paranoid critical postmodernism, surrealism and architecture

Towards a Paranoid Critical Postmodernism

Ross Kelly Postgraduate Diploma Architecture University of Westminster 2011

CONTENTS:

Abstract

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Introduction

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Villa Dall’Ava’s ambition.

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Freud to Dali, their influence on post modernism

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The Paranoid-Critical Method

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Manhattanism was flawed modernist commentary neglecting to recognise scale.

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Postscript: introduction for New Research ‘The Contemporary City’ Rem Koolhaas

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Surrealism and Architecture, Villa Dall’Ava; beautiful musings

Investigating applied ideologies

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Looking at Dominique Boudet’s adventure through the ‘Kunsthal’

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Conclusion

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Abstract In examining the relationship between Surrealism and Architecture it may be useful to examine surrealisms application as an ideology for architectural gestures and whether the narrative is readily discernible to the visitor and the more habitual user once the project has reached completion. If once implemented or realised, will the programme still have a rational outcome, conducive to intentions; will a house be a home? As a method of examination I’d like to look at the early work of OMA and Rem Koolhaas, a motivation generated from images I came across at a recent Surrealism exhibition in the Barbican. Images of a giraffe conversing with Villa Dall’Ava in Paris, a project commissioned prior to OMA’s first build.

Introduction Villa Dall’Ava was commissioned in the early 80s by Dominique Boudet and his wife. The design required both a home for his family, but further more, to add something to the world of architecture. Rem Koolhaas and OMA, an office at that time in London, were contracted despite the fact that they had no completed buildings. Koolhaas had recently published ‘Delirious New York’ and still has a wonderful relationship with the Architectural Association in London.

In ‘Delirious New York’, published in 1978, Koolhaas attempts to describe the chaotic history which generated New York City as we know it, the book also explains Dali’s ‘Paranoid Critical Method’ as a method to discredit Le Corbusier and puritan European modernism’s attitudes towards the city. His argument dissipated by the 90s. By which time, Koolhaas began to consider Corbusier’s modernism as having not yet exhausted its possibilities.

Given the varying allegiances of Koolhaas’ criticism of modernism, a strategy which would always appear to embody to some degree, surreal ideologies, it’s important to understand the origins of surrealism. Such surreal ideologies which would later come to have a direct effect on the direction postmodernism took in the late 70 and early 80.

By looking at OMA’s earlier projects, Villa Dall’Ava in Paris and the ‘Kunsthal’ in Rotterdam, I would like to discuss their generating ideas and the merits of adopting such ideologies. Does the addition of a certain ornament and a curious organisation offer an improvement to the Corbusian machine for living?

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Villa Dall’Ava’s ambition.

The villa is situated on a hill which slopes steeply toward the Seine, the Bois de Boulogne, and the city of Paris, in the residential area of Saint Cloud - a neighbourhood characterised by 19th century houses in a classical "Monet" landscape.

The client wanted a glass house with a swimming pool on the roof and two separate "apartments" - one for the parents, the other for the daughter. They also wanted a panoramic view - from their swimming pool - of the surrounding landscape and the city of Paris.

The site is like a big room, with a boundary made of greenery, garden walls and slopes. It is composed of three parts: a sloping garden, the main volume of the villa, the street level garage with access in a cavity.

The house is conceived as a glass pavilion containing living and dining areas, with two hovering, perpendicular apartments shifted in opposite directions to exploit the view. They are joined by the swimming pool which rests on the concrete structure encased by the glass pavilion.1 “It started really in the mid 60s, what we wanted to achieve with my wife and my daughter was not to have a house, that’s very simple, but try to do something for architecture” 2 From the outset the ambition for this project had the perfect architect’s brief, albeit, the ultimate request of any architecture? Of course and of the utmost importance, the aim for the project was to build a house, but furthermore the client, Dominique Boudet N1 and his wife Didi DallAva, wanted above all else to have a building which offered something to the world of architecture. From the outset the couple wanted to pay respect to modernism and in fact visited several Le Corbusier Villas for inspiration, a journey which began with a visit to Villa Savoye and paid reference to his five points of architecture. The investigation also included visits to Palladian villas and on visiting Villa Emo the couple decided to begin their adventure. An adventure which drew from the impact of such Modernist and Palladian projects, yet realised the necessity of a postmodern gesture. The project began with acquiring a site while at the same time the search for an architect began. It was a search aided by the nature of Dominique Boudet’s career.

N1 Dominique Boudet; background in law and management, devoted most of his career to journalism, mainly as chief editor of ‘Le Moniteur’ construction weekly and of ‘AMC’ a monthly architecture magazine.

Boudet today works as an architecture consultant for public and private clients.

“It was no good for my feeling, so then I decided to go abroad” 3 after three architects and three bad experiences Boudet visited the offices of Rem Koolhaas in London. Aware of some of his work, only drawings, no build, on reflection and the return to Paris, Koolhaas was hired. A justified decision, as who better to hire to design a building to impact the world of architecture than a celebrated author and university academic whose work paid reference 13

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to modernism, realised its shortcomings and offered an Avant-garde opinion on architecture’s development.

Curiously, and considering Kant, the project in terms of architecture would be beautiful as the opinion of Koolhaas’ work had been set in motion by his academic career prior to building anything.

“Taste is the faculty of judging of an object or a method of representing it by an entirely disinterested satisfaction or dissatisfaction. The object of such satisfaction is called beautiful. An object of an entirely disinterested satisfaction must be grounded on what he can presuppose in every other person; attributing a similar satisfaction to everyone” .4

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Celebrated author of ‘Delirious New York’, Koolhaas’ book concludes with the implementation of the research contained in its earlier chapters. Within articulate hypothetical projects, or as Koolhaas terms them ‘totally realistic projects’, Koolhaas’ aim was to embody the research in each proposal. 4 It’s the Roosevelt Island project I’d like to pay particular reference to. In a 1976 lecture given at the A.A. and prior to the release of ‘Delirious New York’, Koolhaas suggests that the success of the proposal is taking the island out of context from NYC and then floating it a longside Westminster. Essentially taking a tenuously linked island off Manhattan, which maintained the grid and the city block with an obvious detachment and then superimpose its reality within a new context; thus generating a new, yet, believable reality within London. Or, at least this is true at the scale of the city. At the scale Roosevelt Island, the arrangement of disassociated believable occurrences within the design, within the architecture, could be considered beautiful objectified musing. This, coupled with the notion of the scale of the city and superimposing within London, without doubt, pays particular reference to Surrealism, Dali and his ‘Paranoid Critical Method’ a theory covering a substantial part of the ‘Delirious New York’. N2 A notion important to Koolhaas as the Roosevelt proposal is part of the conclusion for ‘Delirious New York’ and surely important to Dominique Boudet as he had become his first client. Potentially problematic as such a decision could be hindered by the economics of realisation and implementation of ideologies. The project may have resulted in something other than a home?

But then again, Boudet did refer to the project as an adventure.

