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2008 | Book

Letter from the Editors Read chapter Read first chapter

Nexus Network Journal

Canons of Form-Making In Honour of Andrea Palladio 1508–2008

Editors: Stephen R. Wassell, Kim Williams

Publisher: Birkhäuser Basel

Book Series : Nexus Network Journal

Part of: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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About this book

This volume features a collection of papers dedicated to "Canons of Form-Making", in honor of the 500th anniversary of the birth of architect Andrea Palladio (1508-1580). Theorist as well as practitioner, Palladio's architecture was based on well-defined canons that he had gleaned from studying the treatises as well as the remains of architecture from antiquity. Palladio himself left to posterity not only his large corpus of built works, but his Quattro libri d'architettura. Three of the papers in this issue are specifically about Palladio and his work. The other papers deal with canons of form-making, ancient and contemporary.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter

Letter from the Editors

Letter from the Editors
Stephen R. Wasselland Kim Williams

Canons of Form-Making

Andrea Palladio (1508–1580)
Abstract
A brief description of Palladio’s life and works. The focus is on the evolution of his design methodology, including the growing importance of proportion to his approach. Selected mathematical details are cited in the endnotes, and the list of references includes many publications focused on the relationships between architecture and mathematics in Palladio’s designs.
Stephen R. Wassell
Palladio, Pythagoreanism and Renaissance Mathematics
Abstract
This paper examines the proportional qualities of Palazzo Antonini in terms of contemporary, Renaissance mathematics. It reveals that Palladio was either a masterful arithmetician, or a serendipitous genius.
Lionel March
A Formal Language for Palladian Palazzo Façades Represented by a String Recognition Device
Abstract
This article represents an effort to reveal a new interpretation of the expression ‘the architectural language of Palladian designs’ that is closer to real linguistic paradigms than it usually means. Palladian designs exhibit a highly ordered and well articulated formal language comprised of a finite set of vocabulary elements in plan, elevation and volumetric treatment, together with an implicit set of mathematical rules for the arrangement of these rudimentary elements. The scope of this article is limited to the morphology of the façades of the first nine buildings shown in the second book of Palladio’s treatise, specifically the palazzo designs that he presents in chapter three. The morphology is described in terms of a symbolic encoding system that is represented textually and graphically as a finite state automaton, the concept of which is borrowed from theories of formal languages and computation. The system helps to emphasize commonalities in façade languages and to propose a prototype for generating Palladian palazzo façade designs. The automaton-based encoding system may be developed to function as a base for a computerized façade encoder and decoder.
Buthayna H. Eilouti
A Perspective Analysis of the Proportions of Palladio’s Villa Rotonda: Making the Invisible Visible
Abstract
Because of differences between Palladio’s architecture as built and the ideal architecture represented in the Quattro libri, many analyses have been performed in order to bring to light the proportions that underlie the beauty of the architecture. This present paper proposes a method of analysis based on perspective grids laid out on photographs to reveal how perspective is used to heighten the spectator’s perception of the forms.
Tomás García-Salgado
The Doric Order as a Fractal
Abstract
Owen Jones in The Grammar of Ornament clearly states that ornament comes from a deep observation of nature. He emphasizes the importance of the harmony of the parts and the subordination of one part to another. This subordination and harmony between the parts is what fractal geometry explores as self-similarity and self-affinity. An iterated function system (IFS) is a digital method of producing fractals. An IFS in the shape of columns holding up a lintel produced an attractor displaying fluted columns with capitals and an entablature with the proper number and spacing of triglyphs and mutules. Thus, fractal geometry, through the use of iterated function systems, provides a new insight into the intention of Doric ornament design.
Carl Bovill
Roaming Point Perspective: A Dynamic Interpretation of the Visual Refinements of the Greek Doric Temple
Abstract
Writers, artists, and mathematicians since Vitruvius have attributed the use of the visual refinements as a means by which the Greek builders optically corrected the form of the Doric temple. This study proposes an interpretation in which the visual refinements of the Parthenon are considered from a non-stationary, or “roaming”, point of view. The mathematics of this type of visual space reveals a dynamic zone in which objects visually increase and decrease simultaneously, a behavior consistent with conditions addressed by the visual refinements of the Parthenon.
Michael C. Duddy
The Turkish Baths in Elbasan: Architecture, Geometry and Wellbeing
Abstract
The two Turkish baths in Elbasan have been object of a remarkable survey as part of a vast international research. The original system of the two public baths dates back to the mid-sixteenth century. In the Albanian typology of the hammam, the various environments of increasing temperatures are located along a longitudinal axis ending in the cistern area where the boiler is located. The Albanian baths reveal their Ottoman roots in the complex concept of the vaulted structures. Different, types of vaults in a same space are placed side by side in order to realize more complex compositions; the inner surfaces of the vaults are embellished by elaborate decorations that resemble stalactites. The complexity of the plan and the decorations reveal a rigorous geometric pattern that dominates the space and underlies its composition. All seems the product of a centuries-old wisdom where each element contributes to a complex system aimed at comfort and pleasure of the human being.
Roberto B. F. Castiglia, Marco Giorgio, Bevilacqua
Mathematics as the Vital Force of Architecture
Abstract
This article shows that mathematics serves as a vital force in architecture. By comparing the characteristics that Hans Dreisch attributes to the vital force with the characteristics of mathematical proportions in architecture, this paper demonstrates that both can be seen as principles of individuation, both can be the source of equipotentiality, and both are manifested in harmony.
Anat David-Artman

