I wasn’t sure what to expect from Friday’s lecture. William Curtis is an essayist and architectural historian/critic with strong opinions (about nearly everything it seems). I wasn’t sure if we’d get architectural criticism, academic theory or something else. I have to say that I really enjoyed the lecture, which turned out to be in the last category of “something else.”

The talk focused on photos and sketches of horizons and platforms and the relationship of the human structure of the platform and the perspective of the horizon. He called out the particular appropriateness of the having the talk at the CGAC, Alvaro Siza’s contemporary art museum in Santiago, which is composed of a series of ramps and platforms. Some other highlights:

• Tons of sketches, which have inspired me to try to do mroe quick contour line sketches.
• A successful photograph is a discovery of something. (Food for thought and a goal for future photographs.)
• A photo of Chillida’s “Comb of the Wind” (also featured in Pallasmaa’s talk, but I didn’t get the name on Thursday night). Used in reference to the perception and ambiguity of distance and depth in foreground and background (see below).
• A photo of (similar to this one) and schematic for the water organ on the promenade of the harbor of Zadar, Croatia.
• The definition of architecture as clear thinking, observation and “a rock with an idea behind it” (a quote from someone I didn’t catch).
• The idea that in architecture and design you can create a kind of vibration and tension between foreground (artificially constructed) and background (landscape). Platform – void – horizon and compression. A concept that I would love to explore further in some of my upcoming design projects.