simpozij uvodnik povabilo platforma boštjan vuga janez koželj ákos moravánszky andrej hrausky andreas ruby igor kebel johann bettum simpozij foto esej graf symposium Vabilo Arhitekturna revija AB pripravlja okroglo mizo o Plečnikovi aktualnosti, v sodelovanju z Mestnim muzejem Ljubljana. Diskusija bo potekala v dvo- rani mestnega muzeja Ljubljana 30. oktobra po- poldne. Okroglo mizo bomo posneli in transkrip- cijo objavili v naslednji številki revije AB, z naslo- vom PLEČNIK 2007, v sklopu dogodkov s katerimi bomo obeležili petdeseto obletnico smrti arhitek- ta Jožeta Plečnika. Cilj diskusije, oziroma celotne tematske izdaje re- vije AB, je vzpostaviti odnos med sodobnimi arhi- tekturnimi vprašanji in tehnikami ter Plečnikovi- mi deli. Razgovor bo osredotočen na nekatere Plečnikove izbrane projekte in njihov vpliv na so- dobne arhitekturne prakse. Tekom diskusije bo- mo skušali vzpostaviti novo, svežo perspektivo njegovega dela. Kot moderator bi vam rad predstavil obrise pote- ka diskusije. Preden bomo odprli stimulativno, ži- vahno in mestoma provokativno debato, naj bi vsak od govorcev pripravil približno 10 minut dol- go predstavitev, v kateri bi podal svoj osebni po- gled na posebnosti Plečnikove arhitekturne pra- kse, tehnike in izbranih projektov. Okrogla miza se bo potem nadaljevala z vodenim razgovorom o naslednjih treh glavnih temah: 1. Plečnik in inovativnost 2. Plečnik in prostorke atmosfere 3. Plečnik in učinki površine Diskusija se Plečniku približa preko “bottom up” tehnike, je neke vrste sodobna »ars combinatoria«. Veseli me, da vas lahko pričakujem kot enega od govorcev. Lepe pozdrave. Invitation The ab-Architect's Bulletin, in collaboration with the Ljubljana City Museum, is preparing a round table discussion on Plečnik's relevance. The dis- cussion is to take place in the conference hall of the Ljubljana City Museum, on October 30th in the afternoon. The discussion will be recorded and published in the forthcoming volume of ab, PLEČNIK 2007, as one of the events marking the 50th anniversary of the death of architect Joze Plečnik. The aim of the discussion, as well as of the entire publication, is to establish a relationship between contemporary architectural issues, techniques and Plečnik's works. The discussion will focus on some chosen projects of his and their influence on contemporary practice. Similarly, the discus- sion will try to build a new, fresh, perspective of his work. As a moderator I would like to present you an ini- tial draft of the discussion. Before opening a stim- ulating, partly provocative and vivid discussion, each panellist is requested to give approximately 10 min PowerPoint presentation, outlining their personal view on the specifics of Plečnik's prac- tice and techniques and chosen projects. The round table will then continue with a focussed discussion on the three main topics: 1. Plečnik and innovativity 2. Plečnik and spatial atmospheres 3. Plečnik and surface effects I would consider the discussion as a bottom up technique of actualising of Plečnik's work, a con- temporary “ars combinatoria”. I would be pleased to meet you as one of the panellists. Best regards boštjan vuga 19 simpozij Okrogla miza Plečnik 2007 Boštjan Vuga: Pozdravljeni na jesensko deževnem in sivem, a pri- jetnem popoldnevu okrogle mize »Plečnik 2007« v Mestnem muzeju Ljubljana. Današnja okrogla mi- za je eden od dogodkov, ki obeležujejo 50-letnico smrti arhitekta Jožeta Plečnika. Današnja okrogla miza je tudi sestavni del tematske revije AB, ki bo posvečena Jožetu Plečniku oziroma sodobni per- cepciji njegovega dela. Tema okrogle mize je pomen Plečnikovega dela za nas danes. Začrtali bomo odnos med sodobnimi ar- hitekturnimi praksami in Plečnikovimi projekti. Pri- kazali bomo Plečnikovo delo oziroma Plečnikovo arhitekturno stališče v optiki zeitgeista današnje dobe. Osredotočili se bomo na odnos med sodo- bnim dogajanjem v arhitekturi in Plečnikovimi iz- branimi projekti. Pragmatizirali bomo Plečnikovo delo in ga olupili embalaže, ki ga ustvarja kot mit. Mit o Plečniku gre danes tako daleč, da se ga hoče razglasiti za svetnika, česar si sam najverjetneje ne bi želel. Skozi oči različnih mednarodnih udeležen- cev in udeleženk okrogle mize bomo ustvarjali ak- tualni pogled na Plečnikovo delo danes. Okroglo mizo smo pripravili Miha Dešman, urednik revije AB in predsednik Plečnikovega sklada, Andrej Hrausky, predsednik Društva Arhitektov Ljubljana, in Boštjan Vuga, ki bom okroglo mizo moderiral. Organizatorji okrogle mize so Sklad Jožeta Plečni- ka, revija AB, Društvo arhitektov Ljubljana in Mestni muzej Ljubljana. Plečnikov sklad, glavni organiza- tor, vsako leto tudi podeljuje nagrade sodobnim slovenskim arhitekturam. Na ta na način poskuša pokazati, kakšna je dobra slovenska arhitektura danes, hkrati pa poskuša kazati tudi v prihodnost. Začeli bomo s petimi krajšimi predstavitvami. Pet udeležencev bo predstavilo svoje videnje Plečnikove- ga dela oziroma njegovega razmerja do današnjega časa. Sledila bo diskusija, v kateri se nam bo razprl še kakšen nov pogled na Plečnika in njegovo delo. BV: Pred tem pa bi prosil prof. Janeza Koželja, pod- župana mesta Ljubljane, da s svojim nagovorom odpre okroglo mizo. JK: Kaj še lahko po več kot 50 letih razprav pove- mo o Plečniku novega, kaj še lahko odkrijemo v njegovem delu in življenju? Kaj se lahko iz njego- vih del naučimo, ali imajo sploh še kakšen po- men za prihodnost? Ga lahko obravnavamo kot nasprotnika funkcio- nalizma ali raje kot kritičnega sopotnika moder- nega gibanja? Je bil zares prvi postmodernist, je pripadal klasicizmu ali ekspresionizmu, je bil BV: Before, I want to ask you prof. Janez Koželj, Deputy Mayor of the City Ljubljana to give us an introduction to the event. JK: What more is there to be said about Plečnik after fifty years of discussions, what more is there to dis- cover about his life and work? What can we learn from his works; do they even hold any significance for the future? Should we regard him as an opposer of Functionalism, or rather as a critical fellow-traveller of the Modernist movement? Was he really the original Post-modernist, did he belong to Classicism or Functionalism, was he a Round table Plečnik 2007 Boštjan Vuga: Ladies and gentlemen, on this wet and grey, yet pleas- ant autumn afternoon, I'd like to extend a warm wel- come to the Plečnik 2007 round table here in the City Museum of Ljubljana to all of you. Today's round table is one of the events that mark the 50th anniversary of architect Jože Plečnik's death. Today's round table is also part of AB magazine thematic issue that will be dedicated to Jože Plečnik, in particular to our percep- tion of his work today. The topic of the round table is the significance of Plečnik's work for us today. We will try to set up a relationship between contemporary architectural practices and Plečnik's projects. We will do our best to show Plečnik's work, or rather Plečnik's architectural standpoint in the perspective of the Zeitgeist of our period. We will focus on the relationship between contemporary developments in architecture and select Plečnik's projects. We will try to pragmatise Plečnik's work and strip him of the packag- ing that is turning him into a myth. Today, Plečnik's myth is being taken to extremes, even as far as trying to have him declared a saint, which he is unlikely to have want- ed. On the basis of our international panellists' individual viewpoints, we will try to form a contemporary view of Plečnik's work today. The round table was prepared by Miha Dešman, editor of AB magazine and chairman of the Jože Plečnik Fund, Andrej Hrausky, chairman of the Architects' Society of Ljubljana, and myself, Boštjan Vuga; I'll also try to act as the moderator for the round table. The event was organised by the Jože Plečnik Fund, AB magazine, the Architects' Society of Ljubljana, and the City Museum of Ljubljana. As the main organiser, the Jože Plečnik Fund also awards prizes to contemporary Slovene architec- tures. In this way, it tries to single out quality Slovene architecture of today, as well as hint at the future. We'll begin by listening to five brief presentations. Five panellists will present us with the way they see Plečnik's work and his relationship to present time. These will be followed by a discussion among the pan- ellists that will hopefully bring on further possible views of Plečnik and his work. janez koželj simpozij Okrogla miza Plečnik 2007 Boštjan Vuga: Pozdravljeni na jesensko deževnem in sivem, a pri- jetnem popoldnevu okrogle mize »Plečnik 2007« v Mestnem muzeju Ljubljana. Današnja okrogla mi- za je eden od dogodkov, ki obeležujejo 50-letnico smrti arhitekta Jožeta Plečnika. Današnja okrogla miza je tudi sestavni del tematske revije AB, ki bo posvečena Jožetu Plečniku oziroma sodobni per- cepciji njegovega dela. Tema okrogle mize je pomen Plečnikovega dela za nas danes. Začrtali bomo odnos med sodobnimi ar- hitekturnimi praksami in Plečnikovimi projekti. Pri- kazali bomo Plečnikovo delo oziroma Plečnikovo arhitekturno stališče v optiki zeitgeista današnje dobe. Osredotočili se bomo na odnos med sodo- bnim dogajanjem v arhitekturi in Plečnikovimi iz- branimi projekti. Pragmatizirali bomo Plečnikovo delo in ga olupili embalaže, ki ga ustvarja kot mit. Mit o Plečniku gre danes tako daleč, da se ga hoče razglasiti za svetnika, česar si sam najverjetneje ne bi želel. Skozi oči različnih mednarodnih udeležen- cev in udeleženk okrogle mize bomo ustvarjali ak- tualni pogled na Plečnikovo delo danes. Okroglo mizo smo pripravili Miha Dešman, urednik revije AB in predsednik Plečnikovega sklada, Andrej Hrausky, predsednik Društva Arhitektov Ljubljana, in Boštjan Vuga, ki bom okroglo mizo moderiral. Organizatorji okrogle mize so Sklad Jožeta Plečni- ka, revija AB, Društvo arhitektov Ljubljana in Mestni muzej Ljubljana. Plečnikov sklad, glavni organiza- tor, vsako leto tudi podeljuje nagrade sodobnim slovenskim arhitekturam. Na ta na način poskuša pokazati, kakšna je dobra slovenska arhitektura danes, hkrati pa poskuša kazati tudi v prihodnost. Začeli bomo s petimi krajšimi predstavitvami. Pet udeležencev bo predstavilo svoje videnje Plečnikove- ga dela oziroma njegovega razmerja do današnjega časa. Sledila bo diskusija, v kateri se nam bo razprl še kakšen nov pogled na Plečnika in njegovo delo. BV: Pred tem pa bi prosil prof. Janeza Koželja, pod- župana mesta Ljubljane, da s svojim nagovorom odpre okroglo mizo. JK: Kaj še lahko po več kot 50 letih razprav pove- mo o Plečniku novega, kaj še lahko odkrijemo v njegovem delu in življenju? Kaj se lahko iz njego- vih del naučimo, ali imajo sploh še kakšen po- men za prihodnost? Ga lahko obravnavamo kot nasprotnika funkcio- nalizma ali raje kot kritičnega sopotnika moder- nega gibanja? Je bil zares prvi postmodernist, je pripadal klasicizmu ali ekspresionizmu, je bil BV: Before, I want to ask you prof. Janez Koželj, Deputy Mayor of the City Ljubljana to give us an introduction to the event. JK: What more is there to be said about Plečnik after fifty years of discussions, what more is there to dis- cover about his life and work? What can we learn from his works; do they even hold any significance for the future? Should we regard him as an opposer of Functionalism, or rather as a critical fellow-traveller of the Modernist movement? Was he really the original Post-modernist, did he belong to Classicism or Functionalism, was he a Round table Plečnik 2007 Boštjan Vuga: Ladies and gentlemen, on this wet and grey, yet pleas- ant autumn afternoon, I'd like to extend a warm wel- come to the Plečnik 2007 round table here in the City Museum of Ljubljana to all of you. Today's round table is one of the events that mark the 50th anniversary of architect Jože Plečnik's death. Today's round table is also part of AB magazine thematic issue that will be dedicated to Jože Plečnik, in particular to our percep- tion of his work today. The topic of the round table is the significance of Plečnik's work for us today. We will try to set up a relationship between contemporary architectural practices and Plečnik's projects. We will do our best to show Plečnik's work, or rather Plečnik's architectural standpoint in the perspective of the Zeitgeist of our period. We will