Category: drawing techniques & materials
Postmodern Australia: Robert Pearce’s Drawings for Edmond and Corrigan
1 February 2022
Postmodern Australia: Robert Pearce’s Drawings for Edmond and Corrigan1 February 2022
By Yvette Putra
Writing in Cities of Hope (1993), the historian Conrad Hamann relates that, on mentioning to Robert Venturi the name of the Australian postmodernist architect Peter Corrigan, the first words from Venturi’s mouth were ‘Oh God! Corrigan!’. Yet it must be made clear that to Corrigan, and to his wife and… Read More
The Measure of It: An Essay on Measured Drawings
31 January 2022
The Measure of It: An Essay on Measured Drawings31 January 2022
As a classical architect, George Saumarez Smith not only believes in producing something that is pleasing to the eye, but in the importance of precise measuring in architectural practice, that ‘…the important part of an architect’s role is to produce drawings as instructions to a builder’. The following excerpt is… Read More
Analoge Architektur: Fire Station Project
8 December 2021
Analoge Architektur: Fire Station Project8 December 2021
This drawing of the roof level of a fire station, designed as a student work in 1986, was for the ‘Analoge Architektur’ exhibition at the Architektur Forum Zurich. [1] While the drawing is the work of an individual, it was inconceivable without the competitive and collegial development of a drawing… Read More
Drawing Parallels: John Hejduk’s Wall House 1
6 December 2021
Drawing Parallels: John Hejduk’s Wall House 16 December 2021
By Ray Lucas
The following text is extracted, with permission, from Drawing Parallels: Knowledge Production in Axonometric, Isometric and Oblique Drawings by Ray Lucas, published by Routledge © 2020. Available here. Drawing Parallels explores the uses of parallel projection in the work of five twentieth century architects: James Stirling, JJP Oud, Peter Eisenman, John Hejduk,… Read More
Álvaro Siza: Fast and Slow Lines
20 October 2021
Álvaro Siza: Fast and Slow Lines20 October 2021
By Lok-Kan Chau
Álvaro Siza began working on the ‘Quinta da Malagueira’ project in 1977. In his sketchbooks, he would doodle iterations of the proposal over and over, together with other observational scenes, figures, calculations, and schedules. The sketches have various line qualities. Some are steadier, thicker in the middle, and thinner at… Read More
Writing Prize 2021: Savinien Petit’s Chapelle a deux salles avec luminaire
18 October 2021
Writing Prize 2021: Savinien Petit’s Chapelle a deux salles avec luminaire18 October 2021
When art crosses paths with the language of architecture, odd things can occur. Savinien Petit was an academic painter who is little-known today. Conventional even for his own time, his taste at times did not exceed drawing children in clouds, but mostly he created religious scenes in traditional frescoes for churches, work which was… Read More
Survey: John Goldicutt, Temple of Vespasian
25 August 2021
Survey: John Goldicutt, Temple of Vespasian25 August 2021
Climbing and surveying the ruins of Rome was potentially dangerous, and there are reports of near-fatal accidents involving falls from height. George Wightwick, who would be employed by Soane on his return from Italy, advised students ‘not to risk [their] neck in measuring, for the thousandth time, a Roman ruin’.… Read More
Craving Primal Architecture
17 August 2021
Craving Primal Architecture17 August 2021
‘Architecture does not only respond to the functional and conscious intellectual and social needs of today’s city dweller; it must also remember the primordial hunter and farmer concealed in the body. Our sensations of comfort, protection and home are rooted in the primordial experiences of countless generations.’ [1] – Juhani Pallasmaa… Read More
Superstudio: Finding the Horizon
12 August 2021
Superstudio: Finding the Horizon12 August 2021
Until not too long ago, I would be asked to explain to youngsters accustomed to digital graphics how I used to make montages. I felt like an archaeologist, explaining how, in the Palaeolithic era, Neanderthals used to make their tools. Across several workshops, I have realised that the techniques today… Read More
Sketches from Algiers
2 August 2021
Sketches from Algiers2 August 2021
In October 1975 I returned to Cambridge to complete my architecture course. I had spent my year out in London with MacCormac and Jamieson, an exciting time as it was early days for this young practice and I was one of their very first assistants. In fact, I nearly didn’t… Read More
Drawing Out, Drawing In: Cartographies for ‘Out of the Sea’
24 March 2022
Drawing Out, Drawing In: Cartographies for ‘Out of the Sea’24 March 2022
By Beth George
The provocation for this essay is Drawing Matter’s own: ‘we take the word “drawing” to be as much a verb as a noun…’ Drawing describes an act and a thing: both a process and the outcome of that process. There aren’t many English words like it, and many of them… Read More
landscape drawing matter writing prize 2021