N2 Roosevelt Island, for this demonstration, the Manhattan Grid is extended across the East River to create eight new blocks on the island. At the tip of the island it becomes amphibious, leaving the land to turn into a trottoir on the river, connecting floating attractions too ephemeral to establish themselves on land. ‘Delirious New York’ p301

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Notes 1

OMA website, page URL:

http://www.oma.eu/index.php?option=com_projects&view=project&id=196&Itemid=10

2

Dominique Boudet, OMAs Villa DallAva: A Clients Response, AA lecture, date:

31.01.2007

3

Dominique Boudet, OMAs Villa DallAva: A Clients Response, AA lecture, date:

31.01.2007

4

Rem Koolhaas and Elia ZENGHELIS: OMA, AA lecture, date: 14.03.1976

5

Immanuel Kant, taken form a letter to Marcus Herz, Philosophies of art and beauty,

University of Chicago Press c1964

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Freud to Dali, their influence on post modernism.

I think it’s important to realise that Koolhaas, prior to building Villa DallAva, had no previous completed projects. In essence all Dominique Boudet had to work on as a deciding factor was the work of OMA on paper, both written and through images prepared by the office. While it’s true that the inspiration for the project wasn’t based on surrealism or ‘Delirious New York’, it’s true that the project could never be closer to the research or attitudes. An almost pure academic idea yet to be influenced by the process of economics and realisation? I think to tackle the subject of surrealism I’d like to begin with its origins, with Freud.

The dream-thoughts which we arrive at by means of analysis reveal themselves as a physical complex of the most intricate possible structure. Its portions stand in the most manifold logical relations to one another: they represent foreground and background conditions, digressions and illustrations, chains of evidence and counter-arguments. Each train of thought is almost invariably accompanied by its contradictory counterpart. The material lacks none of the characteristics that are familiar to us from our waking thinking. if now all of this is to be turned into a dream, the physical material will be submitted to a pressure which will condense it greatly, to an internal fragmentation and displacement which will, as it were, create new surfaces, and to a selective operation in favour of those portions of it which are most appropriate for the construction of situations.1 Curiously, if taken out of context the very nature of the production of dreams almost describes the very nature of design. Evaluating foreground and background conditions, digression and illustrations, chains of evidence and counter-arguments are all considerations taken while conceiving design.

Right down to: the physical material will be submitted to a pressure which will condense it greatly, to an internal fragmentation and displacement which will, as it were, create new surfaces, and to a selective operation in favour of those portions of it which are most appropriate for the construction of situations.

If we take into account the genesis of the material, a process of this sort deserves to be described as ‘regression’. In the course of this transformation, however, the logical links which have hitherto held the physical material together are lost. It is only as it were, the substantive content of the dreamthoughts that dream-work takes over and manipulates. The restoration of the connections which the dream-work has destroyed is a task which has to be performed by the work of analysis.2 With Freud publishing such ideas at the beginning of the 19th century, it begins to become clear where the development of surrealism borrowed some ideas. The very notion of taking our experience and due to the pressure 23

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of compression the links sometimes begin to blur or disappear entirely. A seductive invite to attempt to reproduce the unconventional while having full knowledge that we have all experienced such images or situation, despite coming from behind closed doors and the resting unconscious mind. The unconventional distilled from our dull every day lives.

It follows that dream-work is not creative, that it develops no phantasies of its own, that it makes no judgments and draws no conclusions; it has no functions whatever other than condensation and displacement of the material and its modification into pictorial form, to which must be added as a variable factor, the final bit of interpretative revision.3 Of course, artists and authors testing the waters of what is acceptable practice were possibly to surrealisms detriment. Practitioners embraced madness as an almost closer connection to free imagination.

We all know, in fact, that the insane owe their incarceration to a tiny number of legally reprehensible acts and that, were it not for these acts their freedom (or what we see as their freedom) would not be threatened. 4 Surely this motivation would either engross or alienate the reader. Those that enjoy the possibilities offered by new and broken boundaries formed from free ideas, as opposed to, those who prefer that which belongs behind closed doors to remain there. Interestingly the notion of boundaries and place is often an idea explored within surrealism and partially the generating idea for this piece. Place in relation to connection to things, and boundary as a description of appropriate enclosure. With reference to Freud; the compression of life experienced condensed to create new surfaces would surely be the perfect starting point for design. To that end, it would be required to react to that which is the accepted norm. In relation to architectural design, in the 1920s-30s, the prominent ideology of European modernism was overwhelming. To adopt surrealism as an ideology for architectural design would require a response of sorts, to modernism, to add a credible progress of ideas, an analogy which attempts to discredit its predecessor. Modernism celebrated turning its back on all that came before, while claiming to look forward to generate a revolution of ideas. It’s an ideology which may result in modernisms own downfall. The difficulty with discrediting modernism is in discrediting a fundamental and utilitarian approach to design that responds to necessity. In essence, design to some degree will always display reminders of modernism despite the attempts to discredit it. Unless, of course, we return to building Baroque churches. But who could justify this as an ideology to discredit modernism. Post war optimism could have supported such a theory, but who had the money or resources, a very important influence on attitudes responding to proposed ideas.

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Modernism was suggesting an anti diversity of form that couldn’t really be 25

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argued, since the world didn’t have the resources. I think it’s safe to suggest that Rem Koolhaas realised this. Rather than turning his back on modernism, OMA added to it, while maintaining its fundamental approach to necessity.

OMA’s ornament was reference to modernism while the organisation possibly displays a surreal association. Interestingly, such early ideas by OMA are again becoming important in the face of our latest financial situation and sustainable shortcomings.

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While focusing on several aspects of surrealism and other outside influences from the 20th century. O.M.A, with Koolhaas, drew great inspiration from Salvador Dali and his theoretical approach to construct ideas. Those were ideas governed by what Dali called the ‘Paranoid Critical Method’.

NOTES 1,2,3

The translation is taken from J. Strachey (ed.), The Standard Edition of the Complete

Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, London, Vol. 5 (1900-1901), 1953, pp. 633-

86 Text taken from: Art in Theory 1900 - 2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas Charles

Harrison, Paul J. Wood

4

This translation is by R. Seaver and H. R. Lane in André Breton, Manifestoes of Surreal

ism, Ann Arbor, MI, 1969,

pp. 3-47

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The Paranoid-Critical Method The Paranoid-Critical Method is a simple enough theory to understand, but proves a little difficult to explain while still offering enough depth of explanation.

I believe that the moment is at hand when by a paranoid and active advance of the mind, it will be possible to systematize confusion and thus help to discredit completely the world of reality 1 The success of Dali’s work was of course his articulate skill as a painter on a superficial level. But more so, his success was his interpretation of how we see the world. Dali played with the very nature of how we perceive things. We generally perceive the world in a very linear fashion, with a beginning, middle and an end. Dali was aware that within any given story several realities are evolving simultaneously, several linear processes resolving within one event.

In fact, in addition, some end while some begin and others run throughout.

Dali deduced, which was the very success of the Paranoid-Critical Method, that taking instances from possibly dissociated realities, but not necessarily, would provoke the reader’s imagination. I think, simply, that Dali's success lies, perhaps ironically in the visual, the object... beautiful musings.

Quite an apt description of PCM is Koolhaas notion of the ‘Souvenir’; Dali’s PCM is a sequence of two consecutive but discrete operations: 1. the synthetic reproduction of the paranoiac’s way of seeing the world in a new light- with its rich harvest of unsuspected correspondences, analogies and patterns; and 2. the compression of these gaseous speculations to a critical point where they achieve the density of fact: the critical part of the method consists of the fabrication of objectifying “souvenirs” of the paranoid tourism, of concrete evidence that brings the “discoveries” of those excursions back to the rest of mankind, ideally in forms as obvious and undeniable as snapshots. 2

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This is not at all a departure from Freud’s method of analysis but definitely abusing the very nature of the theory, a theory that had a potential for introducing the notion of collective memory; leaving Dali’s work to be both personal yet appealing to the masses. The success of Dali’s work could be partly attributed to his ability to latch on to and also generate archetypes.