focus on the relationship between contemporary developments in architecture and select Plečnik's projects. We will try to pragmatise Plečnik's work and strip him of the packag- ing that is turning him into a myth. Today, Plečnik's myth is being taken to extremes, even as far as trying to have him declared a saint, which he is unlikely to have want- ed. On the basis of our international panellists' individual viewpoints, we will try to form a contemporary view of Plečnik's work today. The round table was prepared by Miha Dešman, editor of AB magazine and chairman of the Jože Plečnik Fund, Andrej Hrausky, chairman of the Architects' Society of Ljubljana, and myself, Boštjan Vuga; I'll also try to act as the moderator for the round table. The event was organised by the Jože Plečnik Fund, AB magazine, the Architects' Society of Ljubljana, and the City Museum of Ljubljana. As the main organiser, the Jože Plečnik Fund also awards prizes to contemporary Slovene architec- tures. In this way, it tries to single out quality Slovene architecture of today, as well as hint at the future. We'll begin by listening to five brief presentations. Five panellists will present us with the way they see Plečnik's work and his relationship to present time. These will be followed by a discussion among the pan- ellists that will hopefully bring on further possible views of Plečnik and his work. janez koželj simpozij boljši urbanist ali boljši arhitekt, je bil boljši arhi- tekt ali boljši oblikovalec? Vsekakor so njegove monumentalne stavbe po- notranjeni mestni prostori, zapornica je most, cerkev je trg, knjižnica stopnišče, tržnica je arka- da, spomenik nastavek za preoblikovanje širšega prostora. Ali je to rimski pristop ali strategija ak- tivnega fragmenta, je urbana akupunktura, in- krement preobrazbe mesta? Je poleg posnemovalcev in častilcev njegovega mojstrstva dejansko obstajala Plečnikova šola in če je, kakšen je bil njen dejanski vpliv na razvoj sodobne slovenske arhitekture, kako je zazna- movala pot njegovih študentov do samostojnih ustvarjalcev? Kako se profesorja prepozna v de- lih arhitektov Ravnikarjeve šole? Je ta dejansko temeljila na nekakšni sintezi modernih in klasi- čnih načel? Mogoče bi bilo prav, da razblinimo mit o tem, ka- ko da je mojster spoštoval kontekst in identiteto kraja; on si je zgodovinski in kulturni kontekst izmišljal, da bi lahko prostor oblikoval po svoje. Sporočilo njegovega odnosa do obstoječega je vendar povsem jasno in nedvoumno, to je, da identiteta ni dana enkrat za vselej, da jo zares ves čas poustvarjamo in na novo oblikujemo. Naj namesto ljubezni do zgodovine raje pouda- rimo arhitektovo težnjo po novem, saj je Plečnik zares neprestano razvijal nove zamisli. Celo več, raziskoval je nove možnosti, ki so jih nakazale njegove zamisli. Njegova metoda je bila razisko- valna, njegova arhitektura eksperimentalna, nje- gove realizacije so bile rezultat dolgotrajnega in ne vedno premočrtnega razvoja osnovne zamisli na način, ki je pogosto vodil do popolnih obra- tov. Način, kako je preobražal svoje zamisli, nika- kor ni bil izraz arhitektovega dvoma, ampak prej dokaz njegove ustvarjalne moči, iz katere izhaja- ta pogum in tveganje, brez katerih ni novosti. Veliko Plečnikovih načrtov za Ljubljano ni bilo uresničenih, še vedno je slišati predloge, da bi veljalo uresničiti njegove najbolj smele zamisli, ki naj bi opogumile najširšo javnost, da bolj sme- lo razmišlja o prihodnji Ljubljani. Premalo pa se poudarja, da je Plečnikova ideja o stalno nastaja- joči in nedokončani celoti mesta, sestavljeni iz fi- zično nepovezanih delov, veliko bolj pomembno in aktualno sporočilo njegovih del. Danes, ko si upamo razmišljati v glavnem le o prezidavah, dozidavah in nadzidavah, se lahko še toliko bolj upravičeno sklicujemo na Plečnikovo metodo. Vedno bolj sem prepričan, da je način, s katerim je arhitekt postopoma sestavljal nanizanko jav- nih prostorov iz različno velikih stavb, mostov, parkovnih in cestnih ureditev, pravzaprav edina, zares uresničljiva strategija urejanja mesta, po kateri vsaka nova stavba oblikuje tudi svoj pro- stor, trg, del ulice in parka ter se z drugimi pove- zuje v optični kompoziciji. Si še lahko pomagamo s Semperjevo teorijo oblačenja konstrukcije, ko danes razmišljamo o ovoju stavbe, ki naj bo raztegljiva in odzivna better urban planner or a better architect, was he a better architect or a better designer? Any way you look at them, his monumental buildings are internalised urban spaces, a floodgate is a bridge, a church is a square, a library is a staircase, a marketplace is an arcade, a monument is a onset for the transforma- tion of the wider space. Is this the Roman approach, is it the strategy of the active fragment, is it urban acupuncture, an increment of a city's transformation? Beside the ones who took after or stood in awe of his mastery, was there an actual Plečnik school, and if there was, what was its actual influence on the development of contemporary Slovene architecture? How did it affect the evolution of his students into independent authors? Where does the Professor shine through the works by the architects of the Ravnikar school? Was it actually founded on some sort of synthesis of Modern and Classical principles? Perhaps we ought to dispel the myth of how the mas- ter supposedly respected the context and the identity of a place, when he was in fact inventing the historical and cultural context so as to shape the space in his own way. The message of his relationship with the existing is, after all, clear and unambiguous: the identity is not given once and for all - in reality, we are reinterpreting it and shaping it anew all the time. Instead of his love of history, let us give some weight to the architect's penchant for invention, as Plečnik was constantly developing new ideas. Moreover, he was looking into new possibilities that had their roots in his own ideas. His method of choice was research, his architecture was experimental, and his realisa- tions were a product of long development of the basic idea. This development was often not straight- forward and could lead to a total change of direction. The way he transformed his ideas certainly wasn't an expression of the architect's doubts but sooner a tes- tament to his creative power, which is gave rise to the courage and the will to take risks, without which n.3othing new is ever created. Many of the plans Plečnik had for Ljubljana were not realised; there are still proposals to realise his most ambitious ideas. Ideally, these would encourage the public to think more ambitiously about the Ljubljana of the future. There is, however, not enough emphasis put on Plečnik's idea about the whole of a city that consists of physically unconnected parts and that's constantly being created and never finished. This message found in his works is much more important and relevant today. Nowadays when we for the most part only dare to think in terms of conversions and extensions, Plečnik's method is all the more relevant. I'm becoming ever firmer in my conviction that the way the architect was gradually putting together a sequence of public spaces from buildings of different sizes, bridges, parks and streets, is a actually the only feasible strategy of urban arrangement: every new building also arranges its space, square, its part of the street or park, and is connected with the others in an optical composition. Can Semper's theory of dressing the construction still help us today as we think about a building's envelope as an elastic and responsive membrane? Does one-off 21 simpozij opna? Ima unikatna, vrhunska obrtniška izvedba v času, ko imamo na voljo industrijsko brezhi- bno izdelane gradbene elemente in proizvode visoke tehnologije, še smisel in pomen? Ali prav zato? Kako je mogoče govoriti o avtorski arhi- tekturi, ki temelji na strogih načelih in uporablja svoj oblikovni jezik v času, za katerega je znači- len pluralizem stilov, govoric in nazorov? Nek- danja vse obvladujoča vloga arhitekta-avtono- mnega ustvarjalca, ki uporablja ekskluzivne me- tode, se je vendar bistveno spremenila. Sodo- bna družba išče v arhitekturi možnost za izraža- nje individualnih razlik, naloga arhitekta je, da predlaga različne možnosti izbora rešitev in oblik, za katere se uporabnik opredeljuje po svobodnem preudarku. Temu pogoju odgovarja arhitektura, ki naj bo čim bolj neopredeljena v funkciji, čim bolj nevtralna v strukturi in čim bolj neizrazita v svoji obliki. Skratka, povsem naspro- tno od Plečnikovih idealov. Res pa je tudi, da je Plečnikovo delo tako izje- mno in nesporno kvalitetno, da ga lahko vedno znova postavljamo na preizkušnjo časa. Zato ni čudno, da se nanj neprestano sklicujemo, ko go- vorimo o oblikovanju, ko govorimo o umetni- škem v arhitekturi, ko govorimo o javnem pro- storu, gradnji mesta, identiteti v luči globalizaci- je. In še posebno takrat, ko želimo postaviti arhi- tekturo ob bok drugih umetniških zvrsti, po- membnih za našo kulturno zavest. S postavlja- njem Plečnika za vzor prepričujemo študente, da mora imeti vsak arhitekt svoje prepričanje, da bi lahko razumel smisel zgodovinskih oblik in bi- stvo idej, pomembnih za nastanek novih idej. In da sta za nastanek novih idej, tako kot pri Plečni- ku, potrebna tudi ustvarjalnost in pogum za kri- tični premislek. Prepričan sem, da boste na okro- gli mizi prišli do zanimivih odgovorov na posta- vljene dileme. Ali jih ovrgli. realisation with first-rate craftsmanship still make sense in the time when we have impeccable industrial construction elements and high-tech products at our disposal? Could it be that it makes sense exactly for this reason? How can we speak about architecture of indi- vidual style founded on strict principles and using it own language of design in time that is characterised by a plurality of styles, languages and principles? After all, the former all-conquering role of the architect as an autonomous creator using exclusive methods has changed quite dramatically. The contemporary society seeks in architecture a possibility for expressing indi- vidual differences, and it's the role of the architect to suggest various possible solutions and designs, which are then considered and chosen by the user. This con- dition is fulfilled by architecture that's as non-commit- tal as possible in its function, as neutral as possible in its structure and as restrained as possible in its shape. The total opposite of Plečnik's ideals, in other words. It is also true that the quality of Plečnik's work is so exceptional and uncontested that it continues to effortlessly stand the test of time. No wonder, then, that it is constantly referenced when we talk about design, when we talk about the artistic in architecture, and when we talk about the public space, about the building of cities, about the identity in the face of glob- alisation - and especially when we want architecture to stand side by side with other art forms that are impor- tant for our cultural identity. By encouraging the stu- dents to look up to Plečnik, we try to convince them that every architect should have a mind of his or her own in order to understand the significance of histori- cal shapes and the essence of ideas that generate new ideas. We try to explain to them that in order to pro- duce new ideas, like Plečnik did in his time, creativity and the courage for critical reflection are essential. I'm convinced that in the course of this round table, you will arrive to interesting answers to the dilemmas that have been introduced - or refute them. ákos moravánszkyBV: Our first panellist, prof. Ákos Moravánszky, comes from Zurich. We're all very thankful that he chose to share his thoughts and opinions as a great expert on the history of architectural theory of the 19th and 20th century. He is also a great expert on the theory of iconology of building constructions and materials, president of the editorial board of the very renowned Swiss architectural magazine Werk, Bauen&Wohnen, and professor of the theory of architecture at the ETH in Zurich. AM: It was very easy to see how Plečnik's use of historic forms could be used as a positive exam- ple, also to criticise modern architecture for its lack of context. Context in this case meant a