MODERNISM
With its geometric discipline and avoidance of
superfluous decoration, the modern movement in
architecture makes a good subject for investigation
through drawing. The key principles of modernism,
namely functionalism and honest construction, provide
good material for the sketchbook. Space, structure,
physical form and climatic response were driven by the
principles of modernism from the 1930s to the end of the
century. Although today there are new and perhaps more
exciting ideas shaping contemporary design practice,
buildings from a few decades earlier provide valuable
insights into the spirit of the modern age.
Since light was a revolutionary force in much
twentieth-century design, drawings that express the
effects of light on space can be particularly useful.
Sunlight and the corresponding patterns of shadows help
bring modernist design approaches into focus. Space is
less easy to draw but the use of shadow and shade along
with strong black lines can provide a tangible element of
the atmosphere sought by architects from Le Corbusier to
Louis Khan. The use and delineation of line tells us a great
deal about how an architect thinks. If one compares the
thin but authoritative line of Mies van der Rohe with the
chunkier and soft-edged line of Frank Lloyd Wright it
prepares us for the difference in the resulting approaches
to modernism. Our own drawings can use line in a way
which respects these different qualities.
Line by itself can rarely express the emotional and
shocking aspects of much modern architecture. The
shock of the new often requires the employment of a
wider range of graphic tools from colour to strong
textures and dark, almost black shadows. Since the
engineering precision and linearity of many twentieth-
century structures mattered greatly, the use of straight
edges can help in understanding and representing the
buildings of the age. Hence, the type and thickness of line
is an important consideration in sketching buildings of the
period. Also since line was the primary tool employed to
represent edges, planes and the grids of construction, the
abstraction of lines by twentieth century architects gives
their buildings an intellectual quality.
Much modern architecture was sculptural, if not
brutal, in character. The drawings made today should seek
to capture the atmosphere of neighbourhoods created on
the premise that ‘form follows function’. This may require
a more lively form of sketching than formerly employed,
perhaps extending into collage and multiple image
making. Whatever tools are used, the distinctiveness of
the age should be expressed in the drawings made.Machinery, function and modernism 139