When we consciously set out to retrieve one archetype, we unconsciously retrieve others; and this retrieval recurs in infinite regress. In fact, whenever we “quote” one consciousness, we also “quote” the archetypes we exclude; and this quotation of excluded archetypes has been called by Freud, Jung, and others “the archetypal unconscious.” 3 Unfortunately, and as Freud suggested, his ability or connection to his meth29

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od left the general opinion of Dali wanting, baffled by his madness. Potentially too connected to his work or close to the freedom of the unconscious.

Or correctly, our general opinion of his public persona left us wondering?

On the other hand, it’s potentially possibly to suggest that his public persona may have been the ultimate reality added to protect his normal sane self, his personal and public life a display of the very method he lived by?

Beyond this, OMA had attitudes towards the City and its congestion. I’d also like to contest the anti Corbusian message which disputes the proposal for ‘Radiant City’ as the death of Manhattanism. I feel this is an easy hindsight based argument. The very success suggested by Koolhaas as the birth of Manhattanism was only developed further by European modernism in the 30’s. Only evident by the 70’s to be beyond the scope of human population development. Corbusian conjecture being defeated by the 20th century, suggested by Koolhaas as the death of what made Manhattan’s success. Koolhaas’ argument seeming to fail to realise scale, the success of the Manhattan city block based on the notion that the block was a city within a city. Surely Corbusier’s ideology is one and the very same.

NOTES 1

Salvador Dali, La Femme visible (Paris: Editions Surrealistes, 1930)

text taken form ‘Delirious New York’ by Rem Koolhaas 1978 p 235

2

‘Delirious New York’ by Rem Koolhaas 1978 p238

3

Marshall McLuhan, Essential McLuhan, by Eric McLuhan and Frank Zingrone, 1997

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Manhattanism was flawed modernist commentary neglecting to recognise scale.

Curiously Koolhaas’s dismissal of Corbusier’s suggestion for Manhattan as a whole rather than a series of 2028 islands is restricting of the nature of its evolution. An evolution celebrated by the idea of the city within a building. While being impressed a city block, its volume and most importantly the scale, I feel it’s only apparent that he failed to recognise the potential for the island of Manhattan to become a single unit to be associated to its local environment, not dissimilar to one block within its grid.

The trouble with the anti Corbusier message is it is incoherent. In Koolhaas’ terms the success of Manhattan is the individuality of the block within the system of the island and its congestion. To dismiss Corbusier, Koolhaas suggests the very death of Manhattanism is due to the all encompassing puritan modern proposal, leaving a distinct lack of a Jane Jacobs’ N1 esque diversity ideology. Unfortunately for the theory, it mainly looks back for justification.

The only distinction between a Manhattan block and the generator of Manhattanism and Corbusier’s Manhattan Island is the scale. The block, within a system, within Manhattan is acceptable. While Corbusier’s proposal for Manhattan within America and globalisation is unacceptable as an ideology.

N1 Jane Jacobs made her name with the ‘Death and Life of the great American Cities’ (1961), a sustained attack on the ‘urban renewal’ being promoted by architects and centralised agencies, arguing that such policies were killing the living organism that was the city. Oxford Dictionary of Architecture

In an interview in 1976 Koolhaas defends his ideology suggesting that its success is due to these projects not being isolated. In his defence I can only suggest that in 1976 the world didn’t realise the potential for globalisation.

If Corbusier was successful in his proposal for Manhattan, this would only implicate that the size of the block had increased, the scale of the block was proposed to assimilate the island. Surely such a suggestion implies that the world is crossing new boundaries. Forgiving the almost futurist view to devastating a city to renew with a utopia, theoretically sound or otherwise.

Koolhaas celebrated the success of the skyscraper as a genius resolution of form, despite the control of the envelope and its financial distillation controlling possibilities for the plans. Design by spreadsheet? The ultimate modernism of form following function, function within the city and worked out to the square foot.

In fact, I think Koolhaas got Manhattanism slightly backwards. Koolhaas celebrated the opportunities offered by the skyscraper, while in fact; the skyscraper was enabled by the volume of people to be catered for.

Koolhaas suggested that the death of Manhattanism was connected to the acceptance of the puritan European attitudes. Manhattanism celebrated the connection between the zoning laws of New York at the time, paying particular reference to the control of the envelope, while acknowledging the financial distillation, by design, of the building interiors in relation to planning. Yet 33

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seem to neglect to associate the death of Manhattanism to the crash of 1929 and two world wars, a situation which in turn could have only influenced modernism further.

Koolhaas’ incoherent message in relation to the death of Manhattanism and anti modernism seemed to have reached a finite outcome. An outcome where I feel for the work to progress, OMA needed to realise a more positive out look. At least as a public face to both generate and rationalise potential projects.

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Postscript: introduction for New Research ‘The Contemporary City’ Rem Koolhaas In an essay entitled ‘Toward the contemporary city’ the post script for ‘Delirious New York’ Koolhaas discusses the merits of modernism and modernism’s shortcomings in its inability to deal with the complexity of daily life. I feel that while Koolhaas’ commentary is true and rational, it is only true and rational for one demographic. A ‘get out’ he refers to often is that modernism’s problem is its utopian attitudes, unfortunately for Koolhaas’ argument, New York is vastly imperfect, but not on his terms.

An interesting point to consider about a city like New York is obviously how successful it seems. The sound theory of ‘Manhattanism’ N1 its congestion and vibrant existence is an easy angle to peruse. Alternatively and potentially more critical and hopefully more relevant, New York needs to be more than the playground for the affluent 20 to 40 somethings’ glamorised in shows like ‘Friends’ or ‘Sex and the City’. That is to say, and on my experience living in NYC for almost two years, New York is somewhere you live for maybe ten years before you have to leave; it’s a city where older people move to slower calmer climates, both socially and geographically speaking. It’s a city where you shouldn’t raise children. A city where crime is at a ridiculous level, in 1978 when Delirious New York was published, 1,820 people were murdered that year in New York City alone. 1 A city to celebrate and worth visiting, or, a city to live in for less than 10 years provided you are between 21 and 45 years old. An alternative explanation could be that NYC is a city which seems to have omitted any drain on the local economy like kids and the retired, or almost retired. Which in turn, makes a lot more space for young, consumer driven, tax-paying Americans. While New York is an example of a very successful capitalist city, it’s a city to be taken lightly. A successful city provided you omit some the right facts.

N1 ‘Manhattanism’ the city strives to reach a mythical point where the world is completely fabricated by man, so that it absolutely coincides with his desires. The Metropolis is an addictive machine, from which there is no escape, unless it offers that, too…. Manhattan had generated its own metropolitan Urbanism- a culture of congestion.

Despite still hanging on to his theory of ‘Manhattanism’; by the time he wrote ‘The Contemporary City’ Koolhaas returns to having more of an affection for the modernist utopian city. In the opening paragraphs he gives a backhanded compliment to Le Corbusier through his admiration for Meis. But he is baffled by modernist pre programming of open plan. An interesting argument, given his affection for the financially resolved Manhattan city block. It’s an argument suggesting that the modernist utopia could never achieve the complexity necessary for daily life. In fact, his criticism of modernism was its utopian tendencies. Interestingly enough, in dismissing modernist utopia, all Koolhaas is suggesting is another utopia. Another ‘no place’. A utopia which builds itself based on the necessity of the current occupant. Uniform plots allotted by the city much like Manhattan and Manhattanism.