Didactics

The Use of Linear Fractional Transformations to Produce Building Plans
Abstract
Linear fractional transformations are mappings on the complex plane that can be used to form building plans. Linking topological and geometrical considerations to meet certain criteria is one way of generating plans. This present study seeks any mathematical structures underlying basic plan forms which would link topological and geometrical maps. It concludes with an algorithm for plan generation.
Christopher Stone

Geometer’s Angle

Dynamic Root Rectangles Part Three: Root-Three Rectangles, Palladian Applications
Abstract
“Dynamic symmetry” is the name given by Jay Hambidge to describe a system of incommensurable ratios for proportioning areas within design compositions. In Parts One and Two of a continuing series, we surveyed the elements of root-two, -three, -four, and -five rectangular systems and, using the root-two rectangle, explored diagonals, reciprocals, complementary areas, and other techniques for composing dynamic space plans. In Part Three, we apply these techniques to the root-three rectangle and consider architectural plans by Andrea Palladio.
Rachel Fletcher

Book Reviews

Branko Mitrovié and Stephen R. Wassell (eds.) Andrea Palladio: The Villa Cornaro in Piombino Dese
New York: Acanthus Press, 2007
Abstract
I cannot claim to be the most objective reviewer of Andrea Palladio: The Villa Cornaro in Piombino Dese, edited by Branko Mitrovié and Stephen R. Wassell, with contributions by Tim Ross and Melanie Bourke. I have know both of the editors for a good while and have spoken to them at length about the Villa Cornaro and Andrea Palladio, and even participated (in a very minor way, and principally by bringing along someone who did the dirty work) in the survey campaign. Some of my most pleasant hours have been spent with Sally and Carl Gable in “their” villa in Piombino Dese. On the other hand, what I lack in objectivity, the book amply makes up for in objectivity of its own, just one of the many respects in which this is not just another book about Palladio.
Kim Williams
Deborah Howard and Laura Moretti (eds.) Architettura e Musica nella Venezia del Rinascimento
Milan: Mondadori, 2006
Abstract
This publication is the proceedings of an international conference which was held on the Isola San Giorgio in Venice on 8–9 September 2005, organized by both the Fondazione Scuola di San Giorgio and the University of Cambridge, where the two editors of the volume, Professor Deborah Howard and Architect Laura Moretti, teach and work.
Sylvie Duvernoy
Metadata
Title
Nexus Network Journal
Editors
Stephen R. Wassell
Kim Williams
Copyright Year
2008
Publisher
Birkhäuser Basel
Electronic ISBN
978-3-7643-8766-2
Print ISBN
978-3-7643-8765-5
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-7643-8766-2