The Eyes of the Skin

fl'om our very encounter with the world and our being-in-the-world - itis not conceptualised or intellectualised.Retinal Architecture and the Lossof PlasticityIt is evident that the architecture of traditional cultures is also essentiallyconnected with the tacit wisdom of the body, instead of being visuallyand conceptually dominated. Construction in traditional cultures isguided by the body in the same way that a bird shapes its nest by movementsof its body. Indigenous clay and mud architectures in various partsof the world seem to be born of the muscular and haptic senses morethan the eye. We can even identify the transition of indigenous constructionfrom the haptic realm into the control of vision as a loss ofplasticity and intimacy, and of the sense of total fusion characteristicthe settings of indigenouscultures.The dominance of the sense of vision pointed out in philosophicalthought is equally evident in the development of Western architecture.Greek architecture, with its elaborate systems of optical corrections, wasalready ultimately refined for the pleasure of the eye. However, the privilegingof sight does not necessarily imply a rejection of the other senses,as the haptic sensibility, materiality and authoritative weight of Greekarchitecture prove; the eye invites and stimulates muscular and tactilesensations. The sense of sight may incorporate, and even reinforce,other sense modalities; the unconscious tactile ingredient in vision isparticularly important and strongly present in historical architecture, butbadly neglected in the architecture of our time.Western architecturaltheory since Leon Battista Alberti has been primarilyengaged with questions of visual perception, harmony and proportion.Alberti's statement that 'painting is nothing but the intersectionof the visual pyramidfollowing a given distance, a fixed centre and acertain lighting' outlines the perspectival paradigm which also becamethe instrument of architectural thinking.45 Again, it has to be empha-in. d [hat the conscious focusing on the mechanics of vision did notsls~OJ11atiCallyresult in the decisive and deliberate rejection of otherau seS before our own era of the omnipresent visual image. The eyesen tiers its hegemonic role in architectural practice, both consciouslyan co:qtlnconsciously, only gradually with the emergence of the idea of abo d'I"sS 1 "'- observer. The observer becomes detached from an incarnaterelation with the environment through the suppression of the othersenS es in particular by means of technological extensions of the eye, and-,the proliferation of images. As Marx W Wartofsky argues, 'the humanVIS10.. n is itself an artifact, produced by other artifacts, namely pictures'.46The dominant sense of vision figures strongly in the writings of themodernists. Statements by Le Corbusier - such as: 'I exist in life only ifI can sec';47 'I am and I remain an impenitent visual - everything is inthe visual';48 'One needs to see clearly in order to understand';49 ' ... IurgC YOU to openyour eyes. Do you open your eyes? Are you trained too en your eyes? Do you know how to open your eyes, do you opent:crn often, always, well?';50 'Man looks at the creation of architecturewitb bis eyes, which are 5 feet 6 inches from the ground';51 and,'Arcbitecture is a plastic thing. I mean by "plastic" what is seen andmeasuredby the eyes,52- make the privileging of the eye in early modernisttbeory very clear. Further declarations by Walter Gropius - 'He[tbe designer] has to adapt knowledge of the scientific facts of opticsand tbus obtain a theoretical ground that will guide the hand givingsbape, and create an objective basis'53 - and by Laszlo Moholy-Nagy­'Tbe bygiene of the optical, the health of the visible is slowly filteringthrough'54 - confirm the central role of vision in modernist thought.Le Corbusier's famous credo, 'Architecture is the masterly, correctand magnificentplay of masses brought together in light',55 unquestionablydefines an architecture of the eye. Le Corbusier, however, was agreat artistic talent with a moulding hand, and a tremendous sense ofmateriality, plasticity and gravity, all of which prevented his architecturefrom turning into sensory reductivism. Regardless of Le Corbusier's26THE EYES OFTHE SKINPART I 27