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TRANSMISSION AND CHANGE IN ARCHITECTURE

Franco Frescura

INTRODUCTION

The concept of a "style", as it is commonly used in the visual arts, or most particularly in architecture, arises from an era when man, imbued with the idea of a "scientific method", was beginning to rationalise and find patterns in his natural and physical environment. Although this represented an important tool which enabled early architectural historians to understand and catalogue their built culture, ultimately its implementation was flawed in that it concentrated upon the finished product to the exclusion of the processes which created it. This means that outward elements of visual similarity became sufficient reason to create generic labels which ignored the social and economic background of a building or the cultural values it represented. This is wrong, for an analysis of these processes and the means of production used reaches beyond those elements of mere aesthetic similarity and reveals the true nature of architecture. It also means that the transmission of aesthetic elements from one generation to the next becomes concerned more with questions of method than with mere visual borrowings.

This does not mean to say that the transmission of architectural forms may not have taken place visually from generation to generation, from culture to culture and from place to place. They have, but these are only possible once certain preconditions of technology and production present within a source group have also been met and incorporated into the social processes of a recipient group. This means that the challenges of production have to be mastered and its technology has to become common currency within a community before transmitted aesthetic elements may be incorporated into a larger concept of a local "style" and "culture".

This is important for it suggests that subsequent generations need not necessarily re-invent a technology, merely re-interpret it. As such then the transmission of aesthetic elements becomes part of a larger body of cognitive symbology whose meaning is generally understood but not necessarily spoken or consciously rationalised.

This paper is concerned with the mechanics of transmission in the architecture of pre-industrial society, primarily over a period of time, although elements of culture and distance will, unavoidably, also be discussed. It analyses their nature and possible origins in such diverse contexts as rural southern Africa, medieval Italy and early Muslim Palestine and thereafter seeks to derive some basic principles.

ELEMENTS OF TRANSMISSION

It is probable that, over the years, the transmission of architectural forms from one generation to the next, will take place through any number of different agencies, either individually or as part of a larger multi-faceted and overlapping series of patterns. Generally speaking however, these may be seen to fall into seven major areas of concern.

1 TRANSMISSION THROUGH TECHNOLOGY

The art of building in any pre-industrial society may be seen to encompass a wide range of relationships between the producer, or builder, on the one hand, and the consumer, or owner, on the other. This spans from hunter-gatherer, pastoralist and early agriculturalist economies, where the role of producer and consumer are usually embodied in the same person, through to a late craft period where specialist artisans begin to arise in a community but where the consumer shares in the craftsman's knowledge and terminology and, should the need arise, may even be able to take part in his work. During this time the transmission of building knowledge takes place as part of the everyday processes of life, where erecting a wall may be as much part of the daily household chores as cooking a meal or weeding the fields. It often involves all members of the family group and each person will have an allotted task to perform, according to their age and gender. Even where master craftsmen do arise the client is still able to enter into debate over the building process, being familiar with the technology being used as well as its limitations. It is only once the technological and aesthetic principles employed are removed beyond the grasp of the average consumer that he, or she, will become alienated from the building process and usually employ a specialist designer to act on his, or her, behalf.

This relationship between consumer and producer however also assumes that the "high" technology and design practices of one era may, with time and usage, become familiar to the average consumer and thus be reduced to the level of a folk or craft tradition. It also means that an existing "popular" technology may be re-interpreted by subsequent generations to produce new forms and buildings in order to fulfil a new set of functions.

The transmission of technology during this time will probably be achieved through daily contact, practical experience, peer group association and tuition from elders, although during the latter part of this period trade guilds would also be a powerful influence. Ultimately, however, it is the guild system which serves to alienate the consumer from the building process and necessitates the introduction of specialist designers.

2. TRANSMISSION THROUGH SOCIAL CUSTOM

This is likely to play a strong role in those communities where the building process is used to reinforce social structures and interpersonal links. In such groups the construction of shelter is part of a larger pattern of survival techniques which also include communal co-operation in such times as planting, harvesting and warfare. Rural man gains a large measure of personal identity through participation in such activities, knowing that he is cooperating in the survival of the group and that, when the need will inevitably arise, his neighbours, in their turn, will also render similar assistance. Thus when a community gathers to build a dwelling for one of its members they tend to erect forms common to the group, in a technology they all understand. Should the family being assisted request that their dwelling be built in a new form or use a new technology then, in doing so, they will be excluding a large proportion of their neighbours from the building process, thus removing them from the cycle of mutual indebtedness and weakening the social links which bind them.

