JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR SHELL AND SPATIAL STRUCTURES: J.

IASS

MECHANICS AND ARCHITECTURE:

NERVI’S CREATIVE KNOWLEDGE VERSUS
THE UNSOLVED CONTEMPORARY COMPLEXITY
Giuseppe REGA
Professor of Solid and Structural Mechanics, Sapienza University of Rome, ITALY; giuseppe.rega@uniroma1.it

Editor’s Note: Manuscript submitted 12 May 2013; revision submitted 4 July 2013; accepted 11 July 2013.This paper is
open to written discussion, which should be submitted to the IASS Secretariat no later than March 2014.

ABSTRACT

The discussion on P.L. Nervi’s contribution to mechanics and architecture is embedded in the wider framework
of the relationship between the two realms. Consciousness and consistency underlying the creativeness of
structural designers of 20th century aimed at building innovative works are contrasted with the unsolved
complexity in the formal conception and practical realization of nonlinear contemporary architecture.

Keywords: Nervi, mechanics, architecture, scientific knowledge, creativeness, consistency, complexity

1. MECHANICS AND ARCHITECTURE
Mechanics determines structure whereas
architecture includes structure. To dwell on this
trivial point and its consequences for design, it is
worth shortly framing the matter within its
historical development.
Architecture, as the concrete outcome of a suitable
and successful combination of form and structure,
was born much before (and independent of)
mechanics, as the science establishing the
theoretical rules of structures. From Antiquity to
Renaissance, such a combination was addressed
according to a purely (Euclidean) geometrical
perspective, which was indeed the naturally
unifying one in both conceptual and practical terms.
Construction problems consisted of finding a proper
way to realize a given, abstract, geometric shape,
using the tools of their time.
When modern mechanics was born in a totally
independent, and wider, context (17th-18th
centuries), the structure of an architectural work
started to gain its conceptual independence of the
form, and the problem of the relation between the
two basic ingredients of the architecture came into
play. The early (17th century) attempts to exploit the
powerful mathematical language of mechanical
science to address problems of architectural design,
such as the best shape of vaults or the stability
criteria of constructions, were among the most
problematically conscious positions in this respect.
The industrial revolution of the 19th century, with
the ensuing technological needs, rapidly led to the
onset of structural engineering as a conceptual and
operational realm increasingly separated from the
architectural one, a model which indeed has been
formalized in the 20th century in both educational
and professional terms.
Of course, the full independence of the two realms
is definitely established at the present time. Yet,
the question arises as to whether this separation,
which often assumes characters of a contraposition,
is the most effective conceptual and operational
model to deal with the complexity of design and
construction of innovative works.
In addressing the positions and feelings most
sensibly opened to the matter within the two
separate realms, one cannot be too schematic. Yet,
within the definitely architectural realm, the need to
regain a unitary conception of form and structure –
along with function – accounting for all three
Vitruvian components (firmitas, utilitas, venustas)
of the architecture, was at the core of the design
philosophy of the Modern Movement, and governed
to a various extent the constructive act of all of its
major representatives (Gropius, Wright, Le
Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Aalto,…).
In turn, landmarks of a cooperative broad-
mindedness within the technically oriented realm
could be traced back to Antonelli (a former Italian
designer) and Eiffel, up to Hénnebique, Torroja,

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Candela, Nervi, Morandi, Buckminster-Fuller, Frei
Otto, Musmeci, Calatrava, ….. In all of these
designers, usually deemed to be engineers crossing
the boundaries of architecture, the relationship
between form and structure can be considered to
have been nearly au pair, though to the solely
constructive aim. As a matter of fact, their broad-
mindedness and practical activity have been
synthesized in the literature under the name “art of
building,” which sums up design and construction
[1]. Yet, in all of them, the artistic dimension was
constantly complemented by a conscious scientific
dimension, so that referring to a “science of the art
of building” seems more appropriate: with the
whole label significantly highlighting how the
ultimate creative act is the art of building, with
science being its fundamental and unitary
underlying mean.
Along the previous line of thinking, it is not easy to
adequately and reliably interpret the personal and
cultural feelings of architects and/or engineers who,
in about the last century, paid proper attention to the
role of structural conception in the design of
challenging new buildings. Yet, to the sake of
readability and to the sole aim of adopting a self-
explicative terminology possibly useful to exchange
ideas, reference can be made to a categorization
proposed and used in [2] to synthetically and
comprehensively classify the building activity over
the centuries as regards the relation between
mechanics and architecture.
