SF Bay Area Archives - Levy Art + Architecture

May 7, 2014July 12, 2019

Phenomenology & Formality: a critical commentary

Case Study: The New East Span of the Bay Bridge

We’ve been talking with our friends and colleagues and it seems that there is general agreement that the best experience of the new East span of the Bay Bridge comes as you travel east through the Yerba Buena Island tunnel. The approach is along the lower deck of the old west span where you are prepared by the staccato rhythm of beams, girders and chevrons overhead. These give way to the concrete beam roof in the tunnel itself which, then, transitions to the smooth, cast concrete undercarriage of the upper deck of the new span. This is where dynamics, the phenomenology of space and experience come into play.

As you leave the tunnel the upper deck peels away curving subtly to the North to reveal the monumental, white tower. The tower, actually a cluster of four columns, bound together by seven “link beams,” is at its most dramatic here, appearing immediately and at full scale within the normal range of vision, it is more vertical, most imposing, white, striking and elegant from this vantage. That impression is set up by the approach and the curved movement of the upper deck. The entire experience is based on high speed travel as it relates to physical form.

More than the formal elegance of the tower itself, described by the Architect, Donald Macdonald, in his book Bay Bridge, History and Design of a New Icon, it is the serial experience that really makes the impression. The critic Mitchell Schwarzer described this cinematic experience of space in his book Zoomscape. “In this thought-provoking book, he argues that the perception of architecture has been fundamentally altered by the technologies of transportation and the camera.” Here time and movement are the fourth dimension and they are employed as tools for understanding and, potentially, for defining design. As realized through the windshield at fifty five miles per hour the verticality of the tower is made more present by the curving sweep of the roadway surface, which is itself a product of the perception of a traveler moving through space. The proportion and the component parts of the tower are made more precise by their relationship to the monolithic, subtly beveled underside of the elevated roadway.

Unfortunately, there is a contrasting experience when travelling the bridge from East to West. Passing through the tolls on the Oakland shoreline, the tower is barely visible in the distance. The actual length of the viaduct, the physical distance, is a part of the issue, but the bigger problem is the architecture, which works against the potential experience of an east to west trip across The Bay.

The particular problem is the design of the light standards. These objects are highly aestheticized miniatures of the tower itself. They are formal by-products, “Key elements from the tower come off the structural system onto the other features of the main span and viaduct.” (p 78) There are illustrated diagrams that detail the geometric and proportional similarities and “the progression of the light fixtures from the East Oakland touchdown to the tower of the main span.” The logic is clear and there is ample precedent for making design decisions in this fashion. The problem is that the experience is lost in the mix. The light standards obscure the main tower and undermine the experience of the bridge.

I make these points, not only as a critique of the bridge, but also as a commentary on design and process relative to the “zoomscape.” The experience of traveling the bridge serves to underscore important issues about how architecture is conceptualized, taught, and ultimately experienced. We have shied away from design that is premised in experience, because we lack the tools, both the representational and critical tools, to describe and discuss design as experience. The visual is prioritized, and has been since the advent of classical ordering systems. We are trained to study form by graphic composition, so much of the dialogue is carried out in two-dimensional media, drawings, photographs, magazines and the internet. Even three dimensional models, whether real or virtual oftentimes represent “privileged views,” without providing cognitive access to the experience of the proposal. Perhaps we need to find other ways of representing our ideas; sound recordings, animated films, immersive environments, so that we can study and design from a dynamic vision of space and spatial experience. We make physical objects, but not as an end, it is their use, inhabitation, or occupation that is the intended goal. They are inhabited over time, by occupants who move and change their point of view. Just bearing this in mind, designing as much with the gut as with the eye will yield tangible results. If we can embed this understanding in our process and methodology, we will be that much further down the proverbial road.

