In recent years I`ve become increasingly aware of my being attracted to one special kind of architecture, namely one which not only takes dark and disturbing realms into consideration, but embraces them and puts them into the core of their existence. This aspect is not limited to architecture only, in fact it is to be found in similar ways in film, art, literature and comics. Considering this topic, nearly every artistic discipline has developed its own genre or at least a stylistic movement which attached great importance to it– as a prime example, there is film noir. In architecture on the other hand, there has not been any comparable involvement that I'm aware of since Gothic.
Man as an emotional being is susceptible to impulses which activate a complex system of emotional reactions. Emotional impulses are able to connect man and environment – the experience of beauty for instance can be classified as a specific positiv valued emotion. An environment is not only a cognitive ambiance but an affective one too - the experience of such an enviroment provokes either attraction or aversion. Different qualities of an ambiance correspond to specific emotional reactions which are part of a wide spectrum consisting of three dimensions: lust and dislike, excitation and boredom and dominance and subservience. The balance between those dimensions is essential for the liking of a given environment.
In architectural theory there seems to be a premature consensus of the necessity for architecture to be positive and friendly, whereas a term like positive falls short of the complex diversity of the human emotions.
An architectural dystopia has to fail because of its misanthropy, an architectural utopia on the other hand can't work either because it aims by definition for a perfect and ideal situation which is to one-sided compared with human nature.
The point of my considerations is not an appeal to only create dark and disturbing buildings from now on, but to consider the qualities of threatening, sinister or apocalyptic environments, explore to which extend they can be transferred into architecture and not to condemn them hastily as negative and unproductive.
My acces to the topic For witches and wizards (formerly For witches and devils) commits itself to the dark connotation of the these building owners.
I see the project as an excellent opportunity to start an experiment creating “architecture noir“ with the aim to learn how to deal with its attributes.
[in progress]
