and finally the post-communist era of the present, also
perceived as ’global’: each of these had its own ideology,
vocabulary, and reference system on both sides of the
Atlantic and the Berlin Wall. Shifts in political views
and rhetoric were, at many points of history, character
issues; but it would have hardly been possible to keep
the Bauhaus’s legacy alive throughout all these wildly
changing political environments without at least
adjusting the language and emphases at some points.
Words changed meaning: ’socialism’ may have resonated
positively in Berlin 1919, but, as Koehler demonstrates,
had to be erased from the catalog of the 1923 exhibition
in Weimar, let alone the Bauhaus’s American press
coverage. It is for posterity to pull all the threads apart;
but it needs to be considered that not only had some
individuals more integrity than others; some, as we learn
it from Magdalena Droste’s essay on Breuer, Bayer, and
the ultimately unsuccessful Marianne Brandt, or from
T’ai Smith’s discussion of Otti Berger’s plight, had also
more luck than others.
1 Many of the volume’s essays are the proceeds of the symposium
“Bauhaus Palimpsest: The Object of Discourse” co-organized by the
editors of this volume with Peter Nisbet, Daimler-Benz Curator of
the Busch-Reisinger Museum in March 2008 at Harvard University.
2 Besides many other books, essays, and conference papers, see:
James Chakraborty, Kathleen, ed., Bauhaus Culture. From Weimar
to the Cold War, Minneapolis et al., University of Minnesota
Press, 2006; Oswalt, Philipp, ed., Bauhaus Conflicts, 1919-2009.
Controversies and Counterparts, Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Verlag;
and the catalogs: bauhaus a conceptual model, ed. by Bauhaus-
Archiv Berlin, Museum für Gestaltung, Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau,
and Klassik Stiftung Weimar, in cooperation with The Museum
of Modern Art, New York, Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Verlag, 2009;
Barry Bergdoll and Leah Dickermann, eds. Bauhaus 1919-1933.
Workshops of Modernity, New York: Museum of Modern Art, 2009.
3 Michael Müller’s essay, The Dictate of Coldness. Critique from
the Left, 1919–1933” in Bauhaus Conflicts 1919–2009, as in note
2., pp. 50–67, complements Schwartz’s article with its detailed
description of the early leftist critique of the Bauhaus.
4 For a detailed discussion of this, see Benjamin H. D. Buchloh,
“Figures of Authority, Ciphers of Regression”, Brian Wallis, ed., Art
After Modernism: Rethinking Representation, New York, The New
Museum of Modern Art, 1984, 107–136.
5 Gropius: “Rede bei den ersten Ausstellung von Schülerarbeiten des
Bauhauses”, June 1919; Karl-Heinz Hüter,Das Bauhaus in Weimar,
Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1976, p. 210.
6 Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical
Reproduction”, Walter Benjamin, Illuminations, edited and with an
Introduction by Hannah Arendt, New York: Shocken Books, 1968, p.
220.
Design Issues: Volume 27, Number 1 Winter 2010
Gilbert Gorski
The Thinking Hand, Existential and Embodied Wisdom
in Architecture
by Juhani Pallasmaa, John Wiley and Sons Ltd.,
2009, 159 pages, 75 illustrations and photographs,
color/bw
Ironically enough, in presenting his case against what he
perceives as an ever increasing cultural reliance on visual
information, Juhani Pallasmaa must necessarily employ
the written word. His recent book, The Thinking Hand,
Existential and Embodied Wisdom in Architecture, expands
upon his 1995 book, The Eyes of the Skin, in which he
argues—simply put—that contemporary art and archi-
tecture holds little meaning for future generations. This
results from a cultural bias toward an objectification and
abstraction of the human condition that numbly accepts
a man-made world detached from any real sensuality or
intuitive feeling. To reverse this trend, as phenomenolo-
gists, architects must experience the world not only with
their eyes, but also—more importantly—with their other
senses—indeed, with their entire bodies.
The Thinking Hand is a compact mosaic of ideas
generously illustrated with complimentary images.
The book’s first four chapters focus on how the hand
is essential for interaction with the world. The last four
chapters, presenting Pallasmaa’s ideas on existential
and embodied perception, broadly extend his thoughts
to all the arts, from poetry to music. All humans—
particularly architects—use their hands to explore and
re-create the world. In Pallasmaa’s view, the hand is the
mind’s extension. In creation, the improvisational actions
of the hand take the lead, “…in the ecstasy of work…
the image emerges as if it were an automatic projection
of the imagining mind. Or, perhaps, it is the hand that
really imagines…”1 All of our senses “think,” our grasp
of life does not reside in, nor is it adequately defined by,
verbalized concepts. “Existential and embodied wisdom
in architecture – refers to the other knowledge, the silent
understanding that lies hidden in the human existential
condition …”2 Hand drawing and sketching access this
unconscious awareness.
The evolution and use of tools acknowledges a
close relationship with the hand. “The beauty of tools
reflects the same pleasure of inevitability as living
creatures,”3 yet “tools are not innocent,”4 they direct
work in specific ways. The computer is a new tool; still
evolving and not yet completely understood. Pallasmaa
acknowledges its inevitability, but is concerned by archi-
tect’s unreflecting embrace of its possibilities. The adapt-
ability and even affection artists have with their tools
as they become extensions of hands and fingers does
not extend into the digital realm.5 There is an intimacy
with the process of discovery that is made difficult, if
not impossible, with computer aided means of modeling.
