Читать онлайн Юрий Погудин - Architecture. Dialectic. Synthesis

Dedicated to my family:

my wife Zoe and daughter Taya,

my mother Lyudmila, my father Alexander

and my sister Nina

Dear readers, the translation of this book was performed by a friend of our family, Anna Kanunnikova. I am deeply grateful to her for the work.

The author hopes that the proposed direction will contribute to new architectural searches and discoveries.

September 14, 2025

Preface to the 2025 edition

Dear readers, in this edition, two interrelated works on the dialectical architectural concept are published together – "Dialectics of Architecture" (2006, Moscow: Litres, 2024) and "Synthesis of Architectural Form. From Meaning to Concept" (Moscow: Litres, 2023) – as well as "Manifesto…" (2023) and articles on the architectural and aesthetic theme (2024-2025), which are close to them.

In total, the works collected in this edition outline the dialectical foundations of understanding architecture and architectural morphogenesis on the basis of the philosophy and aesthetics of Aleksei Fyodorovich Losev (1893-1988) and the propaedeutics of the school of rationalism of Nikolai Alexandrovich Ladovsky (1881-1941). The author is aware of the controversial nature and the incompleteness of the work started. But at the same time, I agree with the statement by Aldo Rossi that architecture "is developing in many paths.1"

I hope that the book will not only be interesting theoretically, but also useful in the practical search for new forms and ways in modern architectural aesthetics.

I sincerely thank my family, the teachers who taught me, my mentors and my students!

Have a co-creative reading!

Feedback and comments can be sent to email: yuripogudin@archineo.ru

Yuri Pogudin. January 18, 2025

DIALECTIC OF ARCHITECTURE

Preface

The work offered to dear readers was created in 2001-2006 and became the general theoretical basis for the book "Synthesis of Architectural Form. From Meaning to Concept" (2023) that has an applied nature. After several years, the author perceives this first attempt to create a dialectical theory of architecture as successful and imperfect at the same time. But still, after minimal processing of the text written long ago, I have decided to publish it. For those who are already familiar with my publications on the topic of architectural morphogenesis (or architectural form generation), this work may be interesting as a kind of background, and as the development of general dialectical foundations of architecture. It will also be interesting to those who value the work of the great Russian dialectic philosopher Aleksei Fyodorovich Losev as an attempt to develop his ideas in the field of architectural theory.

The author expresses his wish that the "Dialectic of Architecture", forming a two–pronged work together with the "Synthesis of Architectural Form", inspire readers to develop and search for new ideas in incessant architectural creation.

Yuri Pogudin

October 14, 2023

Introduction

This work is devoted to understanding architecture, comprehending its philosophical and dialectical meaning.

The author has set himself two tasks: to formulate the essence of architecture and outline the foundations of its dialectical theory, as well as to consider architecture as a "philosophy in stone." These seemingly different tasks are combined in the idea that considers a person in the unity of spirit and body. Getting ahead of ourselves, let's notice that architecture from these positions is understood as an integral spiritual and material being unfolding in human nature, suggesting two points: 1. the continuation and development of the body in nature. From this point of view, architecture is understood as the second human body or the material side of his being presented in nature, and 2. the materialization of the worldview (theology, philosophy, creed, ideology, mythology). From this point of view, architecture is the embodiment of the ideal side of man in nature, ensuring the fullness of human existence in the world.

Essence of Architecture

Architecture as a Second Body

For a better understanding of the essence of the architectural form, let's compare it with the sculptural form. For this purpose, let us turn to the reasoning of Aleksei Losev in his "Dialectic of Artistic Form":