2. SCIENCE OF THE ART OF BUILDING:
CONSCIOUSNESS AND CONSISTENCY
We limit ourselves to the open-mind of early
structural architects or engineers of only the 20th
century, whose creative act was nourished with a
proper blending of scientific achievements, which
include the theoretical understanding of the
principles of strength of materials from the second
half of the 19th century, the discovery and use of
new building materials and technologies (steel,
reinforced concrete) occurring up to the turn of the
20th century, and the emerging role of physical
experimentation in design conception and
realization. Based on a variable combination of
these components, two main archetypal classes of
designers open-minded to the role of structural
mechanics in the conception of challenging
architectures can be distinguished, the “structural-
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builders” and the “structural-mathematicians” [2],
the former being the most populated class. To make
this nominal distinction more apparent via specific
examples – even running the risk of an
oversimplified categorization – designers like
Antoni Gaudì, Felix Candela, Eduardo Torroja, Pier
Luigi Nervi and Riccardo Morandi (Sergio
Musmeci and Frei Otto) could be thought of as
more representatives of the first (second) class.
From a theoretical perspective, one could say that,
in conceiving and realizing their designs, a
constructive mental attitude somehow prevailed
over the mathematical one in the former – though
with meaningful differences – whereas the opposite
occurred in the latter.
Yet, notwithstanding all peculiarities characterizing
the architectural work of those designers (mostly
the “structural-builders”) a number of distinctly
meaningful features, of both technical and
perceptive nature, are shared by all of them:
(i) The tectonic space that underlies and
substantiates the architectural work is handled
via a global and unitary conception, and its
practical realization makes this character fully
apparent; in one word, the architecture design
and construction processes are governed as a
whole.
(ii) Though being characterized by a variety of
geometrical curves and surfaces, as well as
sensibly animated by different technological
solutions, the tectonic space of the
architectural work appears to be substantially
static, self-defined and self-contained, and
with no – or limited – dialogue with the
surrounding environment. This also ensues
from the circumstance that, as a rule, the forms
governing, e.g., closed spaces are
geometrically “pure” and un-fragmented ones.
In conceptual terms, it also reflects the
willingness to pursue certainties, typical of
some time periods.
(iii) As a consequence, the human being taking part
in the tectonic space is strongly oriented by the
geometrical and material set up of the whole
architectural plan, of its main structural
components – which have an apparent role in
the overall work – and of the technological and
architectural details through which the
structural conception is realized.
 JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR SHELL AND SPATIAL STRUCTURES: J. IASS
Borrowing from the contemporary lexicon of exact
and technological sciences, as recently done when
talking of the architecture of complexity [3], one
could indeed refer to these architectural works as
“regular” ones: this attribute also somehow
pertaining to involved, geometrically nonlinear,
architectures (e.g., by Gaudi, Musmeci, Otto)
exhibiting however a language and an internal order
which are comprehensive and understandable.
Overall, the above characteristics are shared by the
architectural works of a number of well-known
architects and engineers. This entitles us to frame
their architectures within a unified context, even
though their peculiar attitude as designers and their
concrete involvement as constructors turned out to
be also meaningfully different.
In this last respect, we are specially interested in: (i)
highlighting how addressing the design of all
aspects of an architectural work as a whole, along
with its construction, entails a high, and indeed very
desirable, level of internal consistency of the overall
outcome; (ii) dwelling on the different role played
in the “art of building” of those designers by the
knowledge of mechanical sciences as available at
their time; (iii) pointing out how, irrespective of
possibly different theoretical positions about how to
conceive a resisting system, its practical design and
construction are generally tackled with a high
degree of structural consciousness.
2.1 Consistency between Formal and Structural
Qualities
As to the first item, it is apparent that an outcome
consistently accounting for all design aspects and
exhibiting, in particular, a high degree of coherence
between shape and material substance is more
easily attainable in those architectural works for
which the form substantially coincides with the
structure. This is indeed the case of most of the
works realized by those architects and engineers,
who mainly designed and built stadiums, exhibition
halls, shells, spatial structures, industrial plants,
churches, and bridges. In many cases, they
succeeded in handling the dominant structural issue
of the architectural conception in a rather inspired
way, ending up with works where the “razon y ser”
[4] or the “naked truth” of the resistant skeleton
provides the architecture with its highest formal
quality.