97
In the early vulnerable phase of the design process, the
computer’s authoritative realism precludes the “seminal
role of vagueness … Motifs present their fertility only if
the connection with the final result remains obscure.”6
Pallasmaa concedes the necessity of digital technology,
but believes that students must first learn how to use
their hands and be made aware of the impact computers
impart on the design process.
Often, Pallasmaa refers to embodied knowledge;
a concept that challenges the historically held belief that
the mind and body are separate, that human thought
occurs independently of its corporeal habitat. He cites a
growing number of scholars, psychologists, and neuro-
scientists who conclude that human beings experience
and respond to their environment largely in unconscious
ways. Our entire body gathers and forms memories
and skills, and it’s with our entire body we thus access
non-conscious knowledge that eludes our conscious
minds. The author references Richard Sennett’s recent
book, The Craftsman.7 Like Sennet, Pallasmaa remembers
his grandfather’s farm and how much of the knowledge
needed there was learned and shared in non-verbal ways.
Assessing the weather and managing livestock requires
intuitive knowledge, or as he describes, embodied
knowledge.
Early in his career as an architect, Pallasmaa
moved away from a modernist abstract aesthetic. A
cultural dependence on two dimensional representation
encourages architects to conceive a built environment
designed for and glamorized by photography and
video that, when experienced in person, ultimately
lacks meaning. Cut off from the craft of building, the
present generation of architects focuses consequently
on self-serving, short lived intellectual constructions. To
speak to future generations, art must spring from sources
impossible to express objectively. Abandoning traditional
methods to embrace originality and creative freedom
leads to a “deadening uniformity on the one hand and
towards a rootless anarchy of expression on the other.”8
The current obsession with novelty thus holds a false
promise; significant art and architecture must maintain
roots and traditions that “survey the biological and
unconscious realms of the body and mind, … Buildings
are not abstract, meaningless constructions, or aesthetic
compositions, they are extensions and shelters of our
bodies, memories, identities and minds.”9
I first became interested in Mr. Pallasmaa’s ideas
when, in 1978, he spoke at the Graham Foundation in
Chicago. Memorable that evening was his description
of architect Alvro Aalto’s method of working. Archives
show that, to inform his work, Aalto relied on undirected
sketching to uncover perceptions he felt all people
subconsciously shared. Thirty-two years later, back in
Chicago at the Illinois Institute of Technology, Pallasmaa
expanded on his earlier thinking to emphasize many of
the ideas presented in The Thinking Hand.
98 Design Issues: Volume 27, Number 1 Winter 2010
The recent Chicago lecture began by stressing
self-development. Only when the creator becomes his or
her own “sole authority” can (s)he create meaningful art.
An education in the arts should concentrate less on the
making of art and more on nurturing the student’s self-
awareness and self-image in the world. “The teaching
of existential wisdom in education takes place primarily
through the growth of one’s personality …”10
Of particular interest in the Chicago lecture was
Pallasmaa’s account of his own work as a designer and
architect. His self described “fragile architecture”—
elegant light weight structures—obviously reflects his
beliefs. But, does he also feel the architecture of our time
is best if it is made impermanent?
1 Juhani Pallasmaa, The Thinking Hand, Existential and Embodied
Wisdom in Architecture, John Wiley and Sons Ltd., (West Sussex,
United Kingdom, 2009), 17.
2 Ibid, p. 22
3 Ibid, p. 49
4 Ibid, p. 50
5 Some artists are challenging this idea with their facility with the
Wacom tablet and other similar devices that replace the computer
mouse with a pen type instrument that more naturally engages the
entire hand. Ryan Church, Alex Ross, and Dennis Allain, to mention
a few, have links to their websites where they discuss their
techniques.
6 Anton Ehrenzweig, The Hidden Order of Art, (first published 1976),
Paladin (St Albans, Hertfordshire), 1973, as quoted by Pallasmaa, p
97.
7 Richard Sennett, The Craftsmen, Yale University Press (New Haven,
Connecticut and London, 2008).
8 Juhani Pallasmaa, The Thinking Hand, Existential and Embodied
Wisdom in Architecture, John Wiley and Sons Ltd., (West Sussex,
United Kingdom, 2009), 113.
9 Ibid, p. 117
10 Ibid, p. 119
Christopher Long
Josef Hoffmann Selbstbiographie
Edited by Peter Noever and Marek Pokorný
Ostfildern, Germany: Hatje Cantz, 2009
144 pages, paperback EUR 19.80
Designers, like artists, fall into two camps: those who
write eloquently and meaningfully about their craft,
and those who speak mostly, if not exclusively, through
their work. In the history of art, we have figures like
Giorgio Vasari, whose Le Vite delle più eccellenti pittori,
scultori, ed architettori has all but eclipsed his artistic
output. At the other extreme are those like Andy
Warhol, maker of indelible images, but who, despite a