‘For me, the most visionary architect, the one who best understood the ineluctable disorder in which we live, remains Frank Lloyd Wright and his 37

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Broacacre City’.2 Returning to his 1978 criticism of Le Corbusier’s ‘Radiant City’ a proposal for New York. Koolhaas fails to realise the ineluctable disorder in which we live. Considering Radiant City’s realisation and the sheer population of the ‘Cartesian skyscraper’, this would all but generate the exact same interactions as Manhattanism suggested, but in the case of Radiant City these interactions may have occurred in an area of the abundant outdoors and surrounded by trees and with an ocean view.N2 Although to his credit, I feel Koolhaas had at this point changed his angel slightly and tended to look back on a more surreal tendency to superimpose a new reality, or within an existing landscape to generate a new and believable reality. In OMA’s proposal for the re-urbanization of Bijlmermeer, rather than knocking the existing and starting from scratch, the proposal realises that superimposing a current transport system, integrated with the city, over a mid 60s modernist high rise was all the project needed to succeed. A very rational approach displaying a distillation of earlier Dali and Manhattanism ideologies. N3

N2 Radiant City, a Corbusier master plan for New York City, Paris and Buenos Aires. It was a proposal which proposed to devastate vast areas of these cities to clear the way for his highly theoretical modernist ideology for the mega city.

The Bijlmermeer should not be approached by means of historical models; the possibility of modern architecture is yet not exhausted. 3

N3 The project for the Bijlmermeer consists of a proposal for the renovation of the urban pattern of a grid, a truly modern extension for social housing, in the southeast of Amsterdam.

It’s something like Corbusier without talent, but conceived according to impeccable doctrine. 4 Give that OMA and Koolhaas are tending more towards modernism, and their ideas for the city seemed to have adopted a certain air of surrealism, earlier work should offer a better insight.

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1

New York Law Enforcement Agency Uniform Crime Reports, New York Crime Rates

1960 – 2009

2

Theorizing a New Agenda for. Architecture, page 328 ‘Toward the Contempory City. By

Rem Koolhaas 1989

3

OMA website, page URL:

http://www.oma.eu/index.php?option=com_projects&view=project&id=756&Itemid=10

4

Theorizing a New Agenda for. Architecture, page 330 ‘Toward the Contempory City. By

Rem Koolhaas 1989

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Surrealism and Architecture, Villa Dall’Ava; beautiful musings Given that Koolhaas’ earlier dismissal of modernism seems to have dissipated by the early nineties, then surely the genius of OMA potentially lies in the application of surrealism and realising the ‘Paranoid Critical Method’. To be more specific, the genius of OMA’s postmodernism must be influenced by that other than an interest in modernism. Certainly appropriate as the project does deal with the city very tenuously, but certainly embodies early ideologies, not having had a chance to be commercially polluted. A first build which is as close as possible to academic attitudes with a supporting client brief.

Investigating applied ideologies

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“Finally the house was completed at the end of 1991, and the last idea of the architect was to have a storyboard for the pictures and the story was to have a giraffe and some eccentric people trying to jump into the pool.” 1 Despite Dominique Boudet’s opinion that the design for the house is not necessarily connected to ‘Delirious New York’ I can’t help but to draw comparisons between how the project was recorded once it was built and a couple of specifics from the book.

On Dali’s arrival in New York City and after his first night’s sleep he awakes for a dream involving “eroticism and lions. After I was fully awake, I was surprised by the persistence of the lions’ roars that I had just heard in my sleep.

These roars were mingled with the cries of ducks and the other animals more difficult to differentiate. This was followed by complete silence. This silence, broken only by roars and savage cries, was so unlike the din that I had expected- that of an immense ‘modern and mechanical’ city- that I felt completely lost….”

But the lions’ roar is real and coming from Central Park Zoo, Paranoid-Critical “souvenir” of a “jungle” that never existed there. 2 I feel it was important for Koolhaas to inhabit the project for the photo shoot in a manner that represented its intentions, utilising a giraffe as a more timid Dali reference than the lions of central park zoo. Although the metaphor of the giraffe goes further; its body supported on an elegant, perfectly evolved, spindly system of legs generated by survival. A metaphor I feel which absolutely draws inspiration from the Dali painting ‘Sleep’, 1937. The painting represents the artists head as soft form architecture, held aloft, as he said, on ‘the crutches of reality’ 3 precariously held in a fragile state of equilibrium.

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“For sleep to be possible, a whole system of crutches in psychic equilibrium is essential. If only one is missing, one would wake up and above all the little boat would disappear immediately’ 4 45

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‘Dead loads’ in engineering refer to the self weight of the proposed structure, which in turn have been worked out to resolve equilibrium of necessity, structurally speaking. In the case of Villa DallAva, I feel Koolhaas’ idea was not only generated or inspired by Dali, but was certainly inspired or confirmed by Robert Venturi N1, in their search for a postmodernism. This is conjecture on my part, in which case, the work certainly falls within Venturi’s theory on postmodernism and its potential.

“First the medium of architecture must be re-examined if the increased scope of our architecture as well as the complexity of its goals is to be expressed.

Simplified or superficially complex forms will not work.”5

N1 Robert Venturi in 1966 his ‘Complexity and Contradictions in Architecture’ proposed ( among much else) that ambiguity, tensions, and intricate complexities should replace the blandness of International Modernism ( getting a in a dig at Meis’ pronouncement that ‘less is more’ by stating that ‘less is a bore’) Oxford Dictionary of Architecture

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The swimmers on the roof, other hand, are a Koolhaas self indulgence and potentially refer to New York City. Superimposing his theory of Manhattanism on a small pool overlooking the Eiffel Tower. The success of the Roosevelt Island project as he suggested was to superimpose its reality a longside Westminster. The swimmers come from the ever increasing theatre stages in projects like the Rockefeller Centre, where the traditional act had to be multiplied to the nth degree to have any impact on the vast stages. A small troop of dancers became hundreds.

“Filling the gigantic stage, dressed in Supermatist costumes: flesh-coloured body stockings marked with a series of black rectangles that shrink toward the waist to end in a small black triangle” 6 But absolutely pays reference to Koolhaas’ allegory of Russian constructive architects escaping their oppression, bound for the Promised Land.

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“All the Constructivist architects, when the situation had become impossible through the authoritarianism of Stalinism, they would use an invention that they made collectively, namely a floating swimming pool which was simple a rectangle of steel floating in water. They used their own movement through the water as a form of locomotion for their escape to New York. It took 40 years; they left in 32 and arrived in 72, just when the world trade centre had been finished.” 7

Of course, the image is inspired by many ideas, but then again the metaphor becomes unimportant, the notion of abstracted disassociated realities existing along side a mixed up Corbusier inspired Villa is why such images evoke the imagination. At least as far as the images go it qualifies the project according to Dali’s ‘Paranoid-Critical Method’. A wonderful juxtaposition, quite a ridged architectural theory offered by Venturi, meeting Dali’s eccentric beautiful musings, to be then distilled through modernism by OMA, to produce what appears to be a very rational ‘house’.

