Atmosphere and Aesthetics: A Plural Perspective. FM e Intro

Heritage and the City: Values and Beyond, 2022

The aesthetic perception of a spatial atmosphere is related to the sensory experience we have in that space. Although this experience is led by a multisensory understanding, the dominant sense is generally the sense of sight in architectural spaces. This dominance—which is generally connected to the Modernist architects as asserted by, for example, Juhani Pallasmaa (2005)—is related to the speed of the perception, or speed of the transfer of the data amount collected by this sense. What is perceived and evaluated aesthetically via the data provided by the sense of sight comprises the composition of the spatial atmosphere in visual respect. In this visual rendition, composition principles have an important role in affecting the experiencers aesthetically in the evaluation of space by setting objective criteria. Therefore, in this paper, I aim to read and understand the relationships between architectural spaces and composition principles as objective atmosphere generators. I chose rhythm, contrast, and unity in variety as the composition principles frequently used in architectural design. To demonstrate this relationship, I firstly made a literature review to provide a base for the analyses theoretically, and secondly, I made a case study comprising the examples having visual organizations created by the mentioned composition principles. The cases to discuss the visual qualities provided by these principles comprise the Villa Stein (Paris, France, 1927) designed by Le Corbusier, the Barcelona Pavilion designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Georg Kolbe’s sculpture named the Dawn (Alba) (Barcelona, Spain, 1929), and the Brion Cemetery (San Vito d’Altivole, Italy, 1969-77) designed by Carlo Scarpa. Examining the atmospheric design and genii given by the composition principles in these cases may pave the way for understanding the lack we have in the aesthetic qualities of today’s architecture.

Social and Cultural Geography

Something more. Atmospheres and pathic aesthetics, in T. Griffero/G. Moretti (ed.), Atmosphere/Atmospheres. Testing a new paradigm, Mimesis International, Milan, pp. 75-89, 2018

2020

My attempt in this paper is to illustrate some of the major developments in current phenomenological aesthetic research in the field of Atmospheres, showing how this concept has first consolidated through phenomenological approaches and has then concretized in the context of contemporary architecture. A main issue in this regard is the theoretical-philosophical basis on which the new contexts of this project are based and are therefore marked by a sensitive and perceptive approach toward the inhabited space. Through the concepts of experience, sensitive perception, and predisposition to places I will investigate how Atmospheres today represent an aesthetic way to interpret not only the inhabited space, but also the architectural project in modern and contemporary architecture.

Lebenswelt Aesthetics and Philosophy of Experience, 2014

My attempt in this paper is to illustrate some of the major developments in current phenomenological aesthetic research in the field of Atmospheres, showing how this concept has first consolidated through phenomenological approaches and has then concretized in the context of contemporary architecture. A main issue in this regard is the theoretical-philosophical basis on which the new contexts of this project are based and are therefore marked by a sensitive and perceptive approach toward the inhabited space. Through the concepts of experience, sensitive perception , and predisposition to places I will investigate how Atmospheres today represent an aesthetic way to interpret not only the inhabited space, but also the architectural project in modern and contemporary architecture.

Open Philosophy, 2019

Atmospheres constitute an ordinary perceptual phenomenon that can become a new experience, as the former are more than the sum of single-sensory perceptual factors. Drawing on the terminological pair ‘subject’ and ‘object’ and its interdependencies, the atmospheric phenomenon can be approached in an essayistic fashion (and by means of applying an aesthetic focus in the broadest sense). In so doing, it becomes clear that the atmosphere serves as a condition for the emergence as well as actualization of special perception. Based on Gernot Böhme’s research and further studies, specific (ontological) determinants are identified and differentiated according to the definitional facets of the ‘and’, the ‘in-between’ and the ‘whereby’ or ‘in what way’. These considerations demonstrate to what extent perception precedes the separation of subject and object in that the atmospheric ‘whereby’ is responsible for creating tuned spaces and situations. Turning to the objects of perception and their concomitant ecstasies as well as to the subject of perception with its reception helps to clarify which components of an atmosphere work in what way. In this context, methods of exploratory involvement and participation (in the Parcours Commenté but even more so in the Aesthetic Fieldwork) gain in importance in order to explore atmospheres from a lifeworld perspective.

This chapter, which is based on my book "Atmosphären erleben", Berlin: Akademie-Verlag 1994, was published in "Designing Atmospheres", ed. Jürgen Weidinger, Berlin: Universitätsverlag 2018, 41-54. A German version was published four years earlier.

Proceedings of DARCH 2022 November - 3rd International Conference on Architecture & Design

In this paper we try to understand ways through which the construction of atmospheres in the field of painting is operated. The methodology consisted of a literature review that enabled a choice of case studies that we found appropriate and capable of producing fruitful connections between themselves. We try to establish several distinctions and different approaches to try to clarify different ways in which, in our perspective, diverse types of atmospheres might be constructed. The case studies are chosen for their ability to question each approach, considering their pictorial values rather than questions of historical or other frameworks. We try to reach conclusions concerning the construction of atmospheres in themselves and what they might induce, considering mainly concepts developed by the neurologist Erwin Straus. We were particularly focused on the potential conclusions and possible knowledge concerning the construction of atmospheres in themselves, and what they might induce in cognitive and its consequences in interpretative forms, namely in design in the scope of its operative field.