Models, architecture, levitation: design-based research into post-secular architecture

摘要

Architects theorise their work through the practices of writing and drawing, but they largely ignore theorisation of, or through the architectural model. Whilst architectural drawings are often discussed in relation to ideas, architectural models are more likely to be discussed in relation to matter. The division between intellectual and material aspects of architecture can be traced back to the Italian Renaissance when architectural labour became associated with intellectual rather than manual labour. Architectural models have tended to escape theoretical consideration because they have been associated with matter, manual labour and craft, and therefore dissociated from the intellectual. With reference to mediaeval models of divinity, the paper discusses how the mind was considered superior to matter because it permitted access to the spiritual. Whilst we live in a predominantly secular age where the spiritual dimension itself is suspect, the supremacy of the intellectual is maintained. With reference to a levitating architectural model constructed by the author, the paper discusses how the strategy of design by making challenges the hierarchy of the intellectual over the material by adopting an embodied approach. Furthermore it examines how the division and dissociation between spiritual and material dimensions might be rethought through the notion of 'ensoulment'.