Social custom is perceived by many to be a conservative force which does not promote the experimentation of either new forms or new technologies. Nonetheless the outwardly-apparent uniformity of many rural dwellings may be perceived to affirm and reinforce an individual's sense of identity and position within that community. This contrasts sharply with the stance taken by industrialised groups whose values usually decry uniformity and believe that "identity" can only be expressed through a differentiation of housing. Thus rural and pre-industrial man may be said to achieve personal identity and social status through a process of co-operation and integration; urban and industrialized man achieves this through alienation and separation.

3. TRANSMISSION THROUGH BUILDING FUNCTION

This refers to the process whereby a structural element of a building, designed to meet the performance criteria of one material, may find itself overtaken by either a shortage of this material, the availability of a new material or the invention of a better technology. Instead of redesigning those parts involved in order to meet new conditions, many elements in the past have displayed a tendency to retain their older form in spite of its potential inefficiency. This may be attributed to the social inertia inherent in the building practices of many pre-industrial societies. Examples recorded include the translation, during Grecian times, of a timber post and lintel system to stone technology, and the retention of pedimented wall openings after the invention of self-supporting lintels.

4. TRANSMISSION THROUGH ARCHITECTURAL FORM

This refers to such cases where a building designed to fulfill the specific needs and social functions of one group, is taken over by another group whose new and quite different requirements are met by the same architectural forms or spaces. The particulars of such cases vary greatly. The growing Christian community of Rome, for example, discovered that many of its religious needs could be met, with little alteration, by the Basilican law courts of the previous order. Thereafter the transformation of the Roman basilica to the cathedral of Gothic times took nearly 800 years to achieve but the two forms remained nonetheless related through a series of slow evolutionary changes which involved both architectural form and building technology. Similarly in medieval Italy the imposition of circular baptistries upon the sites of previous Vestal temples, being sites dedicated to the hearth, woman, the home and hence fertility, must also be seen as the continuation of earlier social practices under the vestige of a new ideology and function - much like the Roman Saturnalia was eventually supplanted by a Christian Christmas..

5. TRANSMISSION THROUGH MATERIAL EXPORTATION

The physical translation of architectural ideas and technologies from one country or society to the next, has been recorded variously during past eras and has taken many forms, from the employment of foreign architects to the removal of whole buildings and their reconstruction on another site. The outcome however has not always been successful as many of the resultant buildings have failed to meet the expectations of either their users or their creators. Perhaps it is for this reason that we tend to know about those examples which have succeeded rather than where the opposite has been true. One such case in point is the visitational mosque of the Dome of the Rock, begun by Byzantine architects and craftsmen in 688. The mechanics of such transmission may also be found in the medieval guild system which permitted master craftsmen engaged upon a journey or a pilgrimage to exchange trade secrets with colleagues in other towns.

6. TRANSMISSION THROUGH THE RE-UTILISATION OF ELEMENTS

This involved the physical removal of structural elements from one building and their re-utilisation in another. The practice may have been intended primarily as a form of cheap construction, but it also served to maintain a sense of continuity from one era to the next and insured that the basic textures of such buildings remained within a larger tradition of local architecture.

7. TRANSMISSION THROUGH ARCHITECTURAL SYMBOLISM

Elements of architecture may, in many ways, be perceived to have become symbols of other and often more complex ideas. A doorway, for example, may also act as a focus for concepts of privacy, threshold, transition, passage, entry, security and, in some societies, birth. A window, as the name suggests, was originally called a "wind hole" with obvious connotations of ventilation and may have had little to do with its more recent functions of lighting, socialisation, communication and social status. Certain building forms may, with time, also become synonymous with selected functions. Banks, universities and government structures, for example, all arouse specific stereotypical pictures in our minds which produce strongly identifiable images and metaphors.

