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Solar Art—Solar Architecture
- Leonardo
- The MIT Press
- Volume 28, Number 3, June 1995
- pp. 231-232
- Article
- Additional Information
SOLART GLOBAL NETWORK Solar Art—Solar Architecture Jürgen Claus The "Law of the Sun," to quote Le Corbusier, guided builders and archi tects from the beginning on. Part of the SolArt Global Network '95 is a rein forced discussion of how that law is ap plied in research and practice of today's architecture. We don't mean the simple application of a photovoltaic panel on top of a roof—even if this may have some practical results. What we mean is a research-based work of art and archi tecture, where new materials and new processes are guided toward a new aesthetic . This way might be illustrated in the vision of architect Ingo Hagemann (Fig. 1), who regards the integration of photovoltaic modules into building en velopes as a chance to explore uncon ventional forms of expression. In a recently published book, Christo pher Day advocates the "ensouling" of buildings through the sensitive juxtapo sition of opposites such as light and mat ter, the greatest of these being "the polarity of cosmos and substance, one bringing enlivening . .. rhythms and the other stable, enduring, rooted in place and time" [1]. Day sees the "sick building syndrome" deriving from inad equate ventilation, wrong microbio logical, thermal and electrical dimensions, etc. One may ask what a The SolArt Global Network section of Leonardo makes visibh the activities of a group ofartists, engineers, scientists and scholars participating in an international project. The participants in the SolArt Global Network are dedicated to provoking the cultural changes necessary to move our societiesfrom a dependence on petroleum-based sources of energy to a dependence on renewable resources. For further information on the SolArt Global Network, contactfürgen Claus and Nora Claus at Centre Overoth, Overoth 5, B-4837Baelen, Belgium. Tel: (32) 87-743791;fax: (32) 87-743796. Additional information can also be obtained on the Leonardo World Wide Web Site, located at . Fig. 1. Ingo Hagemann, rendering of buildings integrating photovoltaic modules. Every new technology brings changes to already established designs. Thus, the integration of photovoltaic cells into building envelopes offers the opportunity for unconventional forms of expression . (top left) Adaptive photovoltaic modules used for roofing assist the free-standing building in developing its own identity; (bottom left) photovoltaic modules are integrated into the prefabricated homogeneous building envelope in buildings on a slope; (center right) a building with large photovoltaic areas facing south. (See text byJürgen Claus.) new understanding and application of Solar Art-Solar Architecture may change. In this special section in Leonardo covering of the SolArt Global Network '95 project we introduce some general thoughts as well as some archi tectural and artistic answers to this ques tion. We hope to contribute to this complex discussion and to indicate the values of artistic work within the archi tectural context. The Multifunctional Wall Frederick Kiesler, in talking about TL· Large Glass of Marcel Duchamp—which for him was surface and space at the same time—called it "the first ji-ray of space. It is architecture, sculpture and painting in ONE" [2]. Glass is of im mense importance for today's new buildings because it is able to react "like" the skin of the body. Helmut Tributsch from the Institute of Physical Chemistry at the Free University of Ber lin writes here about these "skins" in his contribution "Living with the Sun." Artists have worked with multifunc tional walls since the early twentieth century. El Lissitzky created a multifunc tional wall for the art museum in Hanover, directed by Alexander Doerner, in the 1920s. Laszlo MoholyNagy was fully aware that "boundaries become fluid, space is conceived as flow ing—a countless succession of relation ships . . . real spatial experience rests on simultaneous interpenetration of inside and outside, above and beneath, on the communication of the in and the out, on the often invisible play of forces present in the materials and their rela tionships in space" [3]. New and actual "biosphere architec ture" [4]—architecture that is directly Jürgen Claus (artist, writer, educator), Academy of Media Arts, Peter-Weker-Platz 2, D-5000, Cologne, Germany. Received 17January 1995.© 1995 ISAST LEONARDO, Vol. 28, No. 3, pp. 231-236, 1995 231 related through energy...