Tuesday, October 23, 2018

Stream of consciousness | Data Collection | Dinara Satbayeva




Here is my second blog post, which does not come easy, as I need to put together everything I thought about since I started to structure my thesis more thoughtfully. Even though my research topic is not fully shaped I’m starting to think about the data I will use. In the end there can be multiple ways of going around the thesis, so I am tying a less straightforward one. At first, it may seem too early to think about all the numbers and details, however, in many ways, the type of data that you can acquire and the adequacy of this data influences the feasibility of the whole research.

In this blog I would like to start developing a roadmap - a data planning. In my current phrasing, the research suggests an extensive usage of qualitative data that is produced by direct and indirect interaction with people. Studying participatory management involves an attempt for a better understanding of the modes of thinking of my audience. As architecture serves as a backbone structure of human interaction, of the community and the sense of communal space, audience involvement in the interpretive process is unavoidable.

Specifically: How does public opinion on architecture form? What do people appreciate about architecture? Why do people dislike modernist architecture? Do people see themselves as a decision-making party to how architecture is constructed? Do they want to have a decision-making agency?

These questions were popping up in my mind, as I was reading various “how to get your research started” articles. I felt a need to come back to a bigger picture and talk about the society and architecture in general. Historical changes in the ideas of power relationship, ideology and aesthetics can come in handy to consider. Also, before considering what kinds of data collection techniques I can use, it worths thinking about what kind of information I need more narrowly.

So, current position of modernist architecture can be compared in time and space. One of the ways to do this is looking at how modernist architecture of the soviet time can now be interpreted within a larger style of western Brutalism. Especially, it is interesting to look at how these two styles, which have a lot in common aesthetically, can be treated and perceived differently. It is also exciting to see the inherent contradictions of the style and their influence on people's understanding.

Brutalism” refers to the style that was firstly coined by the Swedish architect Hans Asplund. He used the word describing Villa Göth, a modern brick home in Uppsala. This house was designed in 1949 by architects Bengt Edman and Lennart Holm. However, today it is mostly associated with Le Corbusier, who employed the french phrase “béton brut”, to underline the essential material of brutalist architecture – raw concrete. Brutalism was a outgrowth of modern architecture, largely motivated by the urge to rebuild living spaces after the Second World War.

One of the most striking contradictions come from the term itself. It can be easily trapped in a mis-association. The adjective “brutal” that implies various negative connotations of cruel, harsh, and unpleasant, despite having common latin origins with “Brutalist”, is not a correct way of conceptualizing Brutalist architecture. This association in itself can suggest a negative narrative behind those buildings. For modernist architecture the familial connection to brutalism and historical coexistence with an oppressive regime poses an even bigger question of associations.











Habitat 67 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.


Another contradiction comes from the principles of brutalist and modernist architecture. As architect and critic Reyner Banham writes in an article for The Architectural Review in 1955 “The New Brutalism,” there are three three qualities of Brutalist objects: Memorability as an Image, Clear exhibition of structure, Valuation of materials for their inherent qualities ‘as found.’

Without going into details, whereas two first qualities are aiming to define a modern aesthetic clearly, the third is also a way of creating a down-to-earth architecture of simple and functional raw material. In my thinking the principle of 'as found', thus supposed to speak to the audience with more clarity and be more approachable, however in practice, these principles can cause another effect. Concrete and geometrical forms appear as antagonistic and cold.

Therefore, my research is a part of a larger issue of translating brutalist and modernist architecture in the way it was intended to be translated. Conveying its universal, ahistorical and human-needs-centric idea, where the buildings would provide a spacial interactive platform for society, not an oppressive spacial force.

The Brunel University Lecture Center prominently featured in Stanley Kubrick’s movie A Clockwork Orange. Built in the 1960s, designed by Richard Sheppard, Robson & Partners.

This kind of stream of consciousness discussion, if advanced, helps me see the approach for evidence collection I should undertake. If going into specifics of my own research, I can see several paths and hence several data collection scenarios. The first was suggested during my thesis planning meeting, which revolves around a simple question “Why do people like or dislike Soviet Modernist architecture in Kazakhstan?”.

Interviews
Questionnaires and Surveys
Observations
Focus Groups
Ethnographies and Case Studies
Documents and Records

These are some of the methods I will consider as I proceed. Hopefully, this approaches can start a dialog to understand and engage with a topic of how the society views and interacts with our urban landscapes and modernist buildings in particular.


BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Banham, Reyner. "The New Brutalism." October (2011): 19-28.

Molnár, Virág. "Cultural politics and modernist architecture: the tulip debate in postwar Hungary." American Sociological Review 70, no. 1 (2005): 111-135.

Reid, Susan E. "Communist comfort: socialist modernism and the making of cosy homes in the Khrushchev era." Gender & History 21, no. 3 (2009): 465-498.


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