Its Foundation in Pre-dimensionality and formation under Authority of Emotional Forces
Ph.D. Thomas Alsheimer, since October 2020
This doctoral thesis is concerned with approaching the question of architectural space in an unprecedented and fundamentally new way, thereby providing a profound philosophical foundation. The reason for this is the New Phenomenology according to the German philosopher Hermann Schmitz (1928-2021) with its concepts of the pre-dimensionality of space, feelings as spatially poured atmospheres and the felt body («Leib»). With a thorough introduction to this broad-based conceptual system in architectural theory, which is close to the reality of human life, it is applied to architecture in its entirety for the first time.
Pre-Dimensionality. Although architecture creates three-dimensional structures, it is rooted in the «pre-dimensional», i.e. those layers of space that have not yet been defined by the three geometrically assigned dimensions as well as positions, distances and surfaces. Weather, water, sound and smell provide everyday experiences of pre-dimensional volumes that are extended without surface or edge and are of an unquantifiable dimension. The realization of the pre-dimensionality of architectural space - beyond surfaces and bodies - makes it possible to solve many problems and contradictions in architectural theory, such as the long-held body-space dualism, and at the same time leads to the realization that the origin of architectural space can be recognized even before its structural manifestation. The atmospheric potency of architectural space rests in this pre-dimensionality and leads to the concept of emotional forces.
Emotional forces. Contrary to the Western philosophical tradition, the New Phenomenology discovers feelings not as states of the soul or brain processes, but as spatially poured atmospheres, by which the human being is physically seized and has to deal with them in a personal statement. Accordingly, feelings are also pre-dimensional volumes - i.e. extended without surface or edge - and this spatialization of feelings subsequently opens up far-reaching insights into architectural space. On the basis of the authority and demands of these gripping emotional forces - above all anger and shame - the formation of architectural space takes place and confirms the origin of architecture beyond physical formations.
Contactt: thomas.alsheimer[at]uni-weimar.de