It is believed that all mammals, including humans, have a ‘figural primitive’ in the brain, a pattern with two dots representing eyes, a vertical line representing a nose and a horizontal one for the mouth, at the ready to perceive upright face-like input instantaneously. [...]
So when we look at buildings that suggest a face, we feel a kinship, maybe a little love, maybe in reunion with an extended family member.
— metropolismag.com
As advancements in neural imaging technology allow for more accessible and legible understandings of our brain, architectural theory has begun borrowing more and more from neuroscience. The two disciplines' explicit collaboration is part of the agenda of the Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture, and is increasingly adopted in academic design research.
For more on architecture and neuroscience:
21 Comments
Hey, hold on a minute. I thought that preferences in architecture were based on evolving cultural norms and idiosyncratic personal tastes, not human nature.
I think this author is pushing the "kinship" idea a little far. My understanding, based on a lecture I saw in grad school by a German architect whose name I can't recall, is that the figural primitive means not that we look for friendly faces in objects, but that we can't help but see a face in objects when anything even remotely suggesting it exists. It's pareidolia, and it's why we see Jesus in toast, too.
As Merleau-Ponty said, we exist within the flesh of the world.
I'd call it pareidolia if it were a random phenomenon, such as the discoloration of a piece of bread from the toaster, which we interpreted as anthropomorphic. But this is a bit different. We tend to make buildings that look like us, and then we judge them desirable. We are putting the image on the toast, so to speak. It's a feedback loop.
I've probably posted this here before, but it's really aligned with this subject, and well worth watching if you haven't seen it:
Dennis Dalton "A Darwinian Theory of Beauty"
https://www.ted.com/talks/denis_dutton_a_darwinian_theory_of_beauty?language=en
Dalton suggests that we are wired to perceive certain things beautiful, and he offers an evolutionary explanation.
It's also why we are predisposed to like both symmetrical compositions and picturesque compositions. Also why we are predisposed to like legible architecture, both structurally and culturally.
BTW, EKE, thanks for posting the ted talk. I couldn't agree more. What's fascinating is that this kind of information is still ignored from all the progressive schools that claim to be thinking outside the box. As a die hard liberal, I simply will never understand this phenomenon. I think it has something to do with the ideological battles between libs and conservatives and how the Nazi's embraced traditional architecture and attacked the modernists, but at this point, it's been sooo long ago that the staying power of this bias is truly baffling. Anyway, thanks for posting.
OK, but when I see a face in a building I immediately dislike the building, no matter how funny or cute or whatever it is.
And I don't think we make buildings that intentionally look like us, we make things that please us and then sometimes analyze how they reflect us. Look, this amazing sculpture by Eva Hesse doesn't look like us, but I relate to it as a body because I inhabit a body.
Other people are turned off by it because it reminds them of a spider or whatever. I happen to like spiders, too. Viva diversity!
Here here Donna, Viva diversity! Now if we could only get this spirit in our schools...
Classical architects have always intentionally made buildings that resemble us.
I do agree with you on that, Thayer.
I'm surprised to read that you have never run across this, Quondam. The literature and philosophy of classical architecture is filled with examples of explicitly encoded anthropomorphism. This goes at least back to Vitruvius, who wrote at length about the orders as being represented in their proportions by the human body. (The Doric as the sturdy soldier, or the Corinthian as the slender maiden). I'm not aware of any text from Ancient Greece which explicitly states this, but one only needs to look at the Caryatid Porch of the Erechtheion to surmise that they connected the orders with the human body, and probably saw it the same way the Vitruvius did.
Rennaissance and Enlightment architects expanded on this. DaVinci and Blondel, for example, produced many drawings highlighting the fact that the proportions of the elements of classical architecture reflect the human form. The reliance on bilateral symmetry, and the so called "Principal of Threes", where classical architecture is seen as having a "base, shaft and capital" or "foundation, wall and roof" , has often been noted as analogous to "foot, body, head".
This explicit anthropomorphism is not just an accident. It's part of the literature of classical architecture, and part of the way it has been taught for generations.
I believe that it is both, and it can be said that there are important intersections between geometry and human form.
Geometry and anthropomorphism are two of the many lenses through which one can view the language.
Of course not. You are parsing my words pretty finely. When I said, "Classical architects have always intentionally made buildings that resemble us", it was in the sense that someone might say, "People in Minnesota have always loved their cheese". They are not saying that every Minnesotan loves cheese, but that, historically, an awful lot of people from Minnesota love, and have loved cheese.
Let me be very clear, then. Over the history of classical architecture, from antiquity to the present day, a prevailing theme and rationale for the language has been anthropomorphism, either explicit or implied. This is not accidental, but has been part of the written philosophy of classical architecture since antiquity.
Blondel
Of course. There are many themes that contribute to the language.
Ok. Whatever, Quondam. We'll agree to disagree. I'm done.
I apologize for the length but it conveys the point beautifully visually.
First thing must be understood in how human brain thinks and the nature of associative memory, the kind of memory that defines the way human memory works. There is a strong component of that memory that is built around 'pattern recognition'. A basic primitive of human brain function. Because a significant part of human memory and human existence is from our senses especially vision. We are built with a sort of 'software' to see visual patterns and build an association framework. This is a core aspect of human memory and the neural network architecture of the human brain.
This is not at all questioned fundamentally by neuroscience.
A fancy term 'pareidolia' is coined but that is a psychological term coming from the perspective of effect as an aftermath effect not exactly the reason behind it. The reason behind it is because of the way the human brain and human memory works. Memory is more than just the record of experience. Our vocabulary. Our visual recognition and all that. How do we know what a cat looks like even from a gestalt. Because our brain and pattern seeking and recognition structure abstract the world into pattern abstracts. So even from a simple cartoon of garfield and we call him a cat yet take a comparison and you see patterns from a simple exercise.
and
What is it with these character defining traits:
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and
and
I think just with a few examples... what is it that tells you what you are seeing. I am sure, in at least a couple photos, you can see more if you are observant.
What do you see? Why do you think what you are seeing is what you claim to be seeing?
I like where this is going
"There is a strong component of that memory that is built around 'pattern "
Absolutely, which is why the grid patterns favored by some modernists for the whole of their façade are almost universally disliked. There is no pattern beyond an endless series of rectangles. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the abstracted object that tends to contradict our understanding of gravity can also be a turn off because they refuse to be constricted by any recognizable pattern. In a sea of traditional patterns, these buildings can make beautiful counterpoints, but with out the foil, they tend to shut down this pattern searching instinct. Think of it like music. We tend to like beautifully orchestrated sounds and rhythms because they engage this instinct, and with skill, can be counter-pointed with some exquisite pattern breaking moments. Thinking about music again, imagine restricting oneself to listening only to the music some historian told you was "of our time". I love cats also.
Raimund Abraham
He was a professor at Pratt when I went in the late 80's. After hearing stories about him, I avoided him like the plague. Nice drawings though. I like the smiley face at the top.
I loved hearing the stories about Abraham, I had a prof attend Pratt, graduated in 86' I think.
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