Of course, different – and sometimes highly self-
confident – theoretical positions on the role of
statics in architectural works were also confronting
with each other among designers and architecture
scholars. Restricting ourselves to Nervi’s position,
he was claiming that a quality criterion aimed at
satisfying the requirements of only static
correctness and functionality would indeed
guarantee, nearly automatically, the formal quality
of the architectural outcome. This is indeed not
completely true, as also shown by some formally
less convincing outcomes of Nervi’s late works. As
a matter of fact, a number of architecture scholars
somehow conceitedly criticized not only partially
unresolved Nervi’s realizations but also some of his
most acclaimed and successful ones, based on a
viewpoint according to which, in principle, the
manifold values of the architecture cannot be
reduced to only structural ones.
2.2 Role of Science in the Art of Building
As regards the role of mechanical sciences in the art
of building, most of the nominal “structural-
builders” had a marked criticism, to a variable
extent, against the impersonal abstractness and the
heaviness of the mathematical apparatus embedded
in the methods of structural analysis, as resulting
from the achievements in mechanical sciences
occurred up to mid 20th century. As a matter of fact,
Nervi, according to his writings, was among the
designers most clearly sided with a critic position
about the role played by those methods in the
structural conception and design of architectural
works. This is witnessed by, e.g., the following
sharp quotation: “The mathematical analysis of the
equilibrium of resistant structures, started at the
beginning of the last century and grown up to
reaching the considerable present development, has
certainly provided a formidable help to the solution
of static problems. Yet, it has also contributed to
drying the personal sources of intuition and static
sensibility, thus favoring the separation between
scientific-technological attitude and intuitive-
artistic attitude which, besides fostering the
educational and professional separation between
engineers and architects, is also a non-trivial reason
of the crisis faced by the architecture in the last few
decades.” [5, p. 10].
From a perspective of science and of its complex
relationship with architecture, the previous Nervi’s
statement was among those which meaningfully
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characterized him as a follower – or even a top-
level representative in his own field – of rather
conservative positions against the role of mechanics
in architectural design; thus contributing – as he
also says – to induce or make apparent, in the
framework of the architecture, the separation
between human and scientific cultures fostered by
many think-tank experts since the early 20th
century. Of course, it is not within the scope of this
article to dwell on whether this declared dichotomy
– and the ensuing statement about a primacy of
human sciences against mathematical, physical and
natural ones, not even mentioning technological
sciences – was in fact a peculiar outcome of the
Italian situation ensuing from the former Benedetto
Croce’s sharp philosophical position, later on
resumed and formalized in the western culture
within a more general context [6]. Nor is herein of
interest to establish whether Nervi’s position on the
relation between science and architecture was the
source – or, possibly, the consequence – of his
somehow controversial relationship with a
meaningful part of the Italian academic community
of structural mechanics, which, in fact, solely
involved him in teaching university courses, thus
making apparent the specifically technical and
professional context of his contribution.
In fact, Nervi was among the toughest supporters of
the primacy, for structural conception, of a
conscious intuition of, e.g., the flow of forces
governing the local and global static equilibrium of
single components or of the overall mechanism, as
suggested by statements like the following one:
“even the design of technically important or
challenging architectural works barely relies on the
utilization of refined mathematical calculations or,
at least, it requires them just in an operational stage
completely separated from the creative one” [5, p.
29]. It clearly expresses his conviction about the
mentioned separation between creative and rational
stages of structural design in architecture, the
former being referred to the realm of human
sciences, the latter certainly pertaining to that of
mathematical and technological sciences.
According to Nervi, structural intuition is the
natural outcome of a well-fed expertise of the
designer, which is nearly automatically transferred
into a personal ability to predict (or interpret) the
mechanisms through which a structure is well
suited to the role it has to play within the
architectural project. Structural analysis is basically
246
needed to validate formal, geometrical and material
solutions selected a priori, with the associated
dimensional figures, on the sole basis of intuition
and technical expertise, as well as to make the
governing design idea actually realizable in a
possibly optimal way, also from the economic
viewpoint. As a matter of fact, structural
calculations and verifications were entrusted in
Nervi’s professional studio to specifically expert
people like Mario Desideri. In this way, at least in
Italy, Nervi’s studio was among the former cases,
though to a small scale, of conscious division of job
roles in architecture and civil engineering that
would have later become a rule within large design
studios. An organizational model which certainly
allows to efficiently tackle all of the highly complex
design and realization issues of challenging new
architectures. But which, at the same time, runs the
risk to further deepen, from an operational
viewpoint, the detachment between architectural
and structural conception, with the marked
problem-solving character of the latter with respect
to the creative one of the former; a position which
has ended up with the persisting “archistar” system,
where the sole visible design role is the one of the
architect, with the fundamental contribution of the
structural engineer being usually overlooked.