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“What the book wants to do is deal with the architectural object in a different way, there is an almost repulsive focusing on things, on objects on details in architecture. Some of the photography is really more about the experience, such as in this case, a house in Paris where my dream was to publish it in a way where the house was never shown, only the effect of the house on the context. And also the views from the house would define its essential quality”

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Koolhaas, by 1995 was trying to draw attention away from Villa Dall’Ava’s appearance as an almost Corbusier like Villa De Savoye and draw attention to something that OMA have pained to instill in the project. This is surely important, as other wise OMA would have failed to meet the brief and only produced more modernism, rather than post modernism. The image Koolhaas was referring to was a view towards the outdoors, with floor to ceiling glass walls which dissolve the barrier between inside and out. Importantly, and not getting too caught up in the objects as Koolhaas suggests; the chaise is certainly reminiscent of Meis’ Barcelona chair while potentially referring to Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytical couch, while the view through the night time, forest like view, reminds me of the ‘Endless house’ by Frederick Kiesler.

Surreal conjecture on my part once again, but certainly fitting, given the background of the project. Fortunately aided by the fact that all the elements included in the shot are arranged for the sake of the photograph. In an effort to highlight the success of the application of the Paranoid-Critical Method, this time from within the finished project. Many Houses have such views, but I feel it’s safe to suggest that when a piece of art is produced with an intention, this qualifies the work, then such a theory should hold true for a piece of architecture. Given that the image in question does display surreal qualities?

“Trough his intervention, he managed to give pier 52 a revived connection to the seasonal change of the earth, a daily change, a cycle involving the sun, the sky, the temperature, the wind, the water and the passer by, animal or person. Matta-Clark created a connection to the spirit of the New York Harbour on an elemental level. A cut in the floor meaning the movement of the water became part of the fabric of the building, a semicircular cut in the wall allowing wind, but more so, scribing an arc of shadow, changing during the day across the floor. Such interventions at no point distracted from the typology of the wharf, but this typology was certainly enhanced by the spirit of its place. The interruption by the authorities and interruptions by bureaucratic decision making only added a level of socio economic, political commercialism which completed the absolute connection to the modernising global city of 1970’s New York.” N2

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N2 Gordon Matta-Clark, having trained a Cornell University, his disapproval of architecture’s disconnect with the everyday world and a simultaneous fascination with buildings made him engage with ‘Anarchitecture’, a loose collection of friends and collaborators. They highlighted failed social policies and searched for an alternative spatial world in which buildings responded to life and environment, rather than formalist rules. (The Surreal House; Barbican Art Gallery p 332) 9

During building Boudet was apprehensive about the glass box. Even with the addition of a bamboo screen, perforated steel and the curtains. Only later 49

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discovering there is a possibility of change which is quite infinite.

“Sometimes it’s very dull, sometimes very shiny, but in summer it’s extraordinary” Boudet also complimented how beautiful the garden became during the winter, the light scarcely making it snow covered trees. The connection to nature and the changing seasons the final imposed yet ever changing reality superimposed on Villa Dall’Ava, a reality offering a true sublime experience.

But more importantly offering the constant renewing experience that Breton feared couldn’t exist in the static built form, the commodification of space, the means by which ‘experience itself’ comes to be ‘assigned limits’.N2

N2 ‘experience itself’ comes to be ‘assigned limits’ from a essay by Jon Goodburn and David Cunningham entitled ‘On Surrealism and Architecture’, published in AD

During the questions closing the AA lecture Villa Dall’Ava: A clients response, Szymon Busa remarked; “I had the pleasure of having a tour; we took a bunch of first year students.

What was so amazing is you arrive to see the front of the house as in the photographs, an icon. But as soon as you step in it’s really a home. It’s absolutely not a museum or a show room in that respect. One of my favourite places was your daughter’s bedroom, it seemed incredibly un-prescriptive, and it really looked like any other teenagers bedroom.” 11 A statement approved by Dominique Boudet’s insistent nodding. It is clear from Szymon’s impression of Villa’Ava that it is very much a home. At least in terms of a teenage girl, but judging by her fathers approving and complimentary presentation, Villa Dall’Ava had absolutely become their home.

Unfortunately for the discussion so far, I’ve been dealing with images and the opinions of those involved, to one extent or another. Not forgetting that Villa Dall’Ava being a private residence, I visited the ‘Kunsthall’ to investigate such ideologies and their application, in an effort to qualify further the successful application of the Paranoid-Critical Method in building.

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1

The Surreal House: Architecture of Desire (Barbican Art Gallery) p218

2

‘Delirious New York’ by Rem Koolhaas 1978 p262, quotation from Salvadore Dali, The

secret life of Salvador Dali, p 327

3

The secret life of Salvador Dali, New York, 1942

4

The Surreal House: Architecture of Desire (Barbican Art Gallery) p218

5

Robert Venturi, Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture, p19

6

‘Delirious New York’ by Rem Koolhaas 1978 p217

7

Rem Koolhaas, OMA-AMO: Where is our Soul? AA lecture, Date: 04.11.2002

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Rem Koolhaas, S,M,L,XL, AA lecture, date: 29.11.1999

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Taken from my recent essay, Geometry and Sentiment by design

10

Dominique Boudet, OMAs Villa DallAva: A Clients Response, AA lecture, date:

31.01.2007

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Szymon Busa, lecturer at the AA and introducing speaker for OMA’s Villa Dall’Ava: A

Clients Response, AA lecture, date: 31.01.2007

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Looking at Dominique Boudet’s adventure through the ‘Kunsthal’ Dominique Boudet referred to the Villa Dall’Ava as an adventure. Its only fitting my case study should adopt a similar attitude.

No matter how many times you tell yourself that silly o’clock flights never work, the cheap flights always sway the balance. Convinced that some sleep on the flight will fix the ridiculous early rise- going to Rotterdam you find out that the flight only lasts forty minutes and the opportunity is gone. Not to mention the added insult of paying for a taxi to get to Liverpool Street because the tube hasn’t opened yet means that the ten o’clock, slightly more expensive flight, all added, would involve more sleep and would have cost the same.

Landing in Rotterdam, a little tired and with no sense of geography, I quickly found that the Dutch speak English equally as well as me, at least in Rotterdam. The friendly smile aided slightly by the fumbling tourist enquiring from the articulate English speaking population if they understood, although through no fault of my own having dealt with Parisians in Paris or the surprise of how few people speak English in Santiago De Compostela?

I got on the bus labelled central station, which is a comfort in itself as you know, for at least the bus journey, you are headed in the right direction.

On buying the ticket the bus driver insisted on then using a rubber stamp to mark the fact that it has been used. There is an interaction there that’s missing in London, you could quite happily top up your oyster card using the automated machines to pass through the automated turnstile and then inconvenience someone by standing under their armpit for the duration of your journey. Not that I want to spend my life talking to bus drivers, but there is a friendliness to dealing with people and not machines.

I swiftly dropped off the bags to the hostel that was recommended as being around the corner from the Kunsthal and quickly called OMA to follow up on an appointment to visit the practice. Despite explaining my stay in Rotterdam was for three days, I was asked to e-mail the request to their PR who to my frustration, I could hear in the background dictating my course of action. Not wanting to upset anyone I politely agreed, hung up the phone frustrated by them for not dealing with me or giving me any sort of answer.

