Art by Architects

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Order: info@heliarch.gr
ISBN: 978-960-98072-8-9
Pages: 72
Dimensions: 24×24 cm
Edited by: Elias Constantopoulos, Marianna Milioni

In “The Artists of the Obstacle”, Beckett poses the question: Why is anything left representable if the essence of the object is to elude its representation?

Architects represent their ideas in their drawings. From the Renaissance until today, the architectural drawing has been the essential means of conveying information for the architectural study, for the project that is, the projection of the construction into the future. In this transfer from drawing to building, something is always “lost in translation,” as Robin Evans points out but something is also gained.

The architect envisions dwellings and inhabits his representations. However, just as in 20th-century art the visual event is freed from the need for representation, so too in architecture the drawing is not merely a means of representation but also pure creation sometimes even exploding unexpectedly, releasing profoundly evocative spaces like Piranesi’s Carceri and Libeskind’s enigmatic geometric Migromegas.

At the crossroads of Art and Science, whose relationship is not always as separate as we might think, architecture stands in a unique way. Sometimes affirming both, other times placing greater emphasis on one or the other. However, critical thinking and imagination do not exclude each other, whether we refer to Leonardo, Einstein, or Le Corbusier. This is why it is no coincidence that architectural university education is sometimes housed within humanities faculties and other times within technical universities. Architects, with the measuring tool in one hand and the brush in the other, have always maintained a privileged relationship with the fine arts. Sculpture often formed part of their training, as at the Bauhaus, where the fundamental design courses for future architects and designers were taught by prominent visual artists, including Klee, Kandinsky, and others.

Many turned to architecture, beginning with drawing during their teenage years, where they developed their early skills to varying degrees. Sometimes they maintained painting or sculpture as a parallel, relatively independent activity, usually transforming their artistic predisposition into architectural drawings, and always recording their thoughts in sketches in their notebooks. In any case, even when they were forced to abandon their artistic development, it remained a latent desire, a hidden creative outlet. Through discussions about the overall promotion of architects’ work, the current event emerged to support the Hellenic Institute of Architecture. Dionisis Sotovikis’ proposal for an auction revitalized an earlier idea by Vasiliki Petridou for an exhibition of architects’ visual artworks and was enthusiastically accepted by the Board of Directors of the HIA. The exhibition-auction will take place at the Spiteri residence, designed by Aristomenis Provelengios, in Kypseli, from December 1 to 18, 2016. This catalogue is the fruit of that effort and includes works by architects who generously responded to our call, and for this we thank them. Gratitude is also due for their tireless efforts in realizing the event to the co-curators, the Institute’s Secretary General Dionisis Sotovikis and Director Marianna Milioni. I wish that this exhibition of architects’ visual art works will serve as a catalyst for further events and discussions on the fluid relationship between architecture and art.

Elias Constantopoulos 

President of the H.I.A.