The invented eye looks at architecture

Abstract

Architecture and photography are two aspects of our shared visual culture. The influence exerted by photography on architecture is in a large part due to the power insisting upon "actuality" of what has to be seen in the image. Architectural image expresses the "external" (appearance) but only by its implication it conveys the "internal" (spatial aspects). Photographs then beyond their role as documents and like other works of arts are interpretive. With that as a strong belief. the inquiry looks at images as an "expression" which is linked to the "ideas" and issues of the creative activity of its time. The most eventful phase of that creative activity was the turn of the century-the 1920s. The architectural images presumed a way of seeing that often went beyond the real experience of the building itself. By examining the images of that period. one explores a dominant aesthetic tradition. its meaning and how it is transmitted by a photographic style. which corresponds to the various dimensions of the contemporary thoughts of the time. The images are seen as an effect of the changes in both society and technology. With that as a background the inquiry reflects into a awareness of architecture by means of photographic transcription.