pat- tern of historic form, and the big question is whether today, when we have a certain distance to this understanding of context, Plečnik still re- presents an important point of reference. I think - and this is my thesis today - that for Plečnik, context BV: Naš prvi govornik je Ákos Moravánszky, ki pri- haja iz Züricha. Hvaležni smo mu, da bo z nami delil svoje misli in znanje, saj je velik strokovnjak za zgo- dovino arhitekturne teorije 19. in 20. stoletja. Je tudi pomemben strokovnjak za teorijo ikonografije gradbenih konstrukcij in materialov, predsednik uredniškega odbora znane švicarske arhitekturne revije Werk, Bauen&Wohnen, profesor teorije in zgo- dovine arhitekture na ETH v Zürichu. AM: Preprosto je prepoznati, kako lahko Plečnikov način uporabe zgodovinskih form uporabimo kot pozitiven primer, tudi zato, da z njim kritiziramo moderno arhitekturo zaradi njenega pomanjkanja konteksta. Kontekst nam v tem primeru pomeni nek vzorec zgodovinskih form. Veliko vprašanje, ki se nam zastavlja, je, ali je danes, ko smo do takšne- ga razumevanja konteksta vzpostavili določeno distanco, Plečnik še vedno pomembna referenca. Moja današnja teza je, da je Plečniku kontekst simpozij opna? Ima unikatna, vrhunska obrtniška izvedba v času, ko imamo na voljo industrijsko brezhi- bno izdelane gradbene elemente in proizvode visoke tehnologije, še smisel in pomen? Ali prav zato? Kako je mogoče govoriti o avtorski arhi- tekturi, ki temelji na strogih načelih in uporablja svoj oblikovni jezik v času, za katerega je znači- len pluralizem stilov, govoric in nazorov? Nek- danja vse obvladujoča vloga arhitekta-avtono- mnega ustvarjalca, ki uporablja ekskluzivne me- tode, se je vendar bistveno spremenila. Sodo- bna družba išče v arhitekturi možnost za izraža- nje individualnih razlik, naloga arhitekta je, da predlaga različne možnosti izbora rešitev in oblik, za katere se uporabnik opredeljuje po svobodnem preudarku. Temu pogoju odgovarja arhitektura, ki naj bo čim bolj neopredeljena v funkciji, čim bolj nevtralna v strukturi in čim bolj neizrazita v svoji obliki. Skratka, povsem naspro- tno od Plečnikovih idealov. Res pa je tudi, da je Plečnikovo delo tako izje- mno in nesporno kvalitetno, da ga lahko vedno znova postavljamo na preizkušnjo časa. Zato ni čudno, da se nanj neprestano sklicujemo, ko go- vorimo o oblikovanju, ko govorimo o umetni- škem v arhitekturi, ko govorimo o javnem pro- storu, gradnji mesta, identiteti v luči globalizaci- je. In še posebno takrat, ko želimo postaviti arhi- tekturo ob bok drugih umetniških zvrsti, po- membnih za našo kulturno zavest. S postavlja- njem Plečnika za vzor prepričujemo študente, da mora imeti vsak arhitekt svoje prepričanje, da bi lahko razumel smisel zgodovinskih oblik in bi- stvo idej, pomembnih za nastanek novih idej. In da sta za nastanek novih idej, tako kot pri Plečni- ku, potrebna tudi ustvarjalnost in pogum za kri- tični premislek. Prepričan sem, da boste na okro- gli mizi prišli do zanimivih odgovorov na posta- vljene dileme. Ali jih ovrgli. realisation with first-rate craftsmanship still make sense in the time when we have impeccable industrial construction elements and high-tech products at our disposal? Could it be that it makes sense exactly for this reason? How can we speak about architecture of indi- vidual style founded on strict principles and using it own language of design in time that is characterised by a plurality of styles, languages and principles? After all, the former all-conquering role of the architect as an autonomous creator using exclusive methods has changed quite dramatically. The contemporary society seeks in architecture a possibility for expressing indi- vidual differences, and it's the role of the architect to suggest various possible solutions and designs, which are then considered and chosen by the user. This con- dition is fulfilled by architecture that's as non-commit- tal as possible in its function, as neutral as possible in its structure and as restrained as possible in its shape. The total opposite of Plečnik's ideals, in other words. It is also true that the quality of Plečnik's work is so exceptional and uncontested that it continues to effortlessly stand the test of time. No wonder, then, that it is constantly referenced when we talk about design, when we talk about the artistic in architecture, and when we talk about the public space, about the building of cities, about the identity in the face of glob- alisation - and especially when we want architecture to stand side by side with other art forms that are impor- tant for our cultural identity. By encouraging the stu- dents to look up to Plečnik, we try to convince them that every architect should have a mind of his or her own in order to understand the significance of histori- cal shapes and the essence of ideas that generate new ideas. We try to explain to them that in order to pro- duce new ideas, like Plečnik did in his time, creativity and the courage for critical reflection are essential. I'm convinced that in the course of this round table, you will arrive to interesting answers to the dilemmas that have been introduced - or refute them. ákos moravánszkyBV: Our first panellist, prof. Ákos Moravánszky, comes from Zurich. We're all very thankful that he chose to share his thoughts and opinions as a great expert on the history of architectural theory of the 19th and 20th century. He is also a great expert on the theory of iconology of building constructions and materials, president of the editorial board of the very renowned Swiss architectural magazine Werk, Bauen&Wohnen, and professor of the theory of architecture at the ETH in Zurich. AM: It was very easy to see how Plečnik's use of historic forms could be used as a positive exam- ple, also to criticise modern architecture for its lack of context. Context in this case meant a pat- tern of historic form, and the big question is whether today, when we have a certain distance to this understanding of context, Plečnik still re- presents an important point of reference. I think - and this is my thesis today - that for Plečnik, context BV: Naš prvi govornik je Ákos Moravánszky, ki pri- haja iz Züricha. Hvaležni smo mu, da bo z nami delil svoje misli in znanje, saj je velik strokovnjak za zgo- dovino arhitekturne teorije 19. in 20. stoletja. Je tudi pomemben strokovnjak za teorijo ikonografije gradbenih konstrukcij in materialov, predsednik uredniškega odbora znane švicarske arhitekturne revije Werk, Bauen&Wohnen, profesor teorije in zgo- dovine arhitekture na ETH v Zürichu. AM: Preprosto je prepoznati, kako lahko Plečnikov način uporabe zgodovinskih form uporabimo kot pozitiven primer, tudi zato, da z njim kritiziramo moderno arhitekturo zaradi njenega pomanjkanja konteksta. Kontekst nam v tem primeru pomeni nek vzorec zgodovinskih form. Veliko vprašanje, ki se nam zastavlja, je, ali je danes, ko smo do takšne- ga razumevanja konteksta vzpostavili določeno distanco, Plečnik še vedno pomembna referenca. Moja današnja teza je, da je Plečniku kontekst simpozij 2 3 pomenil nekaj drugega. Kontekst ni bil del zgo- dovine kot učiteljice discipline, katere naloga je poiskati »resnično zgodbo«, tako da izbrišeš ves osebni manierizem in dodatke. Ravno naspro- tno, za Plečnika je bila zgodovina zgodovinska znanost oz. »genetska« znanost, torej ne razvo- zlavanje in dekodiranje, temveč prevajanje in prenašanje pomena med različnimi diskurzivni- mi entitetami, ki pa še vedno ohranja izvirno »idejo«. Če Plečnika primerjamo z drugimi arhi- tekti njegove generacije, na primer Petrom Be- hrensom ali Rudolfom Schindlerjem, ugotovimo, da za Plečnika čas teče nekako v obratni smeri. Njegova zgodnja dela, na primer Zaherlovo hišo, lahko zelo preprosto primerjamo s poznimi deli njegovih sodobnikov in obratno. Pri Robertu Venturiju je branje kakega artefakta, na primer fasade ali kosa pohištva, spominjalo na branje besedila. Zahtevalo je razumevanje ra- zličnih simbolov in stilov. Morda se spomnite njegove razstave v washingtonskem Smithsoni- anu leta 1976 »Življenjski znaki«, ki je sicer doži- vela precejšnjo kritiko. Na razstavi je prikazoval različna urbana okolja, hiše itd. in Venturi je ur- bane elemente, gradbene detajle in pohištvo označil s kartončki, ki so pojasnjevali pomen zgodovinskih stilov: »Gostoljubni kolonialen«, »Udobni chippendale« itd. Plečnikovega razumevanja form pa ne moremo razumeti tako dobesedno. Razumevanje kake zgradbe nima nič opraviti z dodeljevanjem ja- snega pomena kaki formi. Plečnik ni bil le velik ustvarjalec podob, ampak tudi tekstur preplete- nih podob, vzorcev, ki jih ni nikoli ustvarjal pre- prosto po pravilih. Podobe je črpal iz arheologi- je, svojih vtisov s potovanj, knjig, etnografskih zbirk itd. Stalno mešanje redov med znanjem, metodološkim navdihom in poezijo ter njegovo deloma dano, deloma pa izmišljeno razumeva- nje konteksta in zgodovine sta danes verjetno najpomembnejša aspekta Plečnikovega dela. Naloga arhitekta je, da iz toka podob splete arhi- tekturo kot pripoved. Peter Zumthor je ta pro- gram opisal kot »Weiterstricken«, (sl. 1, 2) kot vpletanje, namesto da se nove dele zgradbe po- stavi kot kontrast, kar je pogosta strategija pre- zervatorjev; tu so uporabljene niti stare tkanine in mednje vtkano novo. Detajl stika med starim in novim je postal šiv, ki je tudi ključ za razume- vanje zgradbe. Plečnik je podoben pristop upo- rabil, ko je načrtoval obnovo Rimskega zidu v Ljubljani (sl. 3). Njihova najboljša lastnost je zmo- žnost poenotiti pogosto čisto različne sestavne elemente. Dimitris Pikionis je staro in novo obravnaval na podoben način, ko je načrtoval sprehajalno pot na atenskem griču Filopap (sl. 4). Namesto da bi med preteklostjo in sedanjostjo ustvaril kontrast, je tudi Plečnik raje izbral sinte- tičen vzorec, ki ga je lahko vedno uporabljal, tu- di kadar je načrtoval čisto nove zgradbe, na pri- mer Narodno in univerzitetno knjižnico v Ljubljani. Tu ni razlikovanja med ornamentom in detajlom, had a very different meaning. It had nothing to do with history as a master discipline where the task is to find out the "true story" by scraping away all the distortions and all personal mannerisms. Just the opposite: for Plečnik, history was a historic or “genetic” science - not a decoding, not a decipher- ing, but a translation, a carrying-over of meaning between various discursive entities while still main- taining the original “idea”. If you compare Plečnik with other architects of his generation, such as Peter Behrens or Rudolf Schindler, you will realise that for Plečnik, time somehow seems to flow in the oppo- site direction. His early work, for instance the Zacherl house in Vienna, compares very well to the later work of many of his contemporaries, and vice versa. The reading of an artefact like a facade or a piece of furniture resembled for Robert Venturi the reading of a text. It required the comprehension of symbols and styles. Perhaps you are familiar with his famous and also much criticized exhibition at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington in 1976, "Signs of Life". This was an exhibition showing urban environments and homes, where Venturi attached speech-bubbles to urban elements, building details and furniture, there- by decoding the meaning of historic styles, such as "Colonial Convivial" or "Comfortable Chippendale". Plečnik's understanding of forms is not translatable in this literal sense. To understand a building has no- thing to do with the attachment of a clear meaning to a certain form. Plečnik was one of the greatest pro- ducers of not only images, but textures of interwoven images, patterns, that were never simply generated by applying certain rules. These images came from archaeology, his personal travel memories, books, ethnographic collections and the like. This perma- nent mix of regimes between knowledge, method- ological inspiration, and poetics is perhaps the most important aspect today, and the understanding of history and context is partly given and partly imag- ined. This is the reason why there are various interpre- tions of, for instance, the Sacred Heart Church in Prague - all of them true and false at the same time. It is the task of the architect to weave architecture as a