
Architecture in Dialogue with an Activated Ground
Unreasonable Creatures
Urs Bette (Author)
Series: Design Research in Architecture
Architecture in Dialogue with an Activated Ground sets out to validate the role of the unreasonable in the design process.
Using case study projects, architect Urs Bette gives an insight into the epistemological processes of his creative practice, and unveils the strategies he deploys in order to facilitate the poetic aspects of architecture within a discourse whose evaluation parameters predominantly involve reason. Themes discussed include the emergence of space from the staged opposition between the architectural object and the site, and the relationship between emotive cognition and analytic synthesis in the design act. In both cases, there is a necessary engagement with forms of ‘unreasonable’ thought, action or behaviours.
By arguing for the usefulness and validity of the unreasonable in architecture, and by investigating the performative relationship between object and ground, Bette contributes to the discourse on extensions, growth and urban densification that tap into local histories and voices, including those of the seemingly inanimate – the architecture itself and the ground it sits upon – to inform the site-related production of architectural character and space. In doing so, he raises debates about the values pursued in design approval processes, and the ways in which site-relatedness is both produced and judged.
Foreword
Introduction
Coinage
Personal
Austrian
Angewandte
Mentors
Modes
Unreasonable
Analytic
Agents
Characters
Space
Ground
Case Study
Speculative
Built
Experimental
Teaching
Conclusion
Appendix
Bibliography
Index
DOI: 10.14324/111.9781787357228
Number of pages: 246
Number of illustrations: 250
Publication date: 30 March 2020
PDF ISBN: 9781787357228
Read Online ISBN: 9781787357228
Paperback ISBN: 9781787357235
Urs Bette (Author)
Urs Bette is Senior Lecturer at the University of Adelaide and Director of Urs Bette : Design. He holds a Masters degree in Architecture from the University of Applied Arts, Vienna, and a PhD from RMIT University Melbourne. His design works have been shown at the Architectural Biennale Venice, the AEDES Architecture Gallery Berlin and the FRAC Centre Orléans. His research investigates the role of ‘the unreasonable’ in the design process, revealing strategies that facilitate the poetics of architecture within a professional discourse dominated by expectations of quantifiable performance.
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