The Eyes of the Skin by Juhani Pallasmaa
Rarely is a book about Architecture able to transcend its subject and become a poetic trip that re-evaluates human experience. Rarely as you read, particularly an architecture book, can the ideas as well as prose peel away a fog from your mind. Only a precious few books can spark new lines of thought and ideas in such a fertile way. This book is simply breathtaking.
Vision and Knowledge
The book starts off its premise by showing how in Western Culture Vision and Knowledge are inextricably linked, and how that recently architects have become too reliant on purely visual readings of Architecture. Actually Architecture and space are appreciated in much deeper ways on many different levels. A plea is made for the other four senses in architecture so much left behind in the modern world by sight. All the other senses are dealt with but perhaps the body and haptic world are most pertinent to the Architectural project.
The Body in The Centre
I confront the city with my body; my legs measure the length of the arcade and the width of the square; my gaze unconsciously projects my body onto the facade of the cathedral, where it roams over the mouldings and contours, sensing the size of recesses and projections; my body weight meets the mass of the cathedral door, and my hand grasps the door pull as I enter the dark void behind. I experience myself in the city and the city exists through my embodied experience. The city and the body supplement and define each other. I dwell in the city and the city dwells in me.
The Task of Architecture
The task of Architecture is to design for the whole human experience, the body and the mind as a totality of senses and existance. Stirring, and beautiful stuff, and this book goes down as a must read.