narrative out of a flux of images. Peter Zumthor described the programme behind this as "Weiterstricken", (Fig. 1, 2) as "knitting on", as "to con- tinue knitting", rather than building the new part as a contrast to the old, which is the usual strategy for preservationists. He used the threads of the old fabric and continued weaving. The detail of the connection between the old and new parts of the construction is kind of stitching, and as such a clue for understanding this building. Plečnik's approach was indeed very sim- ilar when he was working with the old Roman walls in Ljubljana( Fig. 3). The most striking aspect of this archi- tecture is the capacity to unify the often disparate ele- ments that composed them. Dimitris Pikionis treated old and new in a very similar manner when he designed the walkway and the small structures on the Philopappos Hill in Athens (Fig. 4). Rather than con- trasting past with present, Plečnik, too, chose to create a synthetic pattern that could continue when he used simpozij tako celo najbolj nepredvidljivi kolaži delujejo kot enotne podobe. Kot analogijo bi tukaj ome- nil Mediateko Toya Ita v Sendaiu (sl. 5), ki ji uspe povezati vertikalne in horizontalne niti v eno sa- mo prostorsko »tkanino«. V Semperjevi teoriji je vozel primaren simbol te- hnične potrebe, ki postane estetska rešitev, in te- melj za ustvarjanje razlikovanja med zunaj in znotraj, ki uporablja tekstilno kot ritmično po- navljanje vozlov. Pojem »Stoffwechsel« - meta- bolizem kot način spreminjanja materiala - ni bi- stven le za razumevanje Plečnikovega dela, am- pak tudi za razumevanje Koolhaasove uporabe furnirjev v Casi de Musica v Portu ali novejših del Herzoga & de Meurona v Švici. Za Semperja je vozel izredno pomemben (sl. 6). Je tudi najstarejši tehnični simbol izraza ko- zmoloških idej, ki so se pojavile med ljudmi. V simboličnem smislu vozel pomeni tudi poenote- nje heterogenih podob. V arhitekturi se podo- bno kot na drugih praktičnih področjih vedno znova srečujemo s problemom heterogenosti. Danes je zelo težko izražati znanost in njene ide- je, že vse od Einsteinove relativnostne teorije naprej. Mnogi arhitekti so se poskušali spopada- ti z njimi, od Le Corbusierja do Buckministra Ful- lerja, vendar so težko razumeli, na kaj so se te te- orije dejansko nanašale. Večinoma so ostajali na ravni metafor, slik in podob. Preprosto je biti homogen v čisto konceptual- nem sistemu, medtem ko se praksa pokaže kot polna različnih delcev, ki jih je treba zbrati skupaj, kar se pogosto izkaže za tvegano početje. Kakor Plečnik pokaže pri svoji cerkvi svetega Srca Jezu- sovega v Pragi (sl. 7), gre pri arhitekturi vedno za sintezo heterogenega. V arhitekturi je heteroge- nost morda še bolj prisotna kot na drugih podro- čjih zaradi svojega statusa, ki je med tehnologijo in umetnostjo, med teorijo in prakso, med utili- tarnimi in simbolnimi zahtevami. Arhitekti so vedno veliki ustvarjalci podob. To se začne že pri tlorisih, narisih in prerezih, nadaljuje z diagrami in slikami, konča s perspektivami in bolj dodelanimi renderji. Za arhitekturo so podo- be nujne, saj omogočijo sintezo religioznih, zgo- dovinskih, nacionalnih, socialnih in estetskih konceptov, tako je vsaj bilo pri Plečniku. Podobe delujejo kot ikone, ne pa kot statične slike. Podo- ba se lahko raztopi in sintetizira heterogenost, le če postane pripoved oziroma ko poveže med se- boj možne zgodbe in scenarije v eno samo »zgodbo«. Tu se opiram na Ricoeurjevo filozof- sko delo, ki govori o zmožnosti pripovedi, da sin- tetizira različne elemente, tako da je njihov vodič delovanja, in to vodič, ki ni tog in deterministi- čen, ampak dopušča neko mero svobode. Natan- čno to pa ponavadi iščejo tudi oblikovalci - ne omejujoč, ampak sistematičen način dela. Semperjeva teorija vozlov je še vedno navdih za arhitekte; tako Bernard Cache še vedno govori o Stoffwechsel, arhitekturni studio Gramazio & Kohler pa uporablja robote za izdelavo takšnih it for new assignments, such as the National Library in Ljubljana. There is no difference between ornament and detail here, even the most improbable collage acquires the unity of a picture. As an analogy, I men- tion here Toyo Ito's Sendai Mediatheque (Fig. 5), which succeeds in weaving the horizontal and vertical threads into one spatial “fabric”. In Semper's theory, the knot features as the primary symbol of technical necessity turned into an aesthetic solution and the basis for creating the first division between inside and outside, using textiles as a rhyth- mic repetition of knots. The notion of "Stoffwechsel", metabolism as material transformation, is essential not only for understanding Plečnik's work but also, for instance, the use of veneers in the case of Koolhaas's Casa de Musica in Porto, or the recent work of Herzog & de Meuron in Switzerland. The knot was very important for Semper, both as a technical solution as an image (Fig. 6). As the “oldest technical symbol”, he regarded it an expression of the first cosmogonic ideas which arose among peoples. In a symbolic sense, the knot is also used to create unity out of diversity. In architecture, there is always a prob- lem of heterogeneity, like in many other practical domains. It is very difficult today, when for science it has become so difficult to represent its insights - it started already with Einstein's theory of relativity. Many architects, from Le Corbusier to Buckminster Fuller, refer to it but of course it was very hard for them to understand what these theories were all about. It all remained on the level of metaphors, pic- tures, images that were very important for architects such as Buckminster Fuller. Purely conceptual systems may be homogeneous - practical fields are full of bits and pieces that must be assembled, very often in a risky way. Like Plečnik's Sacred Heart Church in Prague demonstrates (Fig. 7), architectural design is always about the synthesis of the heterogeneous. In architecture, heterogeneity is perhaps even more present than in other domains, because of its status between technology and arts, between theory and practice, between utilitarian and symbolic requirements. Architects are creators of images, starting from plans, elevations and sections, to diagrams and charts, from perspectives to more visionary renderings. Images are necessary in architecture in order to enable the syn- thesis of various religious, historical, national, social, aesthetic concepts - at least, that was the case for Plečnik. Images work as icons, not as static pictures. An image can dissolve and unify heterogeneity only when it becomes narrative, when it connects possible plots and stories into one “story”. I would like to refer here to the philosophical work of Paul Ricoeur, which emphasizes the power of narration to synthesise diverse elements to provide a guide for action: a guide which is not rigid, not deterministic, but has a certain degree of freedom. This is what designers generally look for: a non-binding, but systematic way to work. Semper's theory of knots still inspires designers like Bernard Cache, who also speaks about Stoff- wechsel, or the Swiss architectural office Gramazio 5 6 simpozij 8 9 opečnatih zidov (sl. 8), kjer tekstilni vzorec posta- ne nekaj keramičnega, trdnega, torej nekaj, kar je mnogo trdnejše, a še vedno daje vtis tekstilne površine. Pa seveda fasada lekarne Herzoga & de Meurona v Baslu, ki kaže, kako je tkanina izdela- na kot natisnjen zaslon. Podobe pa ne smejo ostati ločene, ena po ena. Gledati jih je treba v povezavi z drugimi podoba- mi kot del neprekinjenega toka podob. Plečniko- ve zgradbe, objekti in podobe so podvrženi neš- tetim deformacijam, ki preizkušajo meje vzdržlji- vosti. Zdržijo celo tako tvegane reči, kot je pribli- ževanje popularnim formam, samoniklim obli- kam religioznega (kot so modre in rdeče žarnice v lučeh v kripti Plečnikove cerkve na Dunaju), za- nimanje za neelitno, neuradno, ne visoko arhi- tekturo, kar je zopet nekaj, kar je treba omeniti pri Plečniku, in je še vedno zelo pomembno. Casa de Musica Rema Koolhaasa v Portu (sl. 9) kaže prepleteno strukturo, ki je zelo blizu tradici- onalni tehniki keramike azulejo, hkrati pa je tre- ba poudariti tudi pomen podob, ki jih zaznava- mo, imitacije in mimezis. Mimezis je povezana s ponovno uporabo form, ki jih je Koolhaas že uporabil, podob metropole, ki v Portu delujejo skoraj iz konteksta. Hkrati pa je Koolhaasova imi- tacija velemestne arhitekture znotraj tega nena- vadnega »meteorita« zopet nekaj, kar nam je znano, ko se srečamo s Plečnikovim delom. V arhitekturi so podobe v stalnem toku v smeri drugih podob. Še bolj pomembno je, da podobe postanejo izdelani objekti. Pozornost je torej usmerjena v najmanjše detajle izvedbe, česar se današnji arhitekti, ki govorijo o obratu k podobi, niso nujno naučili. V tem pogledu je drugačno ljubljansko pokopališče Žale (sl. 10), ki se mu je včasih reklo Vrt vseh svetih in je oblikovano kot domišljijski sveti kraj, kar nekoliko spominja na rekonstrukcije Delfov, ki so jih ustvarjali franco- ski študentje šole Beaux Arts. V nasprotju s temi francoskimi študijami pa se za Plečnika arheolo- ško izkopavanje po kolektivnem spominu ni končalo z zgodovinsko »korektnim« objektom, ampak z zbirko različnih hkratnih možnosti (po- dobno kot follies v angleških vrtovih). V tej perspektivi postane bolj jasna uporaba po- dob iz antike in zgodovine - vklopijo se v širšo re- alnost, v velike pripovedi o svetu kot celoti. Kako naj drugače sploh deluje kakršnokoli znanje o preteklosti, o svetu, v katerem živimo, če ga po definiciji ne moremo čutiti niti ga zavestno prika- zati znotraj diskurza, razen na način domišljije? Ne Plečnik kot posameznik, temveč Plečnik kot družbeno bitje je dokazal splošno funkcijo domi- šljije in njeno moč, da »ustvari« urbano realnost (na primer prav v Ljubljani). Tu gre za čisto drugačen nivo od historicizma, ki vedno opazuje obstoj določenih form skozi čas. Pripovednost se ukvarja s formami, ki se tičejo začetkov, ki oblikujejo kontinuiteto, ki oblikuje- jo kontekst. Po zelo ozki interpretaciji konteksta postmodernistov, po tej popolni in neotesani & Kohler, who use robots to fabricate such brick walls - again (Fig. 8), a textile pattern is turned into something ceramic, something which is much more solid but still achieves the effect of a textile surface. The facade of the Cantonal Pharmacy in Basel by Herzog & de Meuron shows this woven fabric is now produced as a screen print. Images must not be separated, regarded one-by-one. They must be regarded in connection with other images, as elements a continuous stream of images. The buildings, objects, images by Plečnik are subject- ed to endless deformations to test the limits of their resistance. Even such a risky undertaking as closing up on the popular forms, vernacular forms of religiosity, such as the coloured, red and blue light bulbs in the crypt of Plečnik's church in Vienna - this kind of inter- est for the non-elite, unofficial, non-high architecture is again something worth mentioning in the work of Plečnik, and still very important. The Casa de Musica in Porto (Fig. 8) by Rem Koolhaas shows in its interiors a woven texture, very close to the traditional technique of the azulejo tiles in Portugal, but at the same time the importance of perceived images, of imitation, mimesis must be emphazized. Mimesis is related here to the re-use of forms that inspired Koolhaas earlier, images of the metropolis that almost look like out of place on the site in Porto. But at the same time, this imitation of a metropolitan architecture inside this extraordinary “meteorite” that he designed is again something that is not quite unfa- miliar when we look at Plečnik's work. In architecture, images are in constant flux in the direc- tion of other images. More importantly, images become crafted objects with the incredible attention to the smallest details of execution - something that architects, who speak today of the pictorial turn, not necessarily learned. Different in this case is the Žale Cemetery in Ljubljana (Fig. 10), originally called the All Saints' Garden that was designed as an imaginary holy district, not unlike the reconstructions of Delphi in the works of the French students of the Beaux