Is Baroque erotic?

So to answer this question I guess the most important thing to identify is what erotic architecture is and what quality makes the architecture erotic. For me I think that Erotic architecture is an architecture that plays with emotion of the user in the space. It can be something that attracts people. It could also be something that controls human’s action or surprise them. This quality can be brought up by the used of lighting, material, texture, repetition and scale. These are the thing that can create attraction and eroticism.

It is obvious that Baroque is erotic since my instructor is trying to make us prove that it is erotic but how? How baroque architecture is erotic? Baroque architecture happened in a period of Catholic reformation after the protestant reformation. So Catholic Church would do everything to make sure that their reformation will bring back their people and becomes great again. One way to do that is using the architecture to impress people and to bring people back in faith.

Baroque architecture is the deformation of Renaissance architecture. It has a lot of Elements of the building are manipulated. Comparing to Renaissance architecture, most of the building are simple and express the perfect geometric shapes. They have no ornaments. Unlike, Baroque architecture has a lot of ornaments in it with a lot of high value material such as gold and marble. Baroque architecture also plays with the quality of light. When light shine upon the material, it create the magnificent effects on lighting. The example of erotic Baroque architecture can be seen from the interior of Saint Andrea al Quirinal by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Bernini brought the light from outside to inside of the building, which creates the erotic quality in to the church. He make a hole just right on top of the golden sculpture. When the light hits the sculpture, the sculpture shines. The light complement the sculpture. 

Interior of Saint Andrea al Quirinal by Bernini

Early Renaissance

It is the age of change. In medieval time, people were so obsess with religion and that somehow make some people take advantages of Christianity’s faith. This issue led to the misunderstanding in the core of religion. Therefore, one clergy, Martin Luther decided to make the whole thing right again by posting his 95 theses and decided to translate the Bible that back then has only in Latin version in to German so other than clergy commoner can study bible and they don’t have to study the bible by listening to the priest only but the can just read it. This is the breaking point of the Christianity. It is a big change in society.

This event made a big change in society. The role of religion to the society is not as important as in middle age. Philosophe had gained a lot of role in the society. People became more intellectual that they did. People started to do everything by themselves and not relying on God’s good grace all the time. Without the power of the church controlling people to believe in everything they want them to, many scientists came up with a lot of theory and the world is no longer flat. This doesn’t mean that people were atheist but the church has less important role in their life.

As I have mentioned that people are still have faith in God, people brought the idea of God is sacred into architecture of this period. They believe that people are perfect in term of the way they look because God has created them according to the way he looks. Human body is symmetrical. So one characteristic of Renaissance architecture is symmetry. Then, Leonardo Da Vinci made a sketch of Vitruvian man. Human body can be fitted within the circle and square. So it made these two shapes become perfect and sacred.  In Renaissance architecture, people always put the shape of circle and square into it. For example, the arches have the combination of square and circle. This becomes the most important part of renaissance architecture. 

Vitruvian man by Leonardo Da Vinci 

Renaissance arch

Parametric design

What we have learned last class was about Parametric design which relates to the postmodern architecture. Parametric design is the design that comes from the parameter of what we interested in. So it took the parameter of the subject interest and turn it into the data. Then let the program calculate it and turn it in to a form of architecture. In my opinion, I think that paramentric design is something that is different from what we have had before. It is something that doesn't need the artistic quality as much as the scientific quality. By letting machine compute and build it complete shift the way we look at design because parametric design needs perfection that human cannot give. If only one little millimeter is off, the whole building might not be able to stand.

This is a great shift of design which has occured by the advance in technology. But have you ever thought if it is the right direction. For me I think it is wrong by relying too much of the technology which is equal to how we underestimate human's abilities. And If one day in the future there's no machine, how can we survive by not relying ourself on any technology. Or another sense, can they be architects without any computers?