“I confess I do not believe in time
I like to fold my magic carpet,after use,
in such a way as to superimpose
one part of the pattern upon another.
Let visitor trip.And the highest enjoyment
of the timelessness-in a landscape
selected at random-is when I stand
among rare butterflies and their ecstasy
is something else,which is hard to explain.
It is like a momentary vacuum into
which rushes all that I love.A sense of
oneness with sun and stone.”
Phrasing the line of Vladimir Nabokov from ‘ Speak,Memory ’ Mary Landing illuminate about Peter Zumthor envisions and his process of shaping the space for a context.
‘A feeling of history’ is a conversation between Mary Landing and Peter Zumthor about the process of shaping a building in a historical background. With the reference of Zumthor works like Mining museum in Sauda, shelter for Roman archaeological ruins in Chur, and Kolumba Art Museum in Cologne,he explains his methodology for his oeuvre.
In response to Mary questions, Zumthor defines the meaning of history for him. He say history is a feeling of a place which is stored in a landscape of a places and things which is different from factual history or academic history which is being stored in hundred of papers and being taught at university. Referring history of a place as the memories of past which are real and authentic but are mute,hidden and mysterious. A site is a historical documents which he tries to read and interpret the place and weave them into a new building,integrating them,overlaying or absorbing them like a palimpsest.
A new work of architecture should be like a gestures that inspire interest and respect. A physical gesture of a building are more primal and more directly connected to sensory capacities of our bodies. Architecture should ties with the world at present as they are concrete and real.
While creating the Mining museum in Sauda, he tried to discover the mining trail left in the landscape like the place where water was channeled to be brought down to the washary,where the rock and cliffs had been cut into the canyon. And he used these trails as a guideline for visitors tour of the site. His building blocks on site and its construction details speaks of the of 21th century. And with the other project he used the same vocabulary for shaping this buildings around the site.
Space,material,and light are the other factor which shape Zumthor building. While designing he think about a space as a dark, completely pitch-black and then allow light to come in. The light hits the material and the material become beautiful. Shape and form are flexible,he change them to orchestrate the sound of material,the chemistry of real material and the right amount of shadow and light.
This conversation ends with zumthor ideology of sacred space and emotional reconstruction, divulging the Eliade’s concept for sacred spaces ,as a places loaded with sense of spirituality or value for somebody.He try to reconstruct the emotion of people were naive and related to other phases of life. He tried to compose a language of architecture that belongs to that place and resonates with its time.
“Buildings that have a strong impact always convey an intense feeling of their spatial quality. They embrace the mysterious void called space in a special way and make it vibrate”- Peter Zumthor
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