
El "T M CD0
C)
--
u
00
CO
L
C
Cfl\
1,0
N .......
1 C LrI .
(Y) M
0
ni
CN
C)
Scale III
Found structure!
Overtone Series
fundamental = fn
1
n = series
+
n=1
exact multiples:
fn = D 7 3 Hz,
harmonic (1/n)A, geometric nf
lowest "'D" we can hear
a series in degrees
=
tan~l(An+l/x)
The Series
n
fn (Hz)
A/n (ft)
Scale
1
73
146
15.4
7.7
5.13
3.85
3.08
2.6
2.2
1.9
1.7
1.5
1 *4
1.28
1.18
1.1
1.02
0.96
I
2
3
4
5
6
7*
8
9
10
292
584
11
12*
13*
14*
15
16
1168
II octaves!
*Only approx.
I8
V
I16
III
V
=.-
I
:V
|
*~
,,,
,t
*
.
q
*
*-
1
a I
1.
/*
/"''''
Iv
j
II
III
viiI*
V.
vi
vii
I32
tones of temp. scale.
81
Proportions of the 12-Tone Scale
Quotient* Major
1/1
16/15
10/9
9/8
6/5
5/4
4/3
45/32
3/2
8/5
5/3
9/5
15/8
2/1
Key:
-
1
1/2
2
II
3
III
4
IV
V
6
VI
7
VII
VIII
Minor
-
Scale Step
Tone
Half
Small whole
Large whole
Small third
Large third
Fourth
Large fourth
Fifth
Small sixth
Large sixth
Small seventh
Large seventh
Octave
1.00
1.06
1.11
1.125
1.20
1.25
1.33
1.40
1.50
1.60
1.66
1.80
1.875
2.00
1/$
$/2
1.00
0.94
0.90
0.88
0.83
0.80
0.75
0.71
0.66
0.62
0.60
0.55
0.53
0.50
0.50
0.53
0.55
0.60
0.62
0.66
0.71
0.75
0.80
0.83
0.88
0.90
0.94
1.00
$ = reference to Tonic I
1/$ = interval below Tonic (inversion)
$/2 = reference to Octave (Tonic)
Other categories:
$/1.5 = intervalic reference to fifth
above Tonic
$/1.33 = intervalic reference to fourth
above Tonic
Quotient always relative to tonic and the particular
interval above.
TONIC 1/1
OCTAVE 1/2
82
FIFTH 3/2
FOUR 3/4
Average Common Durational Dimensions of Movement
Dim. Ft.
27r(1 800)
27r(1600)
Slow Walk
(1 mph)
Fast Walk
(3 mph)
(264 fpm)
= 11,309
= 10,053
3200
2400
1800
1200
600
500
400
300
200
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
25
20
15
10
6
(88
fpm)
128
14
36
27
20
13
7
5
4
43 min.
38
12
9
6.8
4.5
2.3
1.9
1.5
1.13
0.75
0.375
0.33
3
2
1
1
Meditational Walk
(0.5 mph)
(44
min.
5
6
0
7
5
4
25
12
0
fpm)
257 min.
228
72
54
41
27
13 .6
11 .4
9 .1
6 .8
4 .5
2 .25
2 .0
1 .8
1 .00
1 .36
1 .13
no longer relevant
these become program dimensions
(see below)
Program Durations
Number of
People
Clock Time
Max.
Min.
Studio/work
Living
Sculpture garden
Performance
Exhibit
Eating
Walking
Reading
Party
1 hrs
4 hrs
? hrs
1 hrs
1 hrs
0.5 hrs
4 hrs
4 hrs
1 hrs
4
8
1
2
2
1
1
2
4
hrs
hrs
hrs
hrs
hrs
hrs
hrs
hrs
hrs
Min.
Max.
2+
2+
4+
200+
200+
50+
5
5
10
300+
300+
100
6
4
100
3+
2+
50+
83
4-
LIBRARY OF ST. GALLEN
84
"he
3m'
v-
-
-.
Ep
W
'~
LIBRARY OF ST. GALLEN, SWISS NAT. TOURIST OFFICE, 1986
85