With E-mail sent and no time to hang around for a reply, I set off for the Kunsthal. Expecting the hostel to be a lot further than promised, I walked out the door around the first corner and there it was. Tourism never being this easy it put a positive spin on the sleep deprivation and that useless piece of information from OMA. From the distance it doesn’t do much, a couple of rectangular volumes 57

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cleverly arranged to deal with an embankment and a lower level road. An overshooting, bright orange, over dimensioned I beam is the first hint of architecture, which appears to be just left lying around on the roof, along with what appears to be a floating platform, a salute to Meis. The extruded central volume housing little more than a stair case really gets the whole thing kick-started. Tall, visible from afar, plastered with the word Kunsthal and situated right next to a major high way; the Kunsthal in Rotterdam uses the technology of Las Vegas. A connection to the city that abuses the highway as an advertisement for the commuter and passerby, the Kunsthal is a traffic intersection. It lies exactly between Museumpark and Westzeedijk, the building becomes the connection between Urban and rural. On getting closer the detail in materials begins to distinguish the varying programmes of the building. The office space contained behind a solid stone finish for privacy, the auditorium and restaurant surrounded by glass and corrugated plastic for light and openness, while the main gallery is contained within a wall of frosted glass to one end and glass with an immediate partition behind at the other, presumably to be bright but still controlling the light. Other stone finished walls hide other volumes also requiring a degree of privacy or light control.

A concrete ramp cuts right through the volume of the building; it joins the upper road level to the lower level gardens to the back, leading to the front door of the Architecture Institute in the distance via a humped foot bridge crossing a canal. Along the ramp, descending into the volume of the building, you notice the rest of the building unfold. Conscious, if not distracted by my camera, as not all museums react kindly to students taking photographs, particularly an indiscrete SLRs which resembles a breeze block on a Nikon shoulder strap. I sheepishly continue snapping while trying to look purposeful when the roof disappears to reveal the Vegas sign above and to the left a void addresses the under passing road giving a real sense of elevation. A little further into the building and an automatic sliding door opens revealing the ticket entrance and auditorium, while in keeping with every museum an unavoidable bookshop sits right by the entry.

To my disappointment I was confronted with a weathered faced, hooped ear ringed Dutch lady standing a head taller than me with a disapproving look on her face. Assuming that she spoke English, the Irish in me took over and at my most charming/ innocent tourist approach, I tried to explain that I’m only interested in the architecture, and enquired if it would be possible to take some photographs. Without hesitation she told me that it would be absolutely no problem at all, just not of the art work. I started to get the impression that people from Rotterdam are very proud of their city, and very excepting of tourists recording what they see to export it on their behalf.

Once passed the hooped ticket lady and bookshop, the auditorium gives you the opportunity to descend to the not so obvious gallery entrance below, 59

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so I climbed to the back of the room for the photo and there discovered the option of a ramp leading to an inclined roof garden. Accessed through a framed view capturing the garden and a glimpse of sky, I was quickly stopped by security from entering the garden, but at that point you arrive at a hidden gallery space to the right off the ramp. A space you would probably not make it to only for the teasing outdoor space drawing you up the ramp.

As a normal gallery space exhibiting international realism this is interesting, but not what I was there for. Following the exhibition it leads you to a corridor at the back of the room which passes over the first entrance ramp and leaves you on a balcony within the double height space of the main gallery space of the Kunsthal. Another couple of photos, but this time a whistle from the gallery floor grabs my attention. I cautiously peer over to find a little man with a disapproving wagging finger. Some one I think I should avoid for the rest of the visit. I jumped in the lift next to the balcony to hide for a second, but of course there he was when the doors opened. I apologised while he was explaining that I should respect the artists work and take no more photos.

Not too much of an issue, except that I now had someone tailing me every corner I took. I decided to go for a coffee and let the heat die down in the hope that maybe his shift ends or he gets fired or something to that effect while I’m away.

Towards the front of the gallery at lower ground level you cleverly pass under the entrance ramp to end up at the bottom of the auditorium, a journey I intended on making later, but stumbled upon without any question of direction.

I quickly questioned my hooped friend who directed me to the restaurant and I grabbed a table right next to a group of beautiful blonde girls- it made a lot more sense than sitting next to pensioners with nothing else to do on a Tuesday in the early afternoon.

Since it was just midday and having not eaten since Liverpool Street at 5am I decided on lunch, besides, the question of the little man with the finger’s career may take a little time. The roof of the restaurant is formed by the underside of the auditorium and again no matter where in the room you sit, you have a wonderful view of the bookshop. Although to its credit the horizontal floor of the space penetrating through the sloping ceiling has a very clever preconceived aesthetic. The blondes left before I came up with the courage to start a conversation so I ordered an espresso and tried to decipher some Dutch literature I picked up along the way. Across the room near the entrance there was a grand piano where from nowhere a little girl of about 10, with her mum, jumped up and decided to have a little go. Immediately, with my lack of sleep, I was scared of some noise making little tyke ruining my lunch. To my astonishment she played beautifully and the whole room went quiet in respect of the moment. Risking sounding like a romantic, it was a moment I am unlikely to forget. Surrounded by fine works of art, sitting in what’s becoming one of my favourite pieces of architecture and listening to genius, while 67

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next to a motorway, now overlooking a humped back bridge leading to the unknown and tucked under a 30 degree inclined ceiling, which is enclosed by floor to ceiling glass. It’s certainly beginning to resonate Dali’s Paranoid Critical Method’ Enough time having passed I decided to brave the gallery again, this time hiding behind pieces of structure or walls, to snap what I could. The trouble with the breeze block is that the noise it makes is directly related to the size; in fact it could be considered some sort of X2 relationship, particularly in a quiet gallery space. The layout of the space reminded me of the Freeze Art Fair: one large double height volume with the floor divided up by white partitions. The roof consisted of an elaborate system of roof lights used to control the lighting, with a suggestion of Venturi structure, again painted bright orange, a colour common in all things Dutch. At the opposite end to the upper and lower level entrances behind one of the exhibitions partitions which spans the length of the room there is an opening at each end. Behind the partition the floor disappears and you find yourself on a grating over a double height space, but being no more than four meters wide and two double heights tall, you get quite a feeling of your mortality with the comfort and security from your faith in technology. Holes are cut in the grating from where the stairs drop to the lower level, only really visible when you are about to fall in.

From the lower level the metal work stairs are beautifully finished with a modernist touch, a single white wall being no higher than its function requires. It is only tall enough to contain you while you descend, retaining the feeling experienced from the grating above and detailed with the Le Corbusier light bulb to finish with the modernist intentions. N1 Ending up back at the entrance ramp, a portion of which is contained within the lower gallery you can return to the upper Freeze like space, or take the ill lit corridor framing the polished low level entrance and back to the bottom of the auditorium, a corridor riddled with Freudian simile and again detailed with the Le Corbusier light bulb. At the entrance you are pointed in the right direction by an interestingly skewed banister following the line from the door to the gallery space. And of course back to the bookshop for research purposes! I’ve booked three days in Rotterdam and it’s only just after three o’clock on the first day, while holding out for OMA to reply, I have some time to kill.

N1 Corbusier’s light bulb, is an idea that the bulb, in its pared back state, is a metaphor for modernism, its visible filament a direct connection to that which lights the world. At the centre of domestic and industrial practice is electricity. Electricity generated through processes directly descended from the machine age.