Going back to the issue of the relation between the
mathematically driven impersonal analysis and the
personal capability of structural synthesis, which is
the core of Nervi’s contraposition, in all cases in
which the latter was lacking or the structure was
markedly innovative with respect to the
consolidated knowledge, he made recourse to
dedicated physical experimentation on small or
medium scale structural models. Following the
innovative and celebrated – even though home-
made – experiments on reversed tensile elements
which drove Gaudì in the design and construction
of the Sagrada Familia, several of Nervi’s important
realizations were firmly founded on the outcomes
of qualified experimental modeling conducted at
specialized university laboratories and ISMES, in
strong collaboration with A. Danusso and G. Oberti
from the Polytechnics of Milan and Turin. A
circumstance meaningfully complemented by the
understanding of the potential for design innovation
embedded in Nervi’s architectural and structural
conception also by the part of the Italian academic
community of structural mechanicists more clearly
oriented towards a theoretical approach to structural
design, like G. Colonnetti [7].
 JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR SHELL AND SPATIAL STRUCTURES: J. IASS
2.3 Designer’s Structural Consciousness
However, and we are now dwelling on the item of
scientific and technical consciousness, Nervi was
well aware of the formidable advancements in
structural mechanics occurred up to the first half of
the 20th century, and gave them full credit. In fact,
he exploited them in the various stages of the
concrete design and realization of an architectural
work basically as powerful technical tools to be
used for verifying and validating hints about form
and size of structural components ensuing from the
sole static intuition, and often supported by
relatively simple calculations and/or by the outcome
of dedicated physical experimentations.
Yet, here is an important point. For a number of
reasons ranging from personal qualities to the
sophisticated level of the underlying academic
education up to the quality of previous professional
training within a persisting class-conscious society,
structural designers like Nervi, and other ones, were
in a position to objectively exploit the scientific and
technical knowledge necessary to firmly found and
evaluate all possible kinds of intuitive solutions
about how a structure can fulfill the requested
requirements. He fully mastered the modern
principles of structural mechanics along with the
approximate, and sometimes tricky, operational
techniques and calculation tools available within the
mechanics community up to the onset of the digital
era. As a matter of fact, on the occasion thirtieth
anniversary of Nervi’s death, several of his
approximate calculations – as available in archival
documents and technical reports – have been
revisited and compared with results obtained via
modern structural software, often in a relatively
blind context; showing how, apart from the
incredibly greater – and sometimes useless –
amount of results made available by digital
computations, the basic outcomes of his
approximate hand calculations were in the
acceptable range of engineering accuracy, if not
even being precisely confirmed. This entitles us to
say that Nervi’s “natural” capability to understand
and conceive correct mechanisms of structural
behaviors was indeed nourished, in a meaningful
way, by the mathematical/mechanical background
necessary to properly evaluate the feasibility and
effectiveness of a structural solution, and to select a
proper one among a number of them. With the final
choice being generally made by virtue of the
balanced and consistent satisfaction of both formal
and technical requirements, the former and the latter
being respectively, yet cooperatively, referred to
Nervi’s capability both as an architect and as an
engineer.
2.4 On Structural-Mathematicians
Also to pave the way to some points to be made
later about the role of mechanics for architectural
design at the present, it is worth dwelling shortly on
the peculiar mental attitude and the concrete
realizations of some designers most clearly
referable to the class of “structural-
mathematicians,” as opposed to the “structural-
builders” (to which Nervi certainly belongs).
Reference is first made to Sergio Musmeci as a
paradigmatic Italian designer of the second half of
20th century, who openly aimed at attaining
architectural and environmental values of his works
via a strictly structurally-driven design approach; in
this respect being a precursor of the
algorithmically-driven design positions which are
now becoming fashionable within a more
globalized and cooperative framework.