"…What is the difference between a sculptural form and an architectural one? To say that the difference lies in the material is ridiculous and strange. To say that one depicts people, and the other protects people from precipitation, is also ridiculous, because sculptures can have features protecting from precipitation, and architecture can depict a living being, something like the famous Trojan horse2. What is the difference, then? I see it only in the fact that architecture organizes pure materiality, that is, mass, volume and density, pure facticity and positedness, fixedness. There is nothing like that in the sculpture. Architecture gives weight to pure materiality, massive three-dimensional dense space, and presents space as a force field. That's why the architectural form is attributed to the first dialectical category in the general sphere of tectonism, to the category that speaks only of pure positing, pure potency, of the one, which as such is above all formalization, because it establishes and generates this formalization. Being reflected on the fourth principle, this principle gives, as we saw in paragraph 2, the categories of mass, volume and density. Architecture is the art of pure mass, pure volume and pure density, as well as their various designs and combinations. And the most important thing is that we thought of the fourth principle, as we remember, only as a carrier, acontainer of meaning, not meaningful in itself, but only positing, really fixing the intelligent element of pure meaning. Therefore, the architectural form is always the form of a carrier, a container of something else, more internal. An architectural work is architectural one not because it is a dwelling, a temple, and nature, but because its dialectical place is in the realm of pure hypostatization and positedness of meaning, from which it is clear why it is always a container. Sculpture, on the other hand, does not deal with space as such, that is, spreading as such. What is important to it is not the weight distribution itself in its qualitative nature, but what exactly is spread out, the single units that are spread out in a weighty way in space. If an architectural work is always a container, then in sculpture we already see what exactly is contained in the body, although not without the body, because otherwise it would be painting, poetry or music. Hence, in my classification, this form belongs to the category of incarnation of the second principle in the fourth one. The second principle, eidos, is precisely the semantic "what" of every incarnation in the sphere of tectonism. – Such is the dialectical structure of sculptural and architectural forms.3"

Architecture is a container, and the ability to contain is the main property of space. Space is primarily characterized by the ability to accommodate things, both at rest and moving. Therefore, architecture can be defined as a form of space, a material form of space. The sculptural form is the form of the material. Sculpture needs space as a sphere of its existence, while architecture is engaged in shaping this space. It explains the famous aphorism of Nikolai Ladovsky: "Space, not stone, is the material of architecture.4" Space is the subject of architectural activity, well-formed space is the goal of architecture, and materials and structures are the means to achieve this goal. Architecture obviously follows the path of liberation from materials and structures by striving to create structures that realize any form. Architect Leonid Pavlov spoke about this, crystallizing his thoughts in the paradox of the fundamental immateriality of architecture. Architecture, in the limit, strives to entirely free itself from the dictates of material and structures, and to become the architecture of certain force fields, etc. Of course, this means liberation from coarse material (metal, glass, concrete, etc.), and not from matter as such. The force field is also more subtle matter. And architecture always remains the material arrangement of a space containing people and nature. The means of architecture are evolving, but its meaning and purpose remain unchanged. In such a way, the form of the living space is created.

In the system of dialectics of the artistic form developed by Losev, architecture is 5quite logically attributed to the first semantic principle, since architecture is the most general unifying basis for all other arts. The basis is the first principle of Meaning in Losev's triad of Basis, Form, and Action6.

On the other hand, the dialectic of human activity derived from anthropology justifies the location of architecture precisely in the fourth semantic principle, since it is thought of precisely as embodying the Triune Meaning, as the body of Meaning7, and Losev quite rightly insists on physicality as the fundamental quality of architecture8. In addition, clarifying the brilliantly clear and simple Losev's definition of architecture as a container, it should be pointed out that architecture is precisely the container of the body, and, even more specifically, of the humanbody. Architecture reveals its meaning not just as a container, but as a container of the human body in its life and functioning. After all, a tree hollow accommodates a woodpecker, but it is not an architectural phenomenon. Further, as we understand essence of architecture in this way, it is necessary to establish a semantic connection between the building, the house as a unit of architecture and the human body. This connection is remarkably illustrated by Fr. Pavel Florensky. Developing the idea of so-called organoprojection, which is that "tools expand the scope of our activity and our senses by continuing our body," the 9philosopher writes: "Let us now turn to the synthetic tool that combines many tools and, fundamentally speaking, all tools. This tool is a dwelling, a house. All the tools are collected n the house, as the center, or are located at the house, near it, related to it, they serve it. What is the projection of a dwelling? What exactly is projected by it? By its design, the dwelling should combine the totality of our tools – our entire household. And if each tool separately is a reflection of some organ of our body from one side or the other, then the whole set of economy, as one organized whole, is a reflection of the whole set of functional organs, in their coordination. Consequently, the dwelling has the whole body in its entirety as its prototype. Here we recall the common comparison of the body with the house of the soul, with the dwelling of the mind. The body is likened to a dwelling, for the dwelling itself is a reflection of the body. <…> A house is like a body, and different parts of household equipment analogically correspond to body organs. The water supply system corresponds to the circulatory system, the electric wires of bells, telephones, etc. correspond to the nervous system, the furnace corresponds to the lungs, the chimney corresponds to the throat, etc., etc.