Monday, January 16, 2017

overcome with light, pt. 2


I have just read Johan Mårtelius' essay Längs bokens rygg (Arkitektur (Stockholm), no. 4, 2006) where he mentions the progression from darkness towards light connecting it both to the entrance sequence in Isak Gustaf Clason's Nordic Museum and to the line 'Från mörkret stiga vi mot ljuset' (From the dark we step towards the light) from the Swedish version of The Internationale.

Mårtelius also mentions that the third, modernist, wing – directly in front as you come up the entrance stair – wasn't added until 1932 so originally you were facing a glazed opening with a door leading straight out into the even brighter daylight outside. I hadn't actually thought about it like that, and find it a little disappointing that if you follow that reasoning there is a distinct spatial direction to your progress: you do not see the same spot in a new light but encounter something actually new instead. even though that too works as a spatial metaphor for learning I'm actually quite happy that third wing was added so quickly - it makes the building a bit more didactic and explicit but it also adds something by forcing you to enter and exit in the same way (well, there are other ways of entering and exiting but they are more obviously secondary so don't really matter that much to the entrance sequence).

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