September 30, 2013April 15, 2019

Monterrey Design Conference

For those of you who attend The Monterey Design Conference, you know how illuminating it is, one of those rare instances where professional development is an actual intellectual exercise. 2013 was no exception. The thing that stands out in my mind was the degree of subtlety that was on display and the emphasis on the phenomenology of space in opposition to more formal or graphic expressions. Perhaps this is best characterized by the “spirit in the prosaic” or the exercise of finding “the great within the small”, and by so doing “elevating the ordinary to the status of architecture” as Marlon Blackwell explained. Listening to him talk I realized that there is a fundamental humility that comes from working in less urbane areas of The United States and that it serves a less esoteric approach to design. Marlon works with small budgets in modest locations and creates sublime results without any of the pretention that is associated the academic practice of architecture.

Brian Price’s brief presentation followed a similar trajectory, a new and more experimental practitioner, he has already realized that we are often best served by “working through subtraction…. re-framing familiar things.” He was eloquent as he discussed the need to find new forms of engagement, a very important comment on the nature of architectural practice in this, still new, century.

Anne Fougeron’s work is a testament to dedication and persistence. Her lecture titled “Work: A Decade” charted a trajectory in both scale and invention that is something to aspire to. I was surprised to learn about her education as an art historian, but knowing that allowed me to understand her work through a new lens. She made references to Dan Flavin and James Turrell, artists who work in the abstract medium of light. This has direct implications for architecture where the medium is space, a material enclosure that has density and presence. Sealed containers that reject, limit, modulate or allow the introduction of light (and other environmental phenomena) as a fundamental “function.” Only someone with an understanding of, and appreciation for, art can appreciate the power of working with this all-present, but immaterial medium. It clearly informs her approach to architecture which is more about being than seeing. A very important message in this era of instantaneous image circulation and consumption.

MDC-Chapel — Site of the AIACC Monterrey Design Conference

I had the unique opportunity to attend The Monterey Design Conference at the same time as I was attending The Carmel Ideas Festival. The Ideas festival is a gathering of authors, some as well known at The New York Times’ David Brooks or the author Jane Smiley. They each speak for twenty minutes to an audience of interested lay people about a diverse set of subjects. As you might expect, they are very good at delivering their thoughts in a concise and compelling fashion. Without being overly critical, I was left with the impression that we, Architects in general, need to get a lot better at communicating our ideas. As wonderful as the projects that were presented were, the presenters often fell into simple narration of the images on the screen, sometimes losing track of the rhetorical agendas that the titles and introductions to their talks suggested.

With that criticism in mind, the highlight of The Conference for me was the Saturday session with Jack MacAllister. Jack spoke for almost an hour, in front of a single image, without notes and without allusion. Granted he has sixty years of experience to draw from, but his “Top 10 list for Architects” was both valuable and entertaining. His common sense advice was, all too often overlooked, is the sort that can only come from a deep and varied career. The way he told his story, and I use the word story intentionally because I am convinced that we need to become better story tellers, made his professional trajectory easy to comprehend. Working from the details at The Salk Institute, to founding firms, to advising, his impact has become larger and larger as he has touched more and more people with his knowledge and wisdom. At this late stage, he is a curator of architects, perhaps more influential than ever. His easy, unscripted, communication underscored that message.

The Conference was a success, and reflecting on it, I have to inquire about the agenda of the organizers, Larry Scarpa, Tim Culvahouse and Robert Ivy among them. Are these thought leaders working to help to usher in a new era in our field? With lecture titles like “Material/Immaterial” with work by Odile Decq whose projects evidence the expressive potential for small modulations within a regulated field, I believe that the message is clear. Space is the medium in which we work, phenomenology is the mode of experiencing that medium and whether or not one can find the language for expressing it, everyone responds to it. Architectural discourse has been on a juggernaut from form follows function, less is more, structuralism, post-modernism, to de-constrcutivism and out the other side. Perhaps The 2013 Monterey Design Conference was styled to remind us about what the real “stuff” of architecture is. To demonstrate that there is ample intellectual potential in contemplating and working from that “stuff” and to re-focus our endeavors in this time of growing environmental concern. There has never been a moment where the world needed our thoughts and talents more, let’s hope we can rise to that challenge.

