Representation and instrumentality of the 1950s Midwest American drawing in architectural practice

Abstract

This paper analyses the instrumentality of drawings in Midwest American architectural practices of the 1950s, by using Bruce Goff as its case study. With consideration for the cultural values characteristic of the post-war period, this article proposes that the architectural drawing provides alternative approaches to mainstream American Modernism. Although the primary role of drawing practice is to represent architectural concepts, the drawing is not merely an analytical and interpretative means of spatial representation. The drawing is also an empirical tool, for visual thinking and the visual imagining of space. In prioritizing visual, sensory and transitory effects, the drawing is aided by spatial experiences and gives particular attention to the viewer. As such, it functions additionally as a tool for testing methodologies of representation, and embodies the effects of natural phenomena to comprise a distinctly perceptive quality in architecture. In this way, the drawing does not merely refer to the visible field of architectural representation. It includes sensory and transitory effects, and mimics the external forms of nature. Through the creativeness of Midwestern architects, the language of composing forms, organization, and structuring was inspired by patterns such as those used in the repetitive compositions of the Beaux-Arts. By connecting organic forms, graphics and artwork, the focus of these architects was to explore how patterns and chaos, from nature, relate to composing space. With consideration for other mid-century architectural, cultural and artistic movements, the aim of this research is to understand how these ideas relate to composing and representing space, towards the possibility of artistic autonomy in architecture.