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Continuity and Transformation in the Work of Panos
Koulermos
Yorgos Simeofordis
The plan expresses the limits of
Form. Form, then, as a harmony of systems, is the generator
of the chosen design. The plan is the revelation of the Form......Architecture
deals with spaces, the thoughtful and meaningful making of spaces.
The architectural space is one where the structure is apparent
in space itself....
The Notebooks and Drawings of Louis Kahn, 1962
During the 1960's the architects of the 'intermediate generation'
born during the 1930's faced the now famous dilemma: continuity
or crisis in the tradition of the Modern Movement? At the scale
of the city and the urban project, European architectural culture
began a critical dialogue with its past. Divergent paths opened
up, particularly in Italy, prompting Reyner Banham to accuse
Italian architects of 'retreating' from the principles of Modern
Movement.
In Greece similar mood prevailed. Indeed,
we can identify a kind of architectural spring, beginning at
the end of 1950's, that coincided with the neo-Brutalist period
of architecture in the country. Yet with the dictatorship of
1967, these efforts faded away. The collective dream of an entire
world sank into a morass of silence. Only a few architects kept
up their theoretical and design inquiries within the 'modern
project', striving to escape the deeply-rooted mythologies of
the Greek tradition.
Among these efforts, particular attention
should be devoted to the work of Panos Koulermos, who came to
Athens in 1965 after describing a trajectory through Europe,
from north to south. He brought with him a Rationalist background
from London (from studies at the Polytechnic of Central London,
teaching at the Architectural Association, and an associate
partnership in Douglas Stephen's office) and valuable experience
from the natural cradle of Italian Rationalism in Lombardy.
This first professional period of work in Athens, which lasted
from 1965 to 1973, marked the beginning of a partnership between
Koulermos and the architects Nicos Kalogeras and Spiros Amourgis.
Together , they shaped a challenging practice which placed particular
emphasis on interdisciplinary research and on education and
culture in general. On the architectural level, the main focus
was on the organization of the floor plan and section in terms
of the tectonic logic of the building.
Koulermos has continued to develop his
work against this background of 'change in continuity'. Although
based in LA since 1973, he continues to move diagonally across
cultures, between the vast city of Reyner Banham's 'Four Ecologies'
and Athens, often stopping in Milan and Venice on the way. He
combines teaching with practice. His work revolves around competitions,
commissions and research designs. All of these have a cohesive
spatial organization which comes out of an unrelenting theoretical
process nurtured by his experience in the classroom and the
workshop.
Koulermos' designs for Los Angeles ,
Venice, Milan and Greece, in particular Crete, express a clear,
balanced relationship between the rational and the symbolic
essence of architecture. The rational is embodied in his public
buildings: the Santa Monica Art Center, the Hollywood City Hall
and Los Angeles Nursery School all convey a deliberately 'timeless
horizon', attained through an abstract elaboration in the design
process of the rational elements of the architectural tradition.
The symbolic element is most frequently present in his designs
for private residences or other small projects, such as the Greek
Pavilion for the Venice Biennale, which have a mytho-poetic
narrative. The concepts of topos, memory and form have been
at the heart of Koulermos' work in recent years, but they have
acquired a personal tone free of the nostalgic emotional charge
that is all too common in contemporary architecture. These concepts
are not articulated in ways defined by Frampton's 'Critical
Regionalism', by the geographically unique notion of 'place',
or by building techniques. Koulermos insists on evoking the
memory of formal associations on the basis of spatial experience,
rather than style.
It was Alberto Sartoris who acknowledged
the central features of modern Greek architecture: simplicity,
clarity of mass and rectilinearity . The architecture of Panos
Koulermos accurately fits this description. It also responds
to Sartoris' polemical thesis, which interprets Rationalism
as a constant force in architecture, deriving from the traditions
of the Mediterranean , and rebuts the idea that modern architecture
originated in the north. Such an approach puts Mediterranean
Classicism against Romanticism and Northern Medievalism, and
maintains the superiority of aesthetics over ethics and sociology.
