When does a sentiment become an architectural concept? Otherness in Hejduk's Wall House 2

摘要

When we talk about architectural design we often draw a distinction between what is designed and how it is designed. The object of design can then be recognised as of a given function type, such as a house, while the manner of design can be treated in terms of style or design idiom. In some cases, however, the manner of design leads us to intuit that more is at stake than style, at least if by style we mean a particular set of formal and compositional principles that can be applied to a variety of designs. A design can communicate a specific idea or feeling over and above satisfying the requirements associated with a function type or a style. Such is the case with 'otherness' as it applies to the design of Hejduk's Wall House 2. In the overall work of Hejduk, otherness is a sentiment explicitly evoked when he speaks of his understanding of works of architecture as well as works in other media, most notably painting. It is also a sentiment implicitly embedded in his poems. This paper discusses otherness as an idea that permeates the design of Wall House 2 so systematically that we can treat it as an architectural concept. Thus, what follows is a case study in the broader question of how a poetic insight, or feeling, that may originate in a variety of media can be transformed into an architectural design concept and be communicated as specifically architectural poetic sense. By implication, the relation between poetic insight and the inherent logic of the symbolic media in which it is expressed is fundamental to the argument.