Arts school. But for Plečnik, in difference to these French studies, the archaeological excavation in collective memory did not end with a historically “correct” object - instead, a variety of simultaneous possibilities emerged, like follies in an English garden. From this perspective, the use of images from antiq- uity and history in general becomes clearer - they plug in into a broader reality, into grand narratives about the world at large. How else can work any knowledge about the past, about the world we live in, which by definition is considered no longer per- ceivable, not represented in consciousness or in dis- course, except in such an imaginary way? Plečnik, not an isolated individual but a social being, proved the function of imagination in general, and its power to “produce” urban reality in Ljubljana. This is a level quite different from historicism, which always regards the existence of forms within time. Narrativity deals with forms that relate to beginnings, to form a continuity, and to form a context. After a very restrictive interpretation of context by postmodernists, 25 simpozij zavrnitvi konteksta s strani Rema Koolhaasa, je Plečnik pokazal način, kako lahko na novo inter- pretiramo kontekst, in mu dal smisel, na katerem lahko še vedno gradimo. BV: Rad bi se zahvalil Ákosu Moravánszkemu za ta izredno zanimiv uvod v naših pet predstavitev. Mi- slim, da se danes vsi strinjamo o nujnosti imagina- cije in imaginarnega, saj vendarle živimo v svetu podob. Potrebujemo jo, da jo zgrabimo, prebavimo in iz nje ustvarimo nekaj novega. Eden od nujnih talentov arhitektov danes je zmožnost prenesti tisti imaginarno v koherenten arhitekturni produkt. and after this total and rather rude rejection by Rem Koolhaas, Plečnik showed a way to re-interpret the meaning of context and give it a new sense which we can still build upon. BV: I'd like to thank Ákos Moravánszky for this very intrigu- ing introduction to the five presentations. I think that we can all agree that especially today, imagination and the imagined are needed, since we live in the world of images. Needed in order to take it, digest it, and create something new from it. One of the talents of an architect of today is how he or she can bring all of the imaginary that almost floats about into a coherent architectural product. andrej hrauskyBV: Our next speaker is Andrej Hrausky who's long been endeavouring to present Slovene architecture, including contemporary architecture. Together with various co- authors, he has to date written five books on Plečnik. AH: As you can see, I was given the title "Old and New". This is a very complicated title and we could spend days talking about it - simply because with any- thing new an architect does, with every new construc- tion, he confronts something existing, which is "old". And even when his work, as "new", is done, it immedi- ately becomes "old" and becomes a context for some- body else's interventions and the cycle repeats. The other thing about old and new is the very fact that it's changed during the course of history. As we know, in the 19th century, the approach towards old was almost romantic. When they rebuilt old buildings, such as old castles or even old towns, they did it in a very imaginative way. Immediately following this approach was its complete opposite: reconstruction and preservation. What's prevailing today, is an approach that we have seen here in Ljubljana, for instance with Mladika. Jurij Kobe, the architect, trans- lated the building by Fabiani into the Foreign Ministry, and his approach was first to get rid of all later addi- tions to get back to Fabiani. All further interventions were done in such a way that one can immediately see what's new and what's old using different colours, dif- ferent architectural language, and different materials. With Plečnik, we can see quite a few interesting approaches in this vein, and I'd like to show you three examples of his creative approach towards the old - how he wanted that the old to somehow survive in the new. I believe it was Aldo Rossi who remarked that there are two deaths of architecture: one when a building is torn down and the other when it's turned into a museum and conserved. What's important is that a building lives. I hope to show you three Pleč- nik's examples that I find very interesting. Plečnik was able to play with forms and materials, almost like with Legos. For example the painting of Virgin Mary of Brezje in Šiška (Fig. 1) - Plečnik didn't like it, and the statue below he also didn't like. So he made a very strong stone frame for the picture, and he placed the statue horizontally. The only thing he added was a cushion to support the head. Of course, BV: Naš naslednji govornik je Andrej Hrausky, ki se že dolga leta ukvarja s slovensko arhitekturo, tudi sodobno. Do danes je z različnimi soavtorji spisal pet knjig o Plečniku. AH: Moja današnja predstavitev nosi naslov »Sta- ro in Novo«. To je zelo zapleten naslov. Lahko bi porabili dneve in dneve ob razpravljanju o njem, preprosto zato ker, karkoli arhitekt naredi nove- ga, z vsako novo konstrukcijo se vedno sooča z nečim, kar že obstaja, z nečim, kar je »staro«. In tudi ko je njegovo »novo« delo končano, v hipu postane »staro«, v hipu postane del konteksta, v katerega posega nekdo drugi, in cikel se ponovi. Drugo dejstvo o starem in novem je, da se njun pomen v zgodovini spreminja. V 19. stoletju je bil pristop do starega skoraj romantičen. Ko so prenavljali stare zgradbe, stare gradove ali celo mesta, so pogosto ravnali zelo domišljijsko. Po- tem se je pojavil ravno nasproten princip - re- konstruiranje in ohranjanje. Pristop, ki prevladu- je danes, je pristop, ki ga najdemo v današnji Lju- bljani, na primer pri Mladiki. Arhitekt Jurij Kobe je Fabianijevo zgradbo preoblikoval v zunanje ministrstvo, tako da se je najprej znebil vseh ka- snejših dodatkov in se vrnil k Fabianiju. Vsi na- daljnji posegi so narejeni tako, da lahko takoj lo- čimo staro od novega, saj uporablja drugačne barve, drugačen arhitekturni jezik in drugačne materiale. Tudi pri Plečniku lahko opazimo precej zanimi- vih poskusov v tej smeri. Rad bi naštel tri prime- re njegovega kreativnega pristopa k odnosu sta- ro-novo. Plečnik je želel, da staro nekako preživi znotraj novega. Mislim, da je bil Aldo Rossi tisti, ki je izjavil, da obstajata dva načina smrti arhitek- ture; eden je, da se poruši, drugi pa, da se spre- meni v muzej in ohranja. Pomembno je, da zgradba nadaljuje svoje življenje. Rad bi pokazal tri takšne Plečnikove primere. Plečnik se je znal igrati z materiali in oblikami kot z lego kockami. Vzemimo sliko Brezjanske Marije v Šiški (sl. 1). Plečnik slike ni maral in tudi kip pod njo mu ni bil všeč. Sliko je zato zaprl v močan okvir iz črnega marmorja, kip pa horizontalno po- ložil pod njo. Dodal je le podstavek, ki je podpiral 1 simpozij zavrnitvi konteksta s strani Rema Koolhaasa, je Plečnik pokazal način, kako lahko na novo inter- pretiramo kontekst, in mu dal smisel, na katerem lahko še vedno gradimo. BV: Rad bi se zahvalil Ákosu Moravánszkemu za ta izredno zanimiv uvod v naših pet predstavitev. Mi- slim, da se danes vsi strinjamo o nujnosti imagina- cije in imaginarnega, saj vendarle živimo v svetu podob. Potrebujemo jo, da jo zgrabimo, prebavimo in iz nje ustvarimo nekaj novega. Eden od nujnih talentov arhitektov danes je zmožnost prenesti tisti imaginarno v koherenten arhitekturni produkt. and after this total and rather rude rejection by Rem Koolhaas, Plečnik showed a way to re-interpret the meaning of context and give it a new sense which we can still build upon. BV: I'd like to thank Ákos Moravánszky for this very intrigu- ing introduction to the five presentations. I think that we can all agree that especially today, imagination and the imagined are needed, since we live in the world of images. Needed in order to take it, digest it, and create something new from it. One of the talents of an architect of today is how he or she can bring all of the imaginary that almost floats about into a coherent architectural product. andrej hrauskyBV: Our next speaker is Andrej Hrausky who's long been endeavouring to present Slovene architecture, including contemporary architecture. Together with various co- authors, he has to date written five books on Plečnik. AH: As you can see, I was given the title "Old and New". This is a very complicated title and we could spend days talking about it - simply because with any- thing new an architect does, with every new construc- tion, he confronts something existing, which is "old". And even when his work, as "new", is done, it immedi- ately becomes "old" and becomes a context for some- body else's interventions and the cycle repeats. The other thing about old and new is the very fact that it's changed during the course of history. As we know, in the 19th century, the approach towards old was almost romantic. When they rebuilt old buildings, such as old castles or even old towns, they did it in a very imaginative way. Immediately following this approach was its complete opposite: reconstruction and preservation. What's prevailing today, is an approach that we have seen here in Ljubljana, for instance with Mladika. Jurij Kobe, the architect, trans- lated the building by Fabiani into the Foreign Ministry, and his approach was first to get rid of all later addi- tions to get back to Fabiani. All further interventions were done in such a way that one can immediately see what's new and what's old using different colours, dif- ferent architectural language, and different materials. With Plečnik, we can see quite a few interesting approaches in this vein, and I'd like to show you three examples of his creative approach towards the old - how he wanted that the old to somehow survive in the new. I believe it was Aldo Rossi who remarked that there are two deaths of architecture: one when a building is torn down and the other when it's turned into a museum and conserved. What's important is that a building lives. I hope to show you three Pleč- nik's examples that I find very interesting. Plečnik was able to play with forms and materials, almost like with Legos. For example the painting of Virgin Mary of Brezje in Šiška (Fig. 1) - Plečnik didn't like it, and the statue below he also didn't like. So he made a very strong stone frame for the picture, and he placed the statue horizontally. The only thing he added was a cushion to support the head. Of course, BV: Naš naslednji govornik je Andrej Hrausky, ki se že dolga leta ukvarja s slovensko arhitekturo, tudi sodobno. Do danes je z različnimi soavtorji spisal pet knjig o Plečniku. AH: Moja današnja predstavitev nosi naslov »Sta- ro in Novo«. To je zelo zapleten naslov. Lahko bi porabili dneve in dneve ob razpravljanju o njem, preprosto zato ker, karkoli arhitekt naredi nove- ga, z vsako novo konstrukcijo se vedno sooča z nečim, kar že obstaja, z nečim, kar je »staro«. In tudi ko je njegovo »novo« delo končano, v hipu postane »staro«, v hipu postane del konteksta, v katerega posega nekdo drugi, in cikel se ponovi. Drugo dejstvo o starem in novem je, da se njun pomen v zgodovini spreminja. V 19. stoletju je bil pristop do starega skoraj romantičen. Ko so prenavljali stare zgradbe, stare gradove ali celo mesta, so pogosto ravnali zelo domišljijsko. Po- tem se je pojavil ravno nasproten princip - re- konstruiranje in ohranjanje. Pristop, ki prevladu- je danes, je pristop, ki ga najdemo v današnji Lju- bljani, na primer pri Mladiki. Arhitekt Jurij Kobe je Fabianijevo zgradbo preoblikoval v zunanje ministrstvo, tako da se je najprej znebil vseh ka- snejših dodatkov in se vrnil k Fabianiju. Vsi na- daljnji posegi so narejeni tako, da lahko takoj lo- čimo staro od novega, saj uporablja drugačne barve, drugačen arhitekturni jezik in drugačne materiale. Tudi pri Plečniku lahko opazimo precej zanimi- vih poskusov v tej smeri. Rad bi naštel tri prime- re njegovega kreativnega pristopa k odnosu sta- ro-novo. Plečnik je želel, da staro nekako preživi znotraj novega. Mislim, da je bil Aldo Rossi tisti, ki je izjavil, da obstajata dva načina smrti arhitek- ture; eden je, da se poruši, drugi pa, da se spre- meni v muzej in ohranja. Pomembno je, da zgradba nadaljuje svoje