Back at the hostel to check on the e-mail I knew OMA hadn’t sent, I quizzed the cute receptionist on where to hang out in Rotterdam on a Tuesday. She sent me to the White Ape. I enquired whether she would be there too, to which I got a response of ‘maybe?’ Between the receptionist and OMA, I really started to get annoyed by people who don’t give straight answers; such is life, although the irritation may have something to do with the lack sleep?

The White Ape a definitely interesting possibility, I made my way to the architecture institute as a good place to continue with my trip.

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As I reached the institute, a very contemporary building on my left, I spotted an art deco house covered with scaffolding on my right. Having studied architecture for almost five years, amazingly I’ve seen few in the flesh, mainly in books. I really started to get excited. Not only that, on photographing the building I noticed another right next door without scaffolding. Trying to come up with a plan to get inside I spotted the Sonneveld House next door again, this time modernist and housing an exhibition of the preserved interior. At that stage my ill conceived plan went out the window, I bought the ticket.

It was a wonderful opportunity to investigate some of Dominique Boudet’s original research and interests.

The anticipation as I entered the Sonneveld House was a wonderful experience. I think the old man at the reception had been there since the thirties, but welcomed the idea of taking photographs provided I didn’t use the flash.

He asked me to wear some, slipper like, over shoes which really enhanced the occasion, an effort to preserve even the ground I was walking on. Words like utilitarian, functionalism and form suddenly spring to mind as I meandered through the building, trying to keep a critical frame of mind. It was all of those things, each room devoted to its function. A laundry room tucked under the stairs as it doesn’t require more, a large, open room addressing a terrace leading to the garden, accessed through floor to ceiling glass, dissolving the barrier between inside and out, and a secondary stair which was not very ornate, leading to a service area for the dining room designed as access for the servants. The kitchen was laid out ergonomically with all the mod cons of the 30s and was directly connected to the stairs and the small service area which was decorated with little more than a washhand basin for hygiene. The dining room was well lit and led directly to the study/living room space, a space which had a grand piano to one end, the natural progression following dinner. At the other an office space surrounded by bookshelves, a space for intellectuals to entertain other intellectuals, there was an arranged seating area in the room facing a fire place, but it resembled more a doctors waiting room, than a comfortable living space, I don’t think function allows for a Sunday morning on the couch when its raining! The entertaining room has access to its own private terrace and the windows from adjacent façades meet to give the corner less effect. Taking the stairs to the next level the first single bedroom has access to a shared en-suite bathroom joined to the next single bedroom. The bathroom has two sinks to more efficiently deal with the morning rush and the whole experience is very well lit. The guest bedroom also shares this bathroom, but has its own pair of sinks so not to interfere too much. The master bedroom is completely en-suite, again with two sinks and also has its own walk in closet. All of the rooms have access to private terraces except for the guest room, which could endure the inconvenience on the short term. The next level leads to a roof terrace which covers the volume of the upper floors, leaving no spaced unused. The main stairs are beautifully simple, leading me back to the front door and disappointed 71

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that there was no more to see. The whole experience felt like a hospital in the seventies, but that’s a compliment seeing as it was built in 1933! The provision of utilities on every floor, despite its functional approach, would be the height of luxury at the time. Modernism and modernism turned on its head all in one sleepless afternoon.

I spent the evening at the White Ape talking to a guitar player from a local band, but no receptionist. The few Dutch beers in me went straight to my head and I stumbled back to the hostel by ten ish…..

Having missed the Architecture Institute for the excitement of modernism, I returned the following morning. A wonderfully expressive building of three interpenetrating volumes, again with hints of Dutch orange, connects to a sweeping building with a seemingly more official capacity. It was inspirational in terms of my studio work, but pales in comparison to the Sonneveld House on its doorstep, only an 1/8 of its size. However the exhibition on light architecture has given me more to consider.

Still waiting for OMA’s response, and being in the Dutch city of architecture I went walking. Having studied engineering I decided to start with the bridges and made my way to the Erasmus Bridge, which is truly a piece of engineering with a wonderful aesthetic. Rotterdam is a city full of very expressive buildings, which at street level don’t fit contextually, although at the scale of the city the context becomes more apparent, the place is full of them. On the other hand, there is a definite context of geometry, the Unilever building next to the interesting elevator style bridge, or the Erasmus Bridge conversing with the oblique façade of the building to its right. The Dutch, from the experience of Rotterdam, are not afraid to experiment, what’s more, the planning authority seem to encourage exactly that and its gets built.

The following day, still waiting for OMA’s response and tired of walking, I decided to simply go for lunch at the Dudok Café. It’s an amazing time capsule. I remember reading ‘Down and out in Paris and London’ by George Orwell, where in Paris and out of work and cash, he decides to work as a kitchen hand in the belly of a hotel. The work was hard and the pay was awful, while the only light came from the huge furnace bellowing heat used by the kitchen and to heat the hotel. The point that I’m trying to make is, the kitchen serviced a restaurant and the book was set in the late 20s; the Dudok Café was exactly what I imagined when reading the book. I walked into a room for the first time, but I was there before. The restaurant was designed to be little more than the sum of the necessary parts, with a huge glass fronted wall resembling the work of Mondrian. To be honest the food was resting the ability of the building to fill the place, but at least the white wine was cold.

(Late lunch….)

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their doorstep to evoke a reaction. The lady at the reception desk said ‘ya sure, but first let me call to get someone for you’ while on the phone her face dropped, it was clear that it wasn’t a good response, she hung up and asked me to leave. A very strange position to be in, in the same vein as when you are a child and you have done something wrong, but all you remember is that you were playing. Despite this, visiting the Kunsthal made the journey worth while.

The wonderful thing about seeing the Sonneveld House and the Kunsthal on the same afternoon is that it offers the opportunity to really identify Koolhaas’ postmodernism. Every inch of the Sonneveld House made sense, but also did offer a slight generosity of space to the more public spaces of the house, the dining room for example. On the other hand the Kunsthal, while having a differing programme, displayed similar intentions, surprising yet entertaining access through and around the building, much like the Sonneveld House, with the allocation of generous space where necessary. But space never wasted as in the café tucked under the auditorium. A plan layout Claude Parent and Paul Virilio’s ‘Function of the Oblique’ would be envious of. N2 But this is almost where modernism ends and postmodern begins. From here you begin to realise the connection to the city, the disassociated yet rational organisation reminiscent of the ‘exquisite cadaver’, N3 the rich materiality full of references and an ambiguity of structure, with a few vertigo inducing moments. Not forgetting the oblique secret garden, a silhouette behind frosted glass, with only a glimpse offered through a locked glass door. A postmodern experience enhanced by implementing Dali’s ‘Paranoid Critical Method

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N2 ‘The Function of the Oblique’ had its origins in the concepts of disequilibrium and motive instability. The idea of using the earth’s gravity as a motor for movement inspired a very Galilean utilization of the INCLINED PLANE- a building form in which the horizontal was used only as a means of establishing a ‘threshold’ between two slopes. The function of the oblique, The architecture of Claude Parent and Paul Virilo 1963-1969 N3 ‘Exquisite Cadaver’ is a drawing that results from a game among friends, in which the head, torso and legs of a person are sutured together ‘blind’ on a folded piece of paper.

