Artificial intuition
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Workshops on artificial intuition. [Artificial Intuition workshops at the TU Delft, Faculty of Architecture, May 1990 ˇ Tutors workshop: Kas Oosterhuis and Ilona Lénárd ˇ Technique: INTER-GRAPH/EMS ˇ Operators: Jacques Firing and Mark Hoevenaars (Eindhoven Academy of Industrial Design)] Intuition is the capacity to act without restrictions, unburdened by codes and free of values ˇ Unformed, too, by schooling (from infants' school to university) where you are mainly taught to comply with preconceived rules and standards ˇ School reports and certificates are the reward for living up to expectations ˇ In the formgiving professions, though, it is crucial that designers are also able to create their own system of standards and values ˇ This is the essence of the profession, and the reason why the implementing disciplines (clients, developers, contractors) need designers to proceed further ˇ They can build, granted, but only in accordance with templates along a predetermined path ˇ If they are to develop further - and they must if they are to gain a solid foothold in the market - then they sorely need the designer's intuition ˇ In the workshops our aim is to further unfurl the designer's intuitive endeavours ˇ We seek to train the intuition by making sketches in digital space ˇ
Sketches in space. Those taking part in the workshops are appointed to draw a number of lines in space, without being given a specific image beforehand ˇ They are encouraged to do this as quickly as possible, so as to minimize any rational influences ˇ The sketches would then be as intuitive as possible ˇ Yet such sketches are not done completely at random ˇ The participants make them themselves ˇ The only criterion is the way their hands move the computer mouse ˇ So each such sketch is autonomous, its value encapsulated in the sketch itself: yet it is most certainly personal ˇ The sketch is individual and particular (i ˇe ˇ not haphazard) ˇ The participants are asked to choose from the welter of sketches a few that they like ˇ That personal choice is the stepping-off point for the next phase of the workshop ˇ The sketches are done in three-dimensional digital space ˇ They are not flat, they are lines drawn in space ˇ Thus the designer's capacity for imagining in three dimensions is activated from the very first phase of the act of design, namely the designer's intuitive preference ˇ It is most enlightening to move through these sketches as if walking in space ˇ You are moving in the weightless realm of a space that is digitally coded ˇ
The concept, the architect's will. The designers, then, are training their intuition, up to this point without a set task, without a programme ˇ It is purely and simply training the unrestricted, taken-for-granted yet highly personal nature of sketches ˇ Using the three-dimensional programming of the computer, lines and spaces can be brought into view and prepared for experiencing by the senses, in a way unavailable to any other instrument ˇ Computers, then, are essential to this task ˇ The workshops up until now have shown most clearly the desire to be able to sketch even more directly in space ˇ It should be possible to translate manual three-dimensional movements into space at a single step ˇ There are programs for doing this, but they are then out of the question due to the costs involved and the availability ˇ The capacity for visual representation offered by the computer shows great promise ˇ So much so that it makes you long for more ˇ The experimental nature of intuitive concepts enables their executants to then put them to the test ˇ A scientific analysis of the intuitively designed concept, in the shape of a report, gives those with decision-making powers a tool with which to make a decision ˇ Intuition is an inductive process, analysis a deductive process ˇ So the participants begin by communicating with themselves by way of the computer ˇ The subsequent phases of the workshop are intended as training for communication with others ˇ The computer is the pre-eminent tool for enabling communication between the most wide-ranging disciplines, in that it couples image and language ˇ Architectural concepts are dictated by a great many parameters ˇ One of these is the intuition of those involved, the strictly personal premisses of, say, the architect, or the intuition of the financial expert in his own field ˇ The intuitive starting-points are brought together in a concept ˇ This concept is an experimental hypothesis which can then be tested as to its validity and suitability ˇ In the concept the will of the designers is illustrated and defined ˇ We ask each participant of the workshop to look at their personal intuitive sketch, and be inspired by it to arrive at a concept ˇ To give a depiction of what the sketch might mean ˇ What was originally a value-free sketch is now attributed with a meaning ˇ
Construction without gravity. Still proceeding from the initial sketch the workshop participants now take a number of elements in the sketch and rearrange them, sometimes drawing them again ˇ They add new elements so as to compile the structure they wanted ˇ As yet gravity is conspicuous by its absence ˇ Working like astronauts in space, they examine the construction from all sides ˇ It is as easy to add something to the bottom as to the top ˇ This exercise is just as valuable for real-life construction ˇ After all, the construction material proceeds from the same obliviousness to gravity as the image envisioned by the designer ˇ The effect of gravity on a steel beam is only calculated when that beam is in place ˇ Before then the beam can only be described in terms of moments of inertia, moments of resistance ˇ The properties of the material are not connected to the situation on site ˇ They are, however, designed to deliver a particular performance in a particular situation ˇ So both material and image are developed without giving consideration to gravity ˇ It is of great importance, I feel, to recognize this fact, so that the potentials offered by material and construction can be better exploited in real life ˇ The longer you spend working in weightless digital space, the greater the tendency will be to challenge gravity ˇ You will then try to see how far you can go in making a gravity-free image ˇ
Styling the electronic model. We then place emphasis in the workshops on the possibilities of styling the object ˇ By this I mean developing a certain precision in the design's final form ˇ Such as when designing a razor or a plastic cup, continually examining it from all sides ˇ So you construct an electronic model and keep changing it until the result is satisfactory from whichever side you regard it ˇ Expressive but of course technical too ˇ During the course of developing an industrial product there is a continual cross-resonance between manufacturers and designers ˇ The designers help with the product's concept, and are involved in the final styling of the product before it is ripe for production ˇ Working with an electronic model stimulates the designer's readiness to subject the architectural image to further critical assessment ˇ This image can be changed, after all, without it falling over ˇ In traditionally set-up, physical architectural models the topside usually gets altered the most ˇ The base is scarcely ever changed, it is fixed for good ˇ The electronic model frees architecture from stacking ˇ
Representation. The final phase of training focuses on good presentation ˇ It is important that the idea, the concept, can be got across to others ˇ And here again we can make use of computer programs that present the model as a mass, with light sources and shadows, and that enable a plane or mass to have its own texture ˇ You choose from a palette with an infinite range of possible colours, you are trained to define the expressive powers of the electronic model ˇ In the workshops participants take a wide range of decisions attendant on making an architectural image ˇ It is essential that designers discover what their strong points are ˇ Not everyone is able to free his or her powers of intuition to the full ˇ Not everyone will be interested in defining concepts ˇ Every step passed through in the workshops is a field of study in itself ˇ Architecture is only just embarking on a development that will lead to a more sophisticated product ˇ And, setting out on this road, the architect is still out of necessity a know-all, who knows only a little about a lot of things ˇ Working professionally with computers will undoubtedly lead to a greater ability to specialize ˇ Given the wide range of new potentials, and given the kind of investments being made in the use of the computer, the various fields of study will inevitably become more clearly defined ˇ One of these will consist of those who are able to deal with their intuitive emotions ˇ And this is one of the most important reasons why we set up the workshops ˇ We have established that the computer can release the greatest creative potential ˇ So the computer is not the stultifying affair it is often made out to be ˇ On the contrary, it offers an enlarged space for everyone wishing to use it for making images ˇ This vast space is as yet a wasteland waiting for pioneering spirits to exploit it ˇ
Details
Title: Intuition and Logic
Date: 04/1990
Magazine: VCA