BACHELOR OF SCIENCE (HONOURS) IN ARCHITECTURE

THEORIES OF ARCHITECTURE AND URBANISM

(ARC61303)
SYNOPSIS: REACTION PAPER (MARCH 2018)
Name: Wong Cho Mun ID No.: 0322723
Lecturer: Mr. Nicholas Ng Tutorial Time: 10am
Reader/Text Title: The Geometry of Feeling Synopsis No: Test 3 (Set B)
Author: Juhani Pallasmaa
In the article “The Geometry of Feeling” by Juhani Pallasmaa tried to issue that his idea where he thinks that
architecture cannot be only play in form. Regarding to what the author said, architecture should give us a
sense of the meaning of our own world or our own existence, because nowadays very few modern building
appeals to our feeling and most of the anonymous house in oldtown or the unpretentious farm will give us a
sense of familiarity and pleasure.

Pallasmaa stated that the artistic dimension of a work of art only exist in a consciousness of the person
experience it. As architects we do not primarily design buildings as physical objects, but the images and
feeling of the people who live in them, but if a building does not fulfill the basic conditions formulated for it
phenomenologically as a symbol of human existence it is unable to influence the emotional feelings linked in
our soul with the image a building create. Pallasmaa argues that, Architecture is a direct expression of
existence, of human presence in the world. It is a direct expression in the sense that it is largely based on a
language of the body of which neither the creator of the work nor the person experiencing it is aware.
Pallasmaa also state that the inner architecture mind emerging out the feelings and memory image is built on
different principles from the architecture developed out of professional approaches. I also agree with
Pallasmaa statement as “Nature does not need man to explain itself, but a building represents its builder”. An
impressive architecture experience sensitized our whole physical and mental receptivity.

I agree to Juhani Pallasmaa, the form of a building is not as important as the meaning of why the building is
built in our own world or our own existence. Architecture is as a sign of culture in the landscape and it is as a
projection of man and a point of reference in the landscape. Architecture replace meaningless reality into a
momentousness journey in life, making a purpose and settling us in a space while creating memory.

Word Count: 352 Mark Grade

Assessed by: Mr. Nicholas Ng Date Page No. 3