življenje. Rad bi pokazal tri takšne Plečnikove primere. Plečnik se je znal igrati z materiali in oblikami kot z lego kockami. Vzemimo sliko Brezjanske Marije v Šiški (sl. 1). Plečnik slike ni maral in tudi kip pod njo mu ni bil všeč. Sliko je zato zaprl v močan okvir iz črnega marmorja, kip pa horizontalno po- ložil pod njo. Dodal je le podstavek, ki je podpiral 1 simpozij 3 4 glavo kipa. Seveda je prekršil nekakšen zakon te- ga, kar je običajno, namreč da morajo biti kipi po- stavljeni pokonci. Pri prvem primeru se je Plečnik igral, pri drugem pa je recikliral. Stopnice, ki jih je uporabil na pro- menadi na Vegovi ulici (sl. 2) (in jih danes ni več tam), prihajajo izpred Mestne hiše. Ko so jo v 30. letih prenovili, je Plečnik vzel stare stopnice in jih porabil tu. Podobno je naredil s podstavki kipov slovenskih skladateljev na Vegovi. Kamniti bloki so bili prej del ograje okrog ljubljanske Opere. Ple- čnik je uredil park okoli Opere, ga odprl in vanj po- stavil kipe skladateljev Verovška in Borštnerja, ki sta bila prej v stavbi. Stare kamne je postavil verti- kalno pred Glasbeno matico in se obrnil na takra- tnega ljubljanskega župana Hribarja in ga prosil za financiranje prvega kipa, bogati ljubljanski me- ščani pa so kasneje dali denar še za druge. Tako je Plečnik recikliral stare kose v nekaj novega. Še bolj nenavaden primer pa je cerkev svetega Mi- haela na Barju (sl. 3), cerkev, namenjena kmetom. Tu je Plečnik uporabil dele bosanskih mlinčkov za kavo. Plečnik je rad obiskoval Bosno in tam je imel prijatelje. Mlinčke za kavo je prinesel z Orienta. Uporabil jih je za lestenec, ki spominja na pladenj s kavnim mlinčkom in skodelicami za kavo. Nazadnje pa omenimo konfrontacijo. Ko vstopiš v Križanke (sl. 4), te na desni pri vhodu pričakajo trije kosi: spodnji del je baročni steber, srednji kos je iz rimskih časov, na vrhu pa je postavljen moderen kip. Gre za nekakšno soočenje med ra- zličnimi obdobji. Plečnik se niti ne potrudi, da bi kose zložil v hierarhičen simbolični vrstni red z rimskim kosom spodaj, barokom v sredini in so- dobnostjo na vrhu, ampak postavi rimski kamen na baročni steber. Naslednji projekt, ki bi ga rad na hitro omenil, je cerkev v Bogojini (sl. 5, 6). Zanjo obstajata dva načrta, zgodnejši ima tloris v obliki kvadrata, ka- snejši pa je okrogel. Domači župnik je naročil no- vo cerkev, Plečnika pa je vseeno zanimalo, kaj naj naredi s staro. Ko je obiskal Bogojino, je ugo- tovil, da s staro cerkvijo ni nič narobe. Župniku je zato pisal: »Nikoli ne uničim nečesa, kar so naši očetje naredili pravilno.« Meni se to zdi odličen primer, kako Plečnik ni hotel uničiti starega, tem- več ga je vključil v novo. Staro cerkev je uporabil kot vhodno vežo v novo cerkev. Zelo pomembna se mi zdijo razlika v višini med njima in stopnice. Stopnice je uporabil za to, da je ustvaril enega svojih slavnih monumentalnih vhodov, ki jih je imel tako rad. Vhod pri Plečniku vedno zaznamu- jejo stopnice - v NUK-u, cerkvi na Barju in Bogoji- ni, čeprav tu stopnic ni veliko. Poudarjena je mo- numentalnost vhoda. Razlika v višini pa mu je tu- di omogočila, da je staro cerkev uporabil in zgo- raj postavil kor. Nova cerkev je skoraj pogoltnila staro z njenim zvonikom vred. To se mi zdi izje- mno inovativen način, kako staro cerkev vključiti v novo, ne da bi jo uničil. Bolj je sicer opazna no- va Plečnikova cerkev, staro pa še vedno vidimo, čeprav je prekrita s strukturo nove (sl. 7). he was breaking a kind of law, what is normal - that a statue should stand up. If in the first example, he was playing, in the second one, he was recycling. The stairs on the Vegova street prome- nade (Fig. 2), which are no longer there, were the old stairs from the Town Hall. When they rebuilt it in the 30s, Plečnik just took away the old stairs and re-used them here. He did a similar thing with the supports for the stat- ues in Vegova Street. These stones were on top of a fence that was around the Opera house. When Plečnik redesigned the park around the Opera house and opened it up, he took the two statues of Borštner and Verovšek that used to be inside the building. He used the stones vertically as supports in front of the Glasbena matica building. Then he went first to Mayor Hribar and asked him to finance the first herm bust, and then other rich citi- zens also collected money and paid for more herms. This was a kind of recycling of old pieces into something new. Even more unusually, in St Michael's church at Barje (Fig. 3) - a church that was designed for the peasants - he used pieces of hand mills for coffee from Bosnia. Plečnik used to go to Bosnia, he had some friends there, and he brought these from the Orient. He transformed these coffee mills into a pendant lamp that resembles a coffee mill on the plate with coffee cups. Next is confrontation is. As you enter in Križanke (Fig. 4), on your right hand side, you can see three pieces. The lower piece is a Baroque column, the middle piece is a stone from the Roman times and on top, there is a modern sculpture. This is a kind of con- frontation of different periods, and he didn't even use the pieces in the symbolic way with the Roman stone at the bottom and the modern statue on top, in a temporal hierarchy, but poses the Roman stone on top of the Baroque column. Another project I'd briefly like to mention is the church in Bogojina (Fig. 5, 6). Here we have the earlier of the two plans - one was square and the other was round. The priest ordered a new church. Plečnik was curious what was to become of the old church and when he visited Bogojina, he saw that the old church was in quite a good condition. He then wrote to the priest, saying: "I've never destroyed what our fathers had done right." For me, this is a primary example of how he didn't want to destroy the old church but rather incorporate it in a new unity. The old church was used as an entrance lobby to the new church; what I find very important here is the difference in height, and the stairs. He used the stairs to make one of his famous approaches that he liked so much, very monumental. Plečnik always uses stairs, either with the Library or the church at Barje, or here - even if there aren't that many. This is the monumentality of approach. Secondly, this difference in height gave him the possibility to use the old church and install the choir in the upper parts. The old church with the old tower has been practically eaten up by the new church. For me, this is a very inno- vative approach how not to destroy the old church and incorporate it into a completely new project. Here, in Bogojina, we obviously see Plečnik's church but he did not destroy the old one - we still see the old church which is covered by the new construction (Fig. 7). simpozij Naslednji projekt je ljubljansko Tromostovje (sl. 8). V sredini se nahaja kamnit stari most, ki ga Plečnik ni hotel uničiti. Namesto tega je dodal po en most za pešce na vsaki strani. To je eden od Plečnikovih uspešnejših projektov, saj je z njim rešil mnogo problemov. Ena od kritičnih težav v Ljubljani je bila cena gradnje. Mestno občino je vedno zanimala poceni gradnja in ideja ne poru- šiti starega mostu, temveč zgraditi dva dodatna, se je izkazala za cenejšo rešitev. Rešitev je bila praktična tudi zato, ker prometa na mostu med gradnjo sploh ni bilo treba ustaviti. Glavna naloga mostu je povezati celoto prostora na obeh straneh reke, saj je ta izredno zapleten. Na eni strani je Prešernov trg, ki ga je Plečniku na drugi strani uspelo speljati v ozko ulico, ki vodi proti Mestni hiši. Celotna kompozicija je orienti- rana proti Robbovemu vodnjaku, najpomem- bnejši ljubljanski baročni fontani, in ljubljanske- mu gradu nad njim. S svojo rešitvijo je Plečnik ohranil stari most, vendar pa ustvaril čisto novo kompozicijo celote in speljal prostor z ene strani reke na drugo. Poleg tega je mostu s stopnicami dal čisto novo obliko, značilno za beneške mo- stove (sl. 9). Plečnik je študiral na Dunaju, vendar pa mu germanska kultura ni bila preveč pri srcu, že Otta Wagnerja je videl kot simbol germanske kulture. Zato je želel poudariti, da je Ljubljana blizu Mediterana, kjer v zraku že skoraj vohaš morje. Bistveno mu je bilo, da preko Ljubljanice zgradi most, ki je bolj mediteranski od katerega- koli dunajskega ali avstrijskega mostu. To mo- žnost je imel zaradi zakona, ki je ostal v veljavi še iz časa avstrijskega cesarstva in je predpisoval, da morata imeti vsaka javna zgradba in trg svoje stranišče. Javna stranišča je torej postavil nivo ni- žje in jih uporabil kot izgovor, da je zgradil sto- pnice. S tem je tudi reko pripeljal bližje mestu in mostu dal »beneški« portal. Zanimive so krogle na ograji mostu (sl. 10). Ko se sprehodiš preko mostu, se te krogle gibljejo v perspektivi. Tiste, ki so bližje, se gibljejo hitreje, tako da na mostu ni- koli nimaš občutka, da si sam. Celo kadar je most prazen, daje občutek, kot da je poln življenja. Tu- di Tromostovje se mi zdi odličen primer, kako ohraniti staro oziroma ga znova uporabiti na či- sto drugačen način. Staremu mostu je Plečnik dal čisto novo vrednost, ustvaril čudovito novo celo- to in hkrati rešil mnoge urbanistične zadrege. Za konec še en primer uporabe »starega« in »novega« - Narodna in univerzitetna knjižnica (sl. 11). Preden je bila zgrajena, je na njenem mestu stala druga, baročna zgradba, ki pa so jo po potresu porušili. Na njenem mestu je ostalo nekaj ostankov prejšnje zgradbe, ko pa so za- čeli kopati temelje za knjižnico, so odkrili še rimske ostanke. Plečnik je simbolično uporabil nekatere od teh ostankov v fasadi nove zgrad- be in pokazal, kako stare zgradbe, ki jih ni več, živijo naprej v novi fasadi. Vse to je seveda zelo simbolično, saj nihče ne ve več, kateri kamni so novi in kateri stari, vendar pa kaže, na kakšen The next project is the Triple Bridge (Fig. 8) In the mid- dle, there is the original stone bridge Plečnik didn't want to destroy it. Instead, he added two additional footbridges over the river. This is one of Plečnik's best projects where he solved a lot of problems. One of the problems that was very critical for Ljubljana was how to build cheaply – the City of Ljubljana was always interested in cost-efficiency - and the idea was that not destroying the old bridge and building two new, smaller pedestrian bridges was much cheaper than any other solution. This solution was also practical as the old bridge could still be used during the construc- tion without having to stop the traffic. The main idea was how to connect the whole of the space on both sides of the river, as it is very complicated. On one side, there's the Prešeren Square and Plečnik somehow transferred the square to the other side towards the small street leading towards the Town Hall. The whole composition is oriented towards the Robba Fountain, the most important Baroque fountain in Ljubljana, and towards the Ljubljana Castle above. With his solution, Plečnik preserved the old bridge; he made a completely new composition of the whole and trans- ferred the space from one side to the other. In addition, with the stairs, he made the shape of the new bridges that is typical for bridges in Venice (Fig. 9). Plečnik stud- ied in Vienna but he wasn't very fond of German culture - for one thing, he saw Otto Wagner as a symbol of German culture. He always wanted to stress that Ljubljana was already a city close to the Mediterranean, a city where you can almost feel the sea in the air. It was therefore crucial to put on the Ljubljanica a form that was more Mediterranean than any bridge that would be found in Vienna or in Austria at large. This was possible only because there was a law in effect at that time, already from the time of the Monarchy, which required any public building or a public square to provide toilets. So, he put the toilets down a level and he used this as an excuse to have stairs lead down there. He wanted to put together the river and the city and to give the bridge a “Venetian” arch. An interesting point is also the way he put the spheres on the top of the parapet (Fig. 10). When you walk over the bridge all these spheres are moving in perspective. The ones that are closer appear to be moving faster and it feels like you're never alone on the bridge. Even if the bridge is empty, it