bravkat - a reflexive praxis
investigating iterative architectural, societal and cognitive scenarios
1-800-APOCALYPSE 'Tabula Rasa ON DEMAND!' Own work, collage. The collage shows a post-apocalyptic landscape that references to the consumer society hysteria juxtaposed with the emerging condition of a capsular society; a ‘fearspace’. An emotion that is overtaking the public domain consequently causing a diplopia (double vision) of the moment, the inability to distinct the real from the unreal (or even surreal). The slender structures depict an over-extended post-modernism, it provokes the question whether our society is solely a mimesis of the real, an irrational attempt to order the temporal existence and territory of humanity. The structures are derived from Simon Ungers' 'Ferrous Forms'.
Claude Nicolas Ledoux 'Le projet du prison d'Aix-en-Provence' (~1785) - plan / 'Château de Mauperthuis' (1763) - elevation. Own work, collage. The collage is a literal interpretation of the doctrine of neoclassicism. The tympana are pointing to inescapable radial centre, the connected roofs form a boundary analogous to prison walls; one might even spot the similarity to the crucifix.
Clash with tradition: Jacob van Ruisdael 'Gezicht op Haarlem' (~1670) / Umberto Boccioni 'Forme uniche della continuità nello spazio' (1913). Own work, collage. The Dutch Golden Age juxtaposed to Italian Futurism. It shows the violence and the destructive scale of the tabula rasa strategies of Italian Futurism, the violent initiator of Modernism. One of the voices of the Futurist movement, Antonio Sant'Elia, states: “No architecture has existed since 1700. A moronic mixture of the most various stylistic elements used to mask the skeletons of modern houses is called ‘modern architecture’. The new beauty of cement and iron are profaned by the superimposition of motley decorative incrustations that cannot be justified either by constructive necessity or by our (modern) taste, and whose origins are in Egyptian, Indian or Byzantine antiquity and in that idiotic flowering of stupidity and impotence that took the name neoclassicism. These architectonic prostitutions are welcomed in Italy, and rapacious alien ineptitude is passed off as talented invention and as extremely up-to-date architecture.” – Sant’Elia, A. Source: Caramel, L., Longatti, A. (1988), ‘Antonio Sant’Elia. The Complete Works.’ p. 160.
Still from the movie 'Tykho Moon' (1996) by Enki Bilal. The still is striking because of the tension between the superimposed monuments of a degrading society (or in the case of the movie 'colony').
Thomas Cole 'The Oxbow (view from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm' (1836) / Simon Ungers 'Speaking Architecture' (2000). Own work, collage. Cantilevering structures, that are situated on a grid, reduce the building envelope dramatically and therefore respect the topography of the landscape. The juxtaposition of the towers affirm the human presence in the landscape but denies human dominance.
Typological research in a Dutch peripheral urban area. It shows - in a straightforward way - the relation between the plot, built surface and type. Own work, CAD.
Impression at night of a pedestrian bridge using a Pratt-truss connecting (and carefully dissecting) two collective planes through the horizontality of the communal sports field. Own work, collage.