In this respect, perhaps one of the most influential structures recorded in our architectural history has been the Colosseum in Rome, not so much for its form or functions, as for the symbolism inherent in its construction. Its facade with its original graduation from simple Doric at ground level, to Ionic on the second and ornate Corinthian on the third, uses these orders as metaphors of the larger social structuring of Roman society, from the nobility through the merchant classes down to the plebs. Significantly once inside the social order was inverted although the ground floor exits, all eighty of them, were commonly referred to as the vomitorium for the manner they could disgorge spectators from the building. The articulation of the Colosseum facade has been a powerful regulating influence upon the facade aesthetic of buildings through to present times. The most notable of these was perhaps the Renaissance palazzo with its rusticated ground floor, the grand first floor or piano nobile and the most comfortable rooms, the family's apartments, on the top floor.

THREE CASE STUDIES

The Dome of the Rock complex in Jerusalem consists of the following buildings: the Dome of the Rock visitational mosque begun in 688; the Dome of the Chain built contemporarily to the Dome of the Rock; and the Mosque of al-Aqsa, rebuilt in 710 and drastically altered in the 1940s. This complex owes much to a Byzantine centralised church tradition as well as the more conventional devotional church plan adopted through a later Coptic Christian influence.

The buildings on the Campo dei Miracoli at Pisa, comprise of four main structures: the Cathedral built in two stages between 1063-1118 and 1261-72; the Campanile built between 1174-1271 and with the bell storey being added in 1350; the Baptistry built 1153-1265; and the Campo Santo begun in the 1200s. These structures owe much to local architectural traditions, starting in the ninth century with the erection of San Paolo a Ripa d'Arno, as well as nearby Roman remains which were extensively plundered and incorporated into these buildings.

The Cathedral complex of Firenze consists of the following buildings: Santa Maria del Fiore, begun in 1296 in direct competition with the Pisan example, and continued until 1434 when Brunelleschi's cupola was completed; the Baptistry built during the mid-11th century; and the Campanile begun by Giotto in 1334 and completed in 1359 after his death.

Read in their wider geographical context these three groups of buildings exhibit a unity of forms, functions and decorative motifs which places them firmly into a larger Mediterranean architectural tradition. Each has used common elements such as the centralised church, the devotional church, the dome and the tower as parts of their planning; each has used a variety of decorative patterns within the individual buildings which, in spite of their diversity, still manage to combine and harmonise, as part of the whole; each has also plundered pieces from the buildings of previous eras and incorporated these into their own.

CONCLUSIONS

Although the processes of architectural transmission discussed above have been separated and itemised for the sake of discussion, it will be obvious that these are either largely overlapping or, in a couple of cases, that they represented different aspects of the same argument. Thus the mechanics of such a transmission cannot be attributed to any one single factor but must rather be seen as the product of any number of these acting as a whole. As such then they cannot be separated from the activities of man or, more specifically, his thinking, prejudices, values and perceptions. If we are to consider the artifacts of man, his buildings, not as products but as the result of a number of interactions, then it becomes reasonable to assume that the choice of forms, textures and aesthetics is not the brainchild of a series of idiosyncratic designers acting in isolation, but rather the work of persons working within the values and norms current to their own time and society. These do not exist in a vacuum but are linked to, and are indelibly formed by, those of previous eras.

Therefore when the builders of the churches, baptistries and campanili of the post-Roman era designed these structures, they were acting within the constraints and practices of their own times. They did not have to re-invent what they used, but merely to re-interpret it, adapt it or reuse it and, in spite of making small, idiosyncratic changes in the process, they continued to practice the same architectural traditions begun by the generations before them.

If we can view such traditions to comprise not a style, but a maniera, a way of doing things, then quite clearly also we are dealing with a larger language of architecture – a vocabulary rich in nouns, idioms and metaphors, having a "high" as well as a "folk" tradition - which is transmitted from generation to generation as a cognitive, unspoken tongue. Like society which gives rise to it, it is not homogenous nor does it remain static and unchanging. It also acts as a banner, a pennon identifying its builders as surely as any battle colours.

POSTSCRIPT

This is the outcome of a conference paper presented in Durban in 1990, which then became a teaching paper (Transmission and Change in Architecture. SA Association of Art Historians Annual Conference on Diversity and Interaction. University of Natal, Durban, 17-19 July 1989). Although it was subsequently published in the conference proceedings, this was not peer-reviewed and only enjoyed limited circulation (Transmission and Change in Architecture. “Diversity and Interaction”, Durban: SAAAH, 1990). I expect that. One of these days I shall revise it for formal publication.