Koulermos' work manifests an 'elective
affinity' with the poetic spirit of Le Corbusier: the expression
of movement as a significant element in urban and architectural
organization is clearly evident in the designs for the FORTH
Research Offices and Conference Center in Heraklion . In his
projects on Crete, Koulermos appears to be recomposing and developing
all his previous experience. He constantly alludes to the Mediterranean
origins of Rationalism, as reflected in the strict geometrical
traces and the tectonic logic of the monument. These origins,
filtered through the work of Luis Kahn and contemporary Rationalists,
constitute the main thread of his work, drawing him closer to
the eternal idea of the classic. His insistence on the mytho-poetic
element, in particular on the notion of the monument, reveals
his metaphysical vein , as well as his critical detachment from the
proponents of the Greek Romantic tradition, who dislike the
very idea of the monument, preferring instead to create an organic
relationship between the building and the earth. The architecture
of the projects for Crete is essentially Mediterranean, reminding
us , as Le Corbusier said, that 'architecture is masterly ,
correct and magnificent play of masses brought together in light'.
In this approach to history, the work
of Panos Kouleros represents what Ignasi de Solà-Morales calls
'the architecture of identity and difference':' His analysis
of the place, his own memory and purely autobiographical episodic
suggestions will lead him to find the simulacrum of a trace
from which to establish the difference that will enable him
to avoid repetition' (Domus no 736, 1992). The projects
in Crete reveal this process. They show a transformation of
the typological structure of the ancient Minoan palaces at Knossos,
Phaestos and Mallia.
The presence of the palaces can be explained
primarily by climatic conditions (Crete is considered to be
the warmest island in the Aegean). They occupy hilltop sites,
are oriented along a main north-south axis, and have a large
internal open court. There are in addition many other interior
courts or lightwells which bring indirect light into the spaces,
creating an almost oriental, labyrinthine atmosphere inside.
Other features include hydro-installations, porticos leading
into courtyards, galleries, and monumental stone stairways with
a rectangular, overly theatrical disposition.
We can discern many of these elements
in the projects for the Science Complex and New Campus of the
University of Crete And the FORTH facilities. In my view, these
buildings show a clear process of 'identity and difference'
with the Minoan palaces. The palaces appear random, yet a thorough
analysis reveals that considerable planning must have preceded
their construction. It also seems clear that the focal point
of the plan was the central court, and that the palaces were
planned in sections radiating from it. According to archaeologists,
the guiding principle in the planning was not aesthetic, but
practical. It is important to note two more points: the exterior
walls marked only the rear of the buildings while the true facades
of the different sections gave onto an interior court, and the
irregularity of the plan and the disparity of the roof levels
was made possible by the use of the flat roof-a regular feature
in Minoan architecture. I insist on this description because
some of these elements are evident, though transformed, in
a number of the above projects.
The Science complex, unfortunately,
has been completed without the part that would have defined
the public court; what Koulermos calls the 'urban piazza' of
the university. However we find a similar organisation in the
Foundation of Research and Technology, where the buildings front
the internal space-in this case a double-volume galleria (stoa)-which
serves as the major organizing space of the complex. The other
external elevations respond to context, horizon and adjacent
buildings and spaces, creating a sense of urbanity.
To paraphrase Giuseppe Terragni, we
might say that the traditional, as well as the modern, lies
'not in the form but in the spirit'. In these projects we can
distinguish Koulermos' search for an 'order' opposed to the
present -day irrationalism of 'styles'. That order is tied to
a firm vision of a humanist culture-a sense of civitas
vis-à-vis urban life. The projects in Crete are simply expressions
of civitas, urban complexes within the landscape. Their
monumentality commemorates the beginnings, the arche. of their
foundation as public, educational places-as places of paideia
; that is , of culture.
Form has no presence. Its existence is in the mind.....Form
precedes Design. Each composer interprets Form singularly. Form,
when realised, does not belong to its realiser. Only its interpretation
belongs to the artist. Form is like order.
Louis Khan, L'architecture d'Aujoud'hui no 142, 1969
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