Musmeci succeeded in designing and building
works whose originality and architectural quality
are indeed attained by exploiting advanced
mathematical methods and models of structural
analysis [8]. In his works, the rationale of the –
often highly innovative – architectural shapes
ensues from the apparent intention to satisfy
structural requirements in terms of minimum
stresses, minimum weight or minimal surface, while
at the same time paying proper care to the formal
aspects of the ensuing architecture. In this respect,
the bridge on the river Basento was certainly his
most conscious realization. It has to be noticed that
Musmeci had an engineering-based background,
which not only did not prevent him from designing
and building works of remarkable formal qualities –
contrary to the dominant expectations according to
some rigidity of the engineering training – but was
indeed able to conceive and realize architectural
works just taking advantage of his natural and
educated broad-mindedness, according to which
architecture is the ideal ground for a fertile
encounter of two cultures which are so far apart
from each other to even appear as manifestations of
two different civilizations.
Though less clearly referable to the somehow
abstract category of structural-mathematicians also
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by virtue of their academic and professional
characterization, some more celebrated designers
used a conscious structurally-driven approach to
address variable architectural typologies.
Contrary to the engineering-based sensibility of
Musmeci, Eero Saarinen was an unquestionably
architecture-driven designer who was able to merge
his formal sensibility with the scientific and
technical requirements needed to successfully
realize innovative and original works. Apart from
other noticeable realizations consciously accounting
for the constraints of structural requirements while
properly embedding them in the overall
architectural conception, his work most relevant to
the analysis herein developed is the landmark
Gateway Arch of St. Louis [9]. Therein, the formal
vision of the architect was fruitfully nourished by
the strict rules of mathematics and mechanics,
according to which the optimal shape of an arch
aimed at transferring its own weight to the ground
with no tensile stresses is represented by the
inverted equilibrium catenary. Saarinen succeeded
in associating formal and environmental values to
this somehow abstract mathematical shape. And the
circumstance that, owing to the obvious limitations
of his scientific background, Saarinen had to make
recourse to the specific expertise of Hannskarl
Bandel as a PhD engineer (a name which, indeed, is
nearly never cited by media referring to this work)
does not change the terms of the problem; but only
witnesses, on one side, of Saarinen’s consciousness
of his limited knowledge while, on the other side,
confirming the misuse to overlook the name of the
structural designer even in those cases in which the
contribution to the conception and realization of the
architectural work turns out to be determinant.
Of course, it could be noticed that, since the early
wonderful realizations of ancient and classical
times, both the bridge and the isolated arch themes
are peculiar ones, whose architectural and
environmental values ensue from having a form
which coincides with the structure. This is no more
true when looking, e.g., at the tensile structures
designed by Frei Otto for the roofs of Montreal
1967 Expo or Munich 1972 Olympic Stadium,
which were realized with the determinant
contribution of Fritz Leonhardt from the Institute of
Structural Mechanics of the University of Stuttgart;
again, a name referred to in the engineering
literature but not always in the architectural one
(contrary to the constant reverse mention of Otto).
248
Anyway, what is of interest here is marking once
more how the laws of structural mechanics, now
consisting of the sole tensile behavior of the roof,
and the outcomes of the associated computations at
the onset of digital era, meaningfully cooperated
with the underlying formal idea, under a high level
of mutual recognition, to produce a work of
considerable architectural quality.
One more point has to be made. Among the
designers mentioned before, Musmeci is the one
who more consciously mastered his structural-
mathematician expertise to the creative act of the
architecture, and indeed he was relying solely on
himself to make this approach concrete. In contrast,
Otto and Saarinen were looking for the proper
combination of different expertise needed to pursue
their architectural idea. Yet, all of the paradigmatic
works discussed in this section exhibit the
maximum consciously attainable degree of internal
consistency between architectural form and
underlying scientific and material substance: an
issue which, overall, will be ever more overlooked
in the contemporary architecture of complexity, as
it will be discussed in the following section.
At the time being, although with some degree of
arbitrariness and to the sole aim of pointing out
some declared broad-mindedness, one can consider
Santiago Calatrava, too, as an updated
representative of this category of structurally- and
mathematically-oriented designers. Not all of his
realizations openly aiming at attaining architectural
values via a structurally consistent design do
succeed in exhibiting formal qualities or fully
justified structural solutions. Yet, a number of
remarkable features allow us to put Calatrava’s
works within the present framework, namely their
architectural gigantism, the programmatically
amazing role played by dynamics in the
conformation of evolutionary buildings, some
engineering rigidity and repetitiveness; all of this
being amplified by Calatrava fully belonging to the
archistar system also by virtue of his remarkable
qualities of personal communicativeness.
