Drawing: The Motive Force of Architecture - Softcover

Peter Cook

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0470034815 ISBN 13: 9780470034811

Publisher: Wiley, 2008

Synopsis

Focusing on the creative and inventive significance of drawing for architecture, Drawings highlights the work of key contemporary figures who have, through their drawn work, affected the course of architectural thinking. Bringing this together is a chapter-by-chapter series of essays that broadly charts the forward movement and expansion of drawing iconography, techniques and methodologies. Thus it will move from such conditions as Victorian romanticism; Modernist heroics, Minimalism, Diagrams, the representation (and inspiration) of movement, technology and motive power; through to notions and examples of digital automatism. In this way, the advent and challenge of computer-based drawing vis-à-vis ‘sketching’ or technique based drawing will be argued as a natural progression rather than a radical explosion. In particular, there are many examples of hand-in-hand development of a project using several techniques. 

Also includes drawings by Sverre Fehn, Mark Goulthorpe, Zaha Hadid, Ron Herron, Tom Kovak, Enric Miralles, Marcus Novak , Cedric Price, Wolf Prix, and Lebbeus Woods.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

Drawing is to architects what writing is to authors. For the designer, jotting must be an almost & unconscious act, relying on the imperceptible synergy between brain, eye and hand, or mouse. The graphic pervades every stage of architectural creation. It represents the initial impulse - the napkin sketch or digital scribble. It is also the primary means of working up a building design - on or off screen - for production and presentation. It, additionally, allows us to fuel our tectonic imaginations and go beyond the built and the feasible into the sphere of the visionary and fantastic. Drawing provides the very motive force of architecture.

Focusing on the creative and inventive significance of drawing for architecture, this book is a paean to the graphic by one of its greatest proponents,Sir Peter Cook. Thematically organised by chapter, Cook joyfully talks us through drawings as motive, strategy, vision, image, composition, expression, technique, surface and fantasy. He provides us with amusing perceptive commentary at every turn, drawing out attention to some of the greatest and most intriguing drawings, ranging from Heath-Robinson, Hugh Ferris and Arthur Beresford Pite to Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, Ron Herron, Coop Himmelb(l)au, Bernard Tschumi and Lebbeus Woods.

;Front cover flap copy for hardback

Spatial Intelligence: New Futures for Architecture draws on a wide range of knowledge and discipline in its discussion of an essential human capability. This includes everything from the latest neurological research to urban design. Leon van Schaik also refers to and illustrates a wide number of buildings and architectural projects across time these notably include:

• Alvar Aalto, House of Culture, Helsinki
• Charles Barry, Cliveden, Berkshire
• Gordon Bunshaft, Beinecke Rare Books and Manuscripts Library, Yale University
• Sean Godsell, Peninsula House, Victoria
• Zaha Hadid, Maggie’s Centre, Fife, Scotland
• Herzog & de Meuron, Laban Contemporary Dance Centre, London
• Toyo Ito, Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, London
• Tom Kovac, Virtual Australian Pavilion, Venice Biennale, Italy
• WR Lethaby, Melsetter House, Orkney
• Frank Lloyd Wright, Frederick C Robie House, Chicago
• Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Barcelona Pavilion
• Reed & Stern and Warren & Wetmore, Grand Central Station, New York
• Ushida Findlay, Soft and Hairy’ House, Baraki, Japan
• Peter Zumthor, Kunsthaus, Bregenz, Austria
• Gunther Domenig, Stein Haus, Steindorf, Germany
• Le Corbusier, Mill Owners’ Association, Ahmadabad, India

From the Inside Flap:

Drawing: the motive force of architecture launches the AD Primers series from John Wiley & Sons, the publishers of Architectural Design. The new series invites key architects, who have made a substantial contribution to AD, to write on a core preoccupation or theme in their work. (Forthcoming titles are planned with Nigel Coates, Juhani Pallasmaa and Leon van Schaik.) Since the 1960s when Peter Cook was a founder of Archigram, his work has celebrated the graphic and then in turn become synonymous with the drawn.

representative of Peter Cook's catholic appreciation of the architectural drawing, this book features a wide range of work from architects across the world and across time. It brings together the highly tuned perceptions and experience of an architect who has been designing for almost five decades, with an eye that is always rejoicing at the discovery of emerging talent.

Featured architects include:

• Neil denari
• Diller and Scofidio
• Sverre Fehn
• Frank Gehry
• Hernan Diaz Alonso
• Kolatan MacDonald
• Zaha Hadid
• Coop Himmelb (l) au
• Arata Isozaki
• Morphosis
• Walter Pichler
• Bernard Tschumi
• Lebbeus Woods

About this edition

• Publisher: Wiley
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0470034815
• ISBN 13: 9780470034811
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208