Ross Levy AIA LEED BD&C CGBP

August 27, 2013September 1, 2021

Ode to the East Span

It is an old friend that we have known for all of our lives
A workhorse of a bridge
More like something you would find in Pittsburgh than Barcelona
I had an industrial presence
In some ways defined the region
Farewell good buddy and all the memories we have
Crossing and recrossing
Of times past, many times past
Tomorrow for the last time

Video from OnlyHDVideo on Youtube

Historic Photos from Eric Fischer’s Flckr Page

August 3, 2013April 15, 2019

Fruitvale Station

I’m not in the habit of writing movie reviews, but Fruitvale Station by Ryan Coogler, deserves some attention. It is both a remarkable piece of film and a provocative commentary. It asks us to reflect on urban life, public transit, “the commons” that we share and the way that the shared space can unite or divide us.

The film depicts the events leading to the shooting and death of Oscar Grant, an unarmed, black man. This is either a terrible tragedy, a gross injustice, or both. The film is remarkable for its depiction of poverty, neither sentimental nor melodramatic, it portrays the daily struggles of the young and disenfranchised in a dramatic but entirely realistic way. The delivery is as tangible as documentary, without the pedantic narrative it is more compelling. The acting and cinematography seamlessly support this approach.

There are vignettes of the BART trains themselves, the tracks, tunnels and landscapes that are a familiar, and now haunting, part of the everyday lives of those of us who live in the Bay Area. These give the film structure, but also, in a very clever way, pace. As the story progresses the shots of the trains, the stations and the riders increase in number and duration creating tension, until we arrive at the chaotic arrest and shooting scene during the early morning hours of January 1, 2009.

While the film is a success as a cinematic experience, there is a deeper subtext about the nature of public transportation as a portion of the “commons” that makes up our shared experience. Specifically, aspects of segregation that are “unintended” and yet institutionalized by physical patterns of development and associated transit systems. These underlie the tragic events that are the film’s narrative.

BART was conceived and constructed as a commuter line, built to move a white collar work force to and from the San Francisco Downtown Center. It functions to mobilize a sub-urbanized population and by doing so, institutionalizes sprawl just as the early train lines built by Henry P. Huntington paved the way for the vast tract development of the Los Angeles Basin. During off hours, this commuter system is left to the less fortunate, those who may not be able to afford to own and maintain a private vehicle, thus reinforcing socio-economic patterns of segregation and literally setting the stage for the series of unfortunate events that led to Oscar Grant’s death. This, in stark contrast to other municipal systems, The New York Subway or Paris Metro, that are regularly used by all segments of the populus because they are the best, most time and cost effective, local transit option. As a result, these systems are egalitarian, functioning as a critical point of integration, bringing the broad spectrum into direct contact with one and other on a regular basis, for both work and recreational travel.

The point is that Transit in the Bay Area only works well at one scale. This is a function of planning, demographics and the challenges of our topography, but it is a fact that stems from the origins of the systems and the lack of a coordinated approach. The simple paucity of lines to many areas, time consuming transfers from system to system, and shear expense, dissuade all but the intended user group. These complications further disenfranchise the less fortunate costing them time and money if this is the only option available to them .

The result is segregation by transportation. The fact is that our system was not built to serve people, rather it was created to serve businesses, corporate headquarters and tract developers. What the film points out is that rapid transit here is for everyone, but not at the same time. As BART, MUNI, AC Transit and others expand, mature and refine their operations, the principals of smart growth, transit oriented development, inclusive housing and new urbanism should inform their efforts. This will result in not only a higher standard of living and greener transportation but greater integration, deeper understating and more sharing. In the end, environmentalism and humanism are founded in the same sense of placing ourselves as individuals within the larger natural and social eco-systems. The ways that we traverse these spaces can either support or detract from this understanding.