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Conclusion It’s important to remember that for the application of the ‘Paranoid Critical Method’ to be successful, the metaphors and simile must be relevant and explore a narrative which will offer a tension to provoke reaction from the reader. For Dali, his beautiful musings are visceral. They grab the eye and then grab the mind. Dali in particular simply juxtaposed something ‘alternative’ for the perhaps equally off the wall, traditional and religious references.

His jewellery work was particularly close to the original over the top religious styling, his next step was to replace a sacred heart (mad in its own way) for a lobster or a melting clock or literally whatever... but the brutal visual assault on the senses comes from the same place in a way, some of his paintings are the least good example of this harassing of the shocking and maximal/ juxtaposition effect of surrealism, as his objects also have a physical immediacy.

For Rem Koolhaas and OMA, this is no different. The metaphors and similes must be relevant and explore a narrative which will offer a tension to grab the eye and then grab the mind. Koolhaas’ beautiful musings are considered, but certainly offer a visceral association. In Koolhaas’ secular world of the built environment of the late 70s early 80s, his tension was to take modernism and use it as his ornament, a tool used to develop his postmodernism. His harassing of the shocking, a slap in the face highlighting modernisms hatred for ornamentation by taking elemental modern moments and using them as a form of decoration.

Koolhaas’ style is an absolute success because of the ineluctable disorder of us, not because it’s a better house. And of course, given the nature of our awareness, unconscious or otherwise, it’s certainly beautiful given the nature of its production, in other words, how the house was conceived. With reference to Kant’s critique of aesthetic judgment, absolutely, but more aptly and appropriately summed up by Breton himself: “The marvellous is always beautiful, in fact only the marvellous is beautiful” Villa Dall’Ava is not a brilliant house, that’s reserved for modernism, but is most certainly a wonderful home full of rich experiences, a quality which will enrich any dream.

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Bibliography Books: Allison, J. The Surreal House (London, Yale University Press , 2010) Cosgrove, D. Daniels S. The Iconography of Landscape (U.K. Cambridge University Press, 1998) Crow, D. Gordon Matta-Clark (New York, Phaidon Press, 2003) Cianchetta, A. Molteni, E. Álvaro Siza, Private Houses 1954-2004 (Milano: Skira, 2004) Colletti, M. Exuberance, Architectural Design Magazine (London, Wiley, 2010) Descharnes, R. Néret, G. Dali, the Painting (Cologne: Taschen, 2001) Descharnes, R. Néret, G. Dali (Cologne: Taschen, 2004) Dovey, K. Framing Places, Mediating Power in built form (London: Routledge, 1999) Durozoi, G. History of the Surrealist Movement (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2004) Elwall, R. Carullo, V. Framing Modernism, Architecture and Photography in Italy 1926-1965 (Estorick Foundation, 2009) Harrison, C. Wood, P. Art in Theory, 1900-2000, An Anthology of Changing ideas (U.K. Blackwell, 1992) Hayward Gallery, Undercover Surrealism, Georges Bataille and Documents (Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2006) Hollier, D. Against Architecture, The writings of Georges Bataielle (London: MIT Press, 1989) Jacobs, J. The Death and Life of the Great American Cities (New York: Random House, 1993) Koolhaas, R. Delirious New York (New York, Monacelli Press, 1978) Koolhaas, R. Mau, B. S, M, L, XL (New York, Monacelli Press, 1998) Kunsthal Rotterdam/ a+t ediciones (Rotterdam Gráficas, S.A. Spain, 2002) Leach, L Rethinking Architecture: A reader in cultural theory (London, Routledge, 1997) Lee, P.M. Objects to be Destroyed (London, MIT Press, 2001) MacLean A. Corner, J. Taking Measure Across America (New York, Yael University Press, 1996) McLuhan, M. Zingrone, F. Essential McLuchan (London, Routledge, 1994) McLuhan, M. Fiore, Q. War and piece in the global village (California: Gingko Press, 2001) Nesbitt, K. Theorizing a New Addenda for Architecture; An anthology of architectural theory 1965-1995 (New York, Princeton Architectural Press, 1996) Parent, C. Virilio, P. The function of the Oblique (London, AA publications, 1996) Parent, C. Virilio, P. Architecture Principe, 1966 and 1996 (Paris, Les Éditions De L’Imprimeur, 1997) Richardson, M. Georges Bataielle, essential writings (London: SAG publica79

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tions, 1998) Richardson, M. Georges Bataielle (London: Routledge, 1994) Rossi, A. The Architecture of the City (New York, MIT Press, 1984) Rowe, C Koetter, F. Collage City (London, MIT Press, 1984) Stevens Curl, J. dictionary of architecture (Oxford, Oxford University press, 1999) Venturi, R Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture (New York, The museum of moderm art, 2002) Welsh, J. Modern House (London: Phaidon, 1995) Archived Lectures: Boudet, D. OMAs Villa DallAva: A Clients Response. Architectural Association: Date: 31.01.2007 Koolhaas, R. Salvador dali, the paranoid critical method, Le Corbusier, New York. Architectural Association Date: 18.12.1976 Koolhaas, R. ZENGHELIS, E. OMA. Architectural Association: Date: 14.03.1976 Koolhaas, R. S,M,L,XL. Architectural Association, Date: 29.11.1999 Koolhaas, R. OMA-AMO: Where is our Soul? Architectural Association: Date: 04.11.2002 Internet References: OMA website, page URL: http://www.oma.eu/index.php?option=com_projects&view=project&id=196& Itemid=10 OMA website, page URL: http://www.oma.eu/index.php?option=com_projects&view=project&id=756& Itemid=10

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Image Credits I1: Obstacles, from S, M, L, XL page 132 I2:Sketch Plans, from S, M, L, XL. Page 176 I3:Sketch Plans, from S, M, L, XL. Page 177 I4:Sketch Plans, from S, M, L, XL. Page 178 I5:Sketch Plans, from S, M, L, XL. Page 179 I6:Sketch section, from S, M, L, XL. Page 184 I7:Sketch section, from S, M, L, XL. Page 185 I8:New Welfare Island, Axonometric, Delirious New York. Page 302 I9:Freud Couch, http://www.alamut.com/images/2002_misc/freudCouch.jpg I10:Portrait of Freud, Dali. Page 119 I11:Morphology of the skull of Sigmund Freud. Dali the paintings. Page299 I12:Portrait of Freud, Dali the paintings. Page 299 I13:The Discovery of America by Christopher Columbus, 1958. Dali. Page 183 I14:Dali’s Diagram of the Paranoid Critical Method. Delirious New York. Page 248 I15:Vertigo of the modern, The Surreal House. Page 222 I16:Vertigo of the modern, The Surreal House. Page 223-225 I17:Sleep, Dali the paintings. Page 291 I18:Church of the Autostrada, Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture.

Page 19 I19:Villa Dall’Ava, The Surreal House. Page 32 I20:Arrival of the floating pool, Delirious New York. Page 309 I21:Model for endless House, Frederick Kiesler. The Surreal House. Page 18 I22:Day’s End, 1975, Gordon Matta-Clark. Page 13 I23:Interior, from S, M, L, XL. Page 152 I24:Interior, from S, M, L, XL. Page 155 I25:Interior, from S, M, L, XL. Page 163 I26:Oblique Circulation, The function of the Oblique. Page 12 I27:Cadavre exquis http://www.nationalgalleries.org/collection/online_ search/4:324/result/0/31332

All other images were taken by myself on research trips 83