conveys the idea that it's full of life on the street. I consider this a beautiful example how to preserve the old and re-use it in a completely new way. Plečnik added completely new value to an old bridge, created a beautiful new whole and solved a lot of city planning problems. Finally, here's another example of "Old and New" - the National Library (Fig. 11). Before it was built, there was another building here, a Baroque building that was torn down after the earthquake. There were some remains of this building left lying around and when they started the digging for the foundations for the NUK, they also found Roman remains. Plečnik symbol- ically put some of these stones into the facade, show- ing in a way how these old, non-existing buildings symbolically live on in the new facade. All this is most- ly symbolical as it is difficult to tell the old stones apart, simpozij andreas ruby BV: Naš naslednji govornik, Andreas Ruby, je arhi- tekturni kritik in teoretik. Študiral je pri Paulu Viri- liu in Bernardu Tschumiju in njegova današnja predstavitev se bo dotikala obeh njegovih učite- ljev. Andreas je bil tudi urednik preminule arhitek- turne revije Daidalos, katere zadnja številka je iz- šla pred štirimi leti. Je tudi partner v podjetju Tex- tbild, sodobnem podjetju, ki se ukvarja z arhitek- turno komunikacijo. Danes bo govoril o humorju. Plečnika si večinoma predstavljamo kot resnega in ponižnega, ki je blizu Boga, verjetno tudi neko- liko pretiravamo. AR: O Plečniku bom spregovoril z nekoliko dru- gačen pozicije kot govornika pred menoj, ki sta oba dobro poučena akademika. Zase bi rekel, da sem dobro poučen amater, v latinskem pomenu besede »amare«, ljubiti - amater kot nekdo, ki ni- ma strokovnega vpogleda v objekt svoje ljube- zni ali izobrazbe. Moj odnos do Plečnika pa je drugačen tudi od odnosa današnjih poslušalcev, domačih, ki ima- jo s Plečnikom tesen odnos in so o njegovem delu dobro poučeni, skratka, poznajo ozadje. Odkril sem, da Plečnik tukaj živi, kar je zelo po- membno, saj je nekaj čisto drugega, če arhitek- turo prvič spoznavaš iz knjig, kot če si ji neposre- dno fizično izpostavljen s telesom in čutili. Kadar ne poznaš ozadja kakega dela, ga bereš či- sto drugače. Tako je bil najmočnejši vtis, ki ga je name napravilo Plečnikovo delo, njegov humor, nekaj, česar v arhitekturi ne najdemo zelo pogo- sto. Ne poznam sicer Plečnika osebno, toda nje- govo delo je polno humorja in inteligentnega nalaganja plasti resničnosti ter prisvajanja in vključevanja zgodovine. Plečnik je znal uporabljati zgodovino, ne kot po- dobo ali citat, ampak jo je znal obdelati, kar bi pravzaprav zgodovina morala biti. Kot smo vide- li na primerih Andreja Hrauskega, je Plečnik zgo- dovino vključeval čisto materialno, namesto da bi jo le oboževal v obliki ikonografskega motiva. Tudi kadar ne uporablja obstoječih gradbenih struktur, pa uporablja nekatere stalnice, retori- čne figure in zgodovinske trope. V oknu kapele na Žalah denimo stebre uporabi kot napere in tako spremeni obstoječi topološki pomen ste- bra v nekaj čisto drugega. Takšno prisvajanje in način bi lahko podobne ideje in raziskovanja uporabili tudi danes. BV: Naše Spomeniško varstvo bi moralo biti pre- cej bolj prilagodljivo, da bi Plečniku danes pustilo izpeljati njegove projekte. Zelo se strinjam, da je za velik del mediteranskega ozračja v Ljubljani odgovoren Plečnik. Če se kadarkoli med marcem in oktobrom sprehodiš med Tromostovjem in Čev- ljarskim mostom, kar močno začutiš Mediteran, in nabrežje Ljubljanice je danes ena glavnih osi sta- rega mesta. but nevertheless, such ideas, such approaches and research could certainly be used even today. BV: I think that national heritage preservation would have to be quite flexible nowadays to make all these proj- ect possible today. I also agree with the point about Plečnik being responsible for the Mediterranean atmos- phere in Ljubljana. If you walk anytime between March and October from the Triple Bridge to the Shoemakers' Bridge, you can certainly see signs of the Mediterranean, making the embankment of the Ljubljanica river one of the most important city axes. BV: Our next speaker, Andreas Ruby, is an architecture critic and theoretic. He studied under Paul Virilio and Bernard Tschumi among others, and what he's present- ing today hints at both of these two teachers. Andreas was the editor of the defunct architectural magazine Daidalos - the last issue was published four years ago. He's a partner in Textbild, a very interesting contempo- rary office that deals in architectural communication. Today he is going to speak of humour. The way most of us imagine Plečnik is - possibly with some exaggeration - a serious, humble figure close to God. But if you are in fact like that, you can also allow yourself to be not only humorous but also irritating, provocative, and radical. AR: I'm going to speak to you from a different posi- tion that my most esteemed forespeakers, who are both very informed scholars. I'd say I'm an informed amateur - in the Latin sense of the word that goes back to "amare", "to love". An amateur therefore has a non-professional background to the subject of his love or education. I'd like to introduce my relationship with Plečnik as an alternative to the audience who, as locals, has a very close relationship and a very informed one: you know the background. I discovered Plečnik lives here, which is very important, i.e. whether you first discover an architecture from a book, or if you're directly, physi- cally exposed to it with your body and your senses. When I came here for the first time and saw Plečnik - I didn't know a lot about him beforehand - and found his incredible work, I was totally mind-boggled. Whenever you don't know the entire historical back- ground to a work, you start to read the work with a totally different sense. And the most important effect that Plečnik's work had on me was humour, some- thing you don't often find in architecture. I don’t know if this is true of Plečnik as a person but his architecture is full of wit and humour and it exhibits very intelli- gent layering of reality and also appropriating and integrating history. Plečnik was able not to use history as an image, as a quotation, but was actually able to process history, which is what history is all about. As we've seen on Mr Andrej Hrausky's examples, Plečnik he incorporated history materially instead of just worshipping it as an iconographic motif. Even if he doesn't incorporate existing building structures but uses certain topoi, certain rhetorical figures and tropes from history. In simpozij preobračaje pomena je izredno zanimivo, tudi ko govorimo o tem, koliko je Plečnikovo delo so- dobno. Učinke prisvajanja zgodovine in spreminjanja v nekaj drugega lahko vidimo v celotnem Plečni- kovem opusu. Na pokopališču Žale še enkrat vi- dimo nekaj podobnega, tokrat na nivoju prosto- ra. Ko sem prvič videl vhod v pokopališče, sem bil prepričan, da ima vhod tudi prvo nadstropje, in veselil sem se, da se bom povzpel nanj in si si- tuacijo ogledal še od zgoraj. Ko pa sem prišel bli- žje, nisem ugotovil samo, da ni stopnic, ampak da v »prvem nadstropju« niti ni tal, na katera bi lahko stopil. To se mi zdi odlična predstava, hkrati pa prevara mojih pričakovanj. V izkustvu Plečnikovih del je tudi neka časovna komponen- ta, v smislu tega, da v njih vedno pričakuješ še nekaj, podobno kot baročni princip sekvencira- nja. Drugače kot v renesančni arhitekturi, kjer ta- koj, ko vstopiš v kak prostor, zajameš celoto pro- stora, v baročni arhitekturi pogosto ni mogoče dojeti celote prostora z njegovega praga. Vhod na pokopališče je eden od mnogih lepih prime- rov časovnosti izkustva Plečnikovih del. Zanimiva je tudi razlika med Plečnikovim odno- som do zgodovine, če ga primerjamo s postmo- dernističnim prisvajanjem zgodovine. Pri mno- gih postmodernih delih imaš občutek, da je mo- del odnosa do zgodovine simulacija, torej po- jem, ki smo ga slišali pri Baudrillardu. Zanj simu- lacija pomeni manjšanje moči realnosti, saj s po- dvajanjem originalu odvzameš njegovo vre- dnost. Kasneje v življenju se je Baudrillard od te- ga koncepta distanciral in ga zamenjal z drugi- mi, na primer s pojmom iluzija. To se mi zdi izre- dno zanimiva poteza, zlasti če jo navežem na Plečnika. Pojem iluzija za Baudrillarda ni bil iluzi- ja v neškodljivem, dobesednem pomenu, am- pak se je vrnil k latinskemu izvoru besede, torej k illudere, igrati se. Torej nečesa ne simuliraš več, ampak se nekaj igraš, tako kot otroci. Zdi se mi, da se Plečnik igra, še posebno, ko se spo- mnim njegove cvetličarne na ljubljanski tržnici. Veliki tempelj je pojedel svojega malega bratca, nekaj, česar Grki očitno nikoli ne bi storili. Od Plečnika sem se naučil, da imaš do zgodovine lahko tudi lahkoten odnos. Ne gre le za to, da bi bil smešen, smešno vedo pomeni nekaj očitnega in enoplastnega. Humor se vedno dogaja v več plasteh, vedno se giblje med smešnim in resnim. Ko gledam Plečnika, me vedno prevzamejo me- šana občutja. Plečnik ni le eden, vedno se poka- že na vsaj dveh ravneh. Vedno se trudi, da bi vzpostavil resno povezavo s tradicijo, povezavo, ki so jo modernisti takrat zavračali. Zavezanost tradiciji je zanj izredno pomembna, vendar pa ne pove celotne zgodbe. Takoj ko Plečnik vzpostavi to povezavo, jo nemudoma preobrne, z njo izva- ja celo vrsto gimnastičnih prijemov. Stopnišče v NUK-u je fascinanten prostor, hkra- ti pa da čutiti enormno moč prostora, neko av- ro, ki nas skoraj prestraši. Ko se začneš počutiti the Žale cemeter chapel’s window he uses columns as spokes, turning the meaning of a certain existing typology such as the column into something else. This type of re-appropriation and redirecting of the meaning in Plečnik's work is very interesting when we talk about his potential to be contemporary. The same effect of appropriating traces of history and transforming it into something different can be seen throughout Plečnik's entire work. The Žale cemetery features the same thing but in this case, there is also something happening spatially. When I first swathe entrance to the cemetery, I obviously thought it was a two-storey structure and I was looking forward to go on the second level and have a better view of the entire ensemble. As I came close, I realised that not only there are no stairs, there's also no floor slab that I could walk on. I find this a brilliant mise-en-scene and at the same time also a deception of my expecta- tions. There is a temporal notion in the experience of Plečnik's works that always gives you something to look forward to, similarly to Baroque architecture with its principle of sequence. Unlike in Renaissance architecture where you essentially get the idea very early as you go into the space, there's the totality of space yet in Baroque architecture, very often it's impossible to get the entirety of space by merely crossing the threshold. The entrance to the cemetery is one of many beautiful examples of temporality of experience in Plečnik’s works. There's an interesting difference when we talk about Plečnik's relationship to history as opposed to Post- modern appropriation of history. In a lot of Post- modern work until today, you have the feeling that the model of relationship to history is one that we could describe as simulation, which is a term we know from Jean Baudrillard. He described this term as disempowerment of reality - as you copy it, you devalue the original. In his later life, Baudrillard took distance from that term and replaced it by another term, i.e. "illusion". I think that's a very interesting move if you put this into a relationship with Plečnik. Illusion was used by Baudrillard not in the sense of the literal illusion as we know it, as a benign term; he took it back to the Latin root of the word. It comes from “illudere”, to put something into play. You no longer simulate something, you rather act like kids. For me, Plečnik is playing and when I see this project – the flower shop in the Ljubljana Market, something is happening here - the temple eats his little brother, which is obviously something that the Greeks would never have done. I actually learnt from Plečnik, that you can have that kind of a light-hearted relationship to history. This