3. ART VERSUS SCIENCE OF BUILDING:
THE UNSOLVED CONTEMPORARY
COMPLEXITY
Though with meaningful differences among various
fields of activity and different countries, the
Seventies of the 20th century marked nearly
 JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR SHELL AND SPATIAL STRUCTURES: J. IASS
everywhere the transition from the post second-
world war firm trust in the unlimited development
and progress of the human being to the uncertain
and fragmented feelings which all fields of society
have been pervaded with up to the new millennium.
At about the same time, the digital revolution
started to display all of its dramatic effects. Of
course, these issues are not a matter of expert
discussion here. Yet, they are at least to be
mentioned in order to properly frame the
considerable change of general feelings that has
characterized the design evolution of novel
architectures and the building activity up to the
present day.
The set of theoretical and practical positions that
have become dominant in the area of architecture in
the last three decades is very rich and diversified,
and dwelling on it is not within the scope of this
article. Yet, still with some risk of excessive
schematization, a major role can be recognized to
the so-called architecture of complexity where, in
the background of the achievements of science of
nonlinear and complex systems and of their
popularization within the contemporary society, a
considerable number of designers (Eisenman,
Gehry, Libeskind, Hadid,…) realized architectural
works defined nonlinear and/or fractal [9]. With
their fascinating characters, most of these works
more or less consciously traceable to some
paradigms of Deconstructivism and Post-
Modernism, meaningfully contributed to establish
the so-called “archistars’ system.” Among scholars
of architecture, the existence of a claimed “new
paradigm of complexity” [9] provoked a sharp
theoretical reaction [10] aimed at demonstrating
how no understanding and/or conscious use of the
very nonlinear and complex concepts is actually
embedded in those realizations. The matter has been
addressed in [3] where, while recognizing the
doubtless fascination of several architectural
outcomes, existing contradictions between the
scientifically- and technologically-based framework
of complexity and its metaphorical use in
architecture have been pointed out.
Nonlinearity, fractals and chaos in architecture (as
well as in art) have become conceptual instruments
to attain a renewed kind of aesthetics, in which
irregularity is not a negative characteristic but
allows the designer/artist to express a new type of
harmony. What is also fascinating for architects is
the ability of these concepts to establish a
connection between science and nature, two
ingredients that have always been important sources
of inspiration. Fractals and chaos can indeed be
found in a wide variety of natural phenomena,
ranging from the jagged coasts of an island to the
tree ramifications, from the irregularity of mountain
ranges to the chaotic form of clouds, all of these
examples suggesting how a non-immediately
recognizable order can indeed be identified behind
the apparent randomness.
A lot of design projects and realized buildings have
been considered to exhibit landmarks (nonlinearity,
stability, attractors, bifurcation, chaos, fractality,
self-organization, catastrophe, jump, energy flow,
unpredictability) typical of the theory of complex
dynamical systems. Nonlinearity and complexity
have been charming suggestions produced in the
designers’ mind and ending up with daring
architectural shapes and complicated constructions.
With regard to the so-called nonlinear architecture,
recalling that architecture is the result of a
combination of formal and substantial factors, it is
important to specify which kind of nonlinearity is
meant when using this term to characterize an
architectural work. Some regular architectures of
the 20th century were already "nonlinear" at least in
the weak sense of exhibiting spatial shapes and
surfaces described by nonlinear equations. Yet, they
were not “complex,” by virtue of the obvious
circumstance, often overlooked by non-expert
people, that nonlinearity and complexity are two
different characteristics, with the latter one
corresponding in architecture to non-regular (and
indeed also nonlinear) shapes only achievable via
sophisticated software of digital modeling. Not to
mention how referring architectural works to
concepts of nonlinear dynamics or chaos is
ontologically inconsistent, owing to the
circumstance that – irrespective of Calatrava’s
attempts – architecture does never exhibit the
temporal evolution features characteristic of a
dynamical system nor the bifurcation phenomena
with a varying control parameter which are typical
of whatever evolutionary system. In fact, the sole
bifurcations reproducible in architecture are the
static ones, which identify a sequence of paths of
static equilibria, like those governing the
mechanisms of leaf growth, where however an
internal control parameter – absent in architecture –
is involved.
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However, even accepting the autonomy of the
notion of complexity in architecture as stated by
Charles Jencks – according to whom there exist two
complexity theories, the architectural and the
scientific one [9] – the question arises about
whether, in its realizations, the former consistently
embeds all of the possibly complex features of its
constituent elements (form and structure, besides
function), as one would indeed expect given the
multicultural and cross-disciplinary character of the
architectural realm; and, in addition, whether such a
combination might indeed succeed in characterizing
the architectural outcome as a conceptually and
perceptively ordered one, as it is typical of complex
systems when looked at with a proper glass.
Within this general framework, the matter of
relation between mechanics and architecture will be
now addressed in terms of complexity, by adopting
the same perspective and the same criteria as those
used in § 2; a choice that will also allow us to
compare with the previously addressed
characteristics of structurally-based “regular”
architectures, of which Nervi was an acclaimed
designer and builder.
3.1 The Gap between Mechanics and
Architecture in the Complexity Perspective
Reference is made again to the perceptive and
physical features of the architectural space.
(i) Though to a variable extent, the tectonic space
of the contemporary architecture of complexity
appears strongly disarticulated, and highlights
how the focus of the design conception and of
its concrete realization is on fragmented aspects
of the architecture rather than on the unitary
ones that characterized most of the previous
building activity, as of Nervi.
(ii) As an obvious consequence, a metaphorically
dynamic tectonic space is obtained. By fully
opening itself to the surrounding environment,
it aims at figuratively breaking its boundaries
and interacting with different cultures (art,
music, literature, biology, natural science,
design…), thus reflecting the peculiar condition
of hybridization and disorientation of the time
being. The sensible animation of the
construction is no more entrusted to its sole
technological details but to the whole space,
which does not exhibit “pure” geometrical, or
even material, characters any more. Curves,
250
surfaces and volumes are not only markedly
varied and unconventional but also highly
scattered, thus giving a dominant feature of
fluidity to the whole tectonic space.
(iii) As a consequence, the human being taking part
in it is strongly bewildered by the geometrical
and material set up and, in particular, by its
main structural components, whose role in the
overall conception turns out to be often unclear.
He is confused by the continuous discovery of
physical and perceptive disjunctions as well as
by reflections and visual transparencies
between interior and exterior.
Yet, while aiming at hybridizing itself with a
variety of outer cultural and physical contexts –
sometimes with a designer’s highly self-confident
vision – the tectonic space of the complex
architecture does not often succeed in coherently
governing all of its inner characters. Clearly, this is
the most important aspect from the viewpoint of the
relation between form and structure, with major
consequences as regards the matters of internal
consistency, role of science, and structural
consciousness, already addressed in the previous
section on “regular” architectures.
From the operational point of view, breaking the
unity of the architectural work corresponds to
separately entrusting its formal conception,
structural project and construction process (along
with the design of its plants, which is an
increasingly demanding issue in large contemporary
buildings) to different professional expertise, to be
properly related with each other given the
challenging nature of the whole problem. Thus, the
issue of the division of roles already pursued in the
past within a relatively simple context has been
brought to its extreme consequences, under the
reaffirmed and updated umbrella of the primacy of
the formal conception with respect to the structural
one. A position certainly referable to the major
freedom of the creative part of our mind with
respect to the rational one, mostly if the goal is
towards designing fully innovative and unknown
shapes; but also entailing a substantial detachment
between the formal idea and the research of a
structural solution suitable to guarantee the
feasibility of the independently chosen form, being
in this respect supported by the rather naive
conviction that advanced modeling software and
digital computations allow for unlimited design and
construction possibilities.
 JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR SHELL AND SPATIAL STRUCTURES: J. IASS
Apart from its suitability to the necessary, yet
definitely subordinate, static requirements, the
outcome of the structural research stage consists
often of a relatively conventional – and “easy”, if
not even arbitrary – solution, which turns out to be
conceptually and operationally inconsistent with
respect to the possibly innovative values of
nonlinearity and complexity which are assumed as
landmarks of the architectural project. A classical
example in this respect is Frank Gehry’s
Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, where the use of a
highly innovative – and indeed complex, but
anyway charming – figurative language has no
counterpart in the underlying structural conception
(and in the ensuing constructional system), which is
quite traditional in both geometric and material
terms.
It is indeed true that designing an unconventional
structural skeleton well suited to secure the stiffness
and strength requirements needed to a highly
involved architectural shape is not an easy task; it
requires sophisticated knowledge of both the
nonlinear properties of conventional or new
materials and the geometrically nonlinear behavior
of highly deformable structures. Two matters
which, as a rule, are not yet adequately addressed
by the conservative standard codes and regulations
for civil constructions adopted in whatever country,
thus precluding the possibility to consciously and
fully exploiting the tremendous potential embedded
in the mathematical and physical nonlinear world
for a more effective and innovative design. Yet, no
meaningful effort is made in civil engineering nor,
of course, in architecture, to possibly fill this gap of
scientific and technological knowledge.
The consequences are twofold, and are concerned
with both a theoretical and a practical perspective.
From a cultural and ontological viewpoint, several
celebrated architectures lacking internal coherence
between complexity of the exhibited forms and
conventionality of the underlying structures are
indeed lacking “tectonic ethics” [2, 3, 11, 12].
Thus, irrespective of their possible fascination, they
sound like a gratuitous false, a feature which indeed
is much more questionable than the conscious false
intentionally pursued, e.g., in the artistic field.
In turn, from an operational point of view, the
available scientific knowledge on nonlinear
methods, innovative materials and complex
physical phenomena – which has now reached a
critical mass and is ready for exploitation to
develop basic new technologies – is completely
overlooked. This corresponds to giving up the
theoretical and practical knowledge presently
available to the aim of form improving or form
finding, which are indeed paradigms of possible
architectural innovations at present. The former, to
be considered in a wide sense as the possibility to
naturally optimize shape – but also material, and
hence overall behavior – of the structural system
according to a performance-oriented design
philosophy (minimum weight, minimal surfaces,
uniform resistance, minimum displacements,
maximal ductility…), which adds notable value to
the formal conception. The latter, meaningfully
corresponding to the creative role that mechanics
can play for designing topologically novel, and
optimized, architectures, also possibly inspired by
the shape-resistant skeleton of natural or biological
forms. Two missions which were indeed embedded,
to a variable extent, also in the partially
unconscious background of either purely scholars of
mechanics (from Galileo to Huygens and Jakob
Bernoulli) or structural-builders (like Eiffel or
suspended bridge designers) of the past, besides
being openly declared, e.g., in Musmeci’s design
philosophy, though with the still limited tools of his
time.
Finally, it is worth noting how, even in those cases
in which a responsible use of advanced algorithmic
design allows one to interactively conceive complex
architectural shapes which are also structurally
coherent and sustainable, the available building
technologies may be so traditional that a further
practical inconsistence arises with respect to the
claimed theoretical complexity; thus confining the
creative act aimed at pursuing originality and
amazement to the sole virtual conception of the
architectural work, or making its distance with the
actually built architecture fully apparent. A mental
attitude certainly fed by the deceptive values of the
present image-based society, which is specifically
questionable if compared to the “substantial”
coherence between design and construction
embedded in the unitary vision of both Nervi and
other 20th century structurally-inspired designers.
Nor the now fashionable use of advanced software
[13] for generating complex curves, surfaces and
volumes or the implementation of, e.g., a fractal- or
genetically-based parametric algorithm for the
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 Vol. 54 (2013) Nos. 2 & 3 September n. 176 & 177
solution of specific design aspects, according to a
generative, evolution-based or performance-based
architecture paradigm, can fill the void of coherence
often existing between form and structure as well as
between conception and realization.
3.2. Towards a renewed science of the art of
building
In the age of complexity, instead of being solely
driven by fanciful, or even concrete, utopia, design
of meaningful architectural works has to relay on
conscious utilization of scientific concepts,
computational tools and technological means, as
available at the present or in the near future [14].
Innovation in architecture must be meaningfully
substantiated by development of materials and
technological solutions exploiting new mechanical
and structural concepts – like those embedded, e.g.,
in the challenging conception and realization of
tensegrity architectures [15] – with the aim of
consciously governing such scientific issues as
shape sensitivity, nonlinear behavior of materials
and structures, evolutionary structural optimization,
minimal mass design, and so on.
The most technical computational aspects remain of
course an area of expertise of structural engineers.
Yet, the challenge consists of realizing a figure of
designer in between architecture and engineering (a
structural architect and/or a conceptual designer)
consciously complementing and integrating
structural intuition with well-founded, though non-
specialized, mathematical and mechanical
knowledge. The latter supporting and feeding the
former, which remains a basic ingredient of the
creative process, with the consciousness necessary
to conceive and realize challenging novel
architecture.
Besides stimulating structural engineers to
overcome and update possibly rigid and hyper-
conservative mental attitudes to the aim of realizing
a renewed science of the art of building, where
rational and creative conceptions consciously
govern au pair the design process since its very
beginning, such a perspective would also
correspond to feeding structural creativeness with a
more modern and democratic content.
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