isn't about being funny - funny is always clear and always one-levelled. Humour is always two-levelled, it has the capacity to negotiate the serious and the hilarious. I always have a double sensation when I look at Plečnik. Plečnik is not one - he's at least twofold. There's always the struggle to create a link to tradition that Modernist architecture was just cutting through in his time. The engagement towards tradition is absolutely central to his work but again, it's not the only story: as soon as he 1 2 simpozij 4 5 6 nekoliko pohojeno, pa opaziš nizke stebre na vr- hu stopnišča. Jaz si ob njih oddahnem zaradi nji- hove komičnosti. Iz njihovih proporcev lahko sklepaš, da jim nekaj manjka, da so se pogrezni- li v tla. Tudi njihova tipologija je nekaj, kar si je Plečnik izmislil, očitno je, da se navdihuje iz jon- ske volute, ni pa ji čisto enaka. Na vrhu stebrov je klop, ki vabi, da se usedeš nanjo - kot da bi se usedel na glave vseh Grkov. Gre za več kot le za klop. Arhitektura od tu črpa globino pomena in mnoštvo referenc, za kar mnogi Plečnikovi so- dobniki niso imeli dovolj širine. Ultra zagrizeni funkcionalisti niso nikoli imeli dovolj širine, da bi se na ta način igrali z zgodovinskimi referenca- mi. Plečnik te na mnogo različnih načinov vabi, da ne ostaneš pred prostorom in ga občuduješ, ampak da si ga aktivno prisvojiš, bodisi fizično (tako da se usedeš na klop) bodisi v mislih in ta- ko naprej razvijaš arhitekturo, ki ti že sama po- nuja različne namige. Meni najljubši Plečnikov projekt pa je ulična sve- tilka pri filharmoniji. Gre za ekstremen primer spreminjanja pomena, pa tudi humorja; z Boš- tjanom Vugo sva mu neuradno nadela ime »ste- ber dvojne impotence«. Zanimivo je, da ni po- stavljen nekje skrito, temveč stoji na pomembni točki mestnega prostora, poleg filharmonije in velikega, zelo prestižnega Kongresnega trga. Plečnik artikulira najhujši strah vsakega moške- ga, ga celo podvoji in postavi kot utež nad fan- tastične dosežke naše kulture. Plečnik ima ne- verjetno zmožnost, da objektov ne uporabi kot vase zaprtih entitet, ampak skoraj kot antene, ki pošiljajo in sprejemajo informacije. Verjetno najbolj nenavadna med Plečnikovimi zgradbami, v pozitivnem smislu seveda, pa je cerkev svetega Mihaela na Barju. Tu mu je z na- činom konstrukcije prostora uspelo dekonstrui- rati, celo sprevreči zgodovinsko ikonografijo cerkve. Atmosfere, ki vlada v prostoru, ne bi ni- koli povezal s krščansko cerkvijo. Spominja na prostore najrazličnejših kultov, ki pa vsi prihaja- jo od nekod drugod. Gre za kulturno prilagodlji- vost oziroma večjezičnost, ki se pojavita v tem prostoru, kar se mi zdi izredno sodobno. Danes je mnogo arhitektov, ki si prizadevajo doseči prav to - programske kode objektov spremeniti z uporabo neprilagojenih atmosferskih signalov. BV: Hvala, Andreas, zelo osvežujoče je bilo videti še drugačen pogled na Plečnika, mislim, da bomo o njem še razpravljali med diskusijo. Blizu mi je tudi te- hnika, s katero se v zadnjem času ukvarjaš, to je kri- žanje ozračij oziroma dizatmosferizacija, nekaj, kar ima opraviti s Verfremdung oziroma potujitvijo. builds up that link, he transforms it, he does all kinds of gymnastic exercises with it. The staircase space of the Library is an amazing space, but at the same time, you feel a very strong sense of spatial power, an aura, it's almost intimidating and just when you begin to feel a bit oppressed, you're relieved when you see these columns. To me, it's a comic relief to see them - you're bound feel there's something miss- ing that's embedded in the ground just from the pro- portion of the scale. The typology of the columns is something that is more or less invented by Plečnik - it obviously draws on the Ionic volute but is not the same. On top of the columns there is a bench that invites you to sit on it, but you have the feeling you're sitting on top of the Greeks, there's more to it than just a bench. It's a moment of giving architecture a depth of mean- ing and of references that many other Plečnik's con- temporaries didn't have the generosity of exploring. The ultra-hardcore Functionalists would never have had the generosity to play with this kind of references of history. Plečnik makes all kinds of invitations for you not just to stand in front of the space in awe but to actively appropriate it, be it that you do something physical, such as sitting on the bench, or that you men- tally develop the architecture further as there are all kinds of hints and jokes presented to you. My favourite Plečnik's project is the column. It's an extreme example of change of meaning and also of humour - Boštjan and I unofficially subtitled it "the column of double impotence". It's interesting that it doesn't stand somewhere hidden away but is actually at a very important point in the space of Ljubljana, next to the Concert Hall and a big prestigious Congress square. Plečnik arrives to articulate the ulti- mate fear of every man and to even duplicate it and put it as a weight on the fantastic achievements of our culture. It’s in an incredible capacity to use the object not as a self-contained entity but almost like an anten- na that sends out and receives information On a final note, probably the most deeply disturbing - in a positive way - of Plečnik's buildings is the church at Barje in Črna vas where I feel he managed to decon- struct or subvert the historical iconography of a church with a construction that, atmospherically speaking, I would've never associated with a Christian church. It draws on all sorts of cultic environments that seem to come from somewhere else. There's a cultural versatility, or multi-linguality that comes into space here that I find extremely contemporary - there are many architects today that try to do just that, transform the codes of the programme of a building through disconcordant atmospheric signals. BV: Thank you, Andreas - it was very refreshing to see this kind of view of Plečnik - I think we'll take it up in the discussion later. It was quite close to the technique you developed recently, i.e. cross-atmosphering, or disat- mosphering - something which has to do with the changing of atmospheres and Verfremdung, or estrangement. 31 simpozij igor kebelPlease welcome our next panellist, Igor Kebel. Igor works in a state of elasticity between Ljubljana and Amsterdam. He studied in Ljubljana and afterwards went to the Berlage Institute in Amsterdam. Together with Mika Cimolini, he now has a split office between Ljubljana and Amsterdam, called Elastik, IK: I will present the relation of structure and geome- try in Plečnik's work. This means that I'm not going to bring into the first plan narratives of Plečnik's archi- tecture but instead I will characterize geometry of his work, with regards to the structural ornament and its capacity within his working opus and broader. The subject of my discussion is the potency - or impotency - of his structural implementation of the ornament. So, since I'm not going to present the topics of the representational geometry but instead I will dwell on the notion of the operational geome- try. I also believe that he was a pragmatic tradition- alist who in practice often didn't really hesitate much to break with the same classical tradition. Let’s take for example two of Plečnik's projects which I consider here the most relevant, Langer House and the Church of the Holy Spirit, both locat- ed in Vienna. Both are dating into his earlier period, and they're both about the space-forming through the ornament and the space-forming through the structure. Langer House, with its refurbishment done by Plečnik, stands out because of the space- forming geometry of the ornament. It's systematic and rigorous in terms of the fasade ambience and its utilisation. For the Langer House (Fig. 1) he created a scrolled and wreathed fasade with embossed win- dows and balconies. The rich and rationally system- atised fasade included designs for the structural fasade openings while bringing new techniques of the embossed fasade ornamentation. Plečnik's other early work has been geometrically systematized and intrinsically elaborated through the matter; for example the Church of the Holy Spirit in Vienna (Fig. 2). The church is the first one intro- ducing reinforced concrete inside of the a religious object where the structure is organising a space, and also where the structure has been ornamented with symbolic qualities which could be geometrically measured. Most radical is the church's crypt, with its slender concrete columns and angular, cubist capi- tals and bases. It's not about the narratives, it's not about what one would forcefully dare to imply, it's not also about the values; on the contrary, it is about what's been calculated, designed, drawn, and built. A bit later, the first real reinforced concrete church in its totality was built in Basel. Plečnik spoke about it through the promoters at that time in Architectura Perennis, that this church was certainly very success- ful from the inside but at the same time, that "hairy skin of the concrete", as he named the materialisa- tion of the fasade of St. Anton Church in Basel , was just not alike the one the should be used for the reli- gious objects. What he meant is that it didn't comply with the representational importance of the pro- gram. According to them, the matter shall not BV: Pozdravimo naslednjega govornika, Igorja Ke- bla. Igor se v stanju elastičnosti nahaja med Lju- bljano in Amsterdamom. Študiral je v Ljubljani in kasneje na Berlage Institute v Amsterdamu. Sedaj skupaj z Miko Cimolini vodi arhitekturni biro Ela- stik, nekje med obema mestoma. IK: Predstavil bom odnos med strukturo in geo- metrijo v Plečnikovem delu. To pomeni, da to- krat v prvi plan ne bom postavil pripovedi v Ple- čnikovi arhitekturi, temveč bom poskušal določi- ti geometrijo njegovega dela glede na struktur- ne ornamente in njihove zmožnosti tako v Ple- čnikovem opusu kot tudi širše. Tema moje disku- sije je torej možnost oziroma nemožnost struk- turalne implementacije ornamenta. Moja tema ne bo geometrija reprezentacije, ampak se bom lotil geometrije delovanja. Verjamem, da je bil Plečnik pragmatičen tradicionalist, ki v praksi ni okleval prelomiti s svojo klasično tradicijo. Mislim, da je postmodernizem Plečnika izrabljal, prav tako kot verjamem, da je bil Plečnik tradici- onalist, ki mu ni bilo preveč mar za tradicijo. Nje- govo delo pa je imelo mednaroden pomen in ši- roko podporo. V širšem nacionalnem kontekstu je bil Plečnik zelo individualen. Bil je del širšega gibanja, ki je slavilo geometričnost podobe, kar je danes zelo sodobno. Za primer vzemimo dva Plečnikova projekta, ki se mi zdita najbolj relevantna, Langerjevo hišo in cerkev Svetega Duha, obe na Dunaju. Oboje sta njegovi zgodnji deli iz dunajskega obdobja in obe govorita o oblikovanju prostora skozi orna- ment in strukturo. Langerjeva hiša in njena obnova, ki jo je vodil Plečnik, izstopata zaradi ge- ometrije ornamenta, ki oblikuje prostor. Kar se ti- če ozračja fasade in njene funkcije, je stroga in si- stematična. Na Langerjevi hiši (sl. 1) je Plečnik ustvaril zavito in polžasto fasado z reliefnimi okni in balkoni. Bogata in racionalna sistematična fa- sada vključuje oblikovanje strukturalnih odprtin na pročelju in pokaže nove tehnike reliefne or- namentacije fasade. Druga Plečnikova zgodnja dela so geometrijsko sistematična in notranje dodelana skozi snov, na primer cerkev Svetega Duha na Dunaju (sl. 2). Dunajska cerkev je prvi religiozni objekt, kjer struktura iz armiranega betona organizira pro- stor in kjer je struktura ornamentirana s simbol- nimi elementi, ki jih je mogoče geometrično izmeriti. Najbolj radikalna je cerkvena kripta s tankimi betonskimi stebri ter kockastimi, kubi- stičnimi kapiteli in podstavki. Tu ne gre za pripo- ved oziroma za to, kar je v strukturi implicitno, niti ne za vrednote, ampak za nekaj, kar je bilo izračunano, oblikovano, narisano in zgrajeno. Nekoliko kasneje je bila v Baslu zgrajena prva res armirano betonska cerkev. Plečnik oziroma tisti, ki so takrat delali pri Architectura Perennis, so izjavili, da je baselska cerkev izredno uspešna v notranjosti, da pa »kosmata« zunanja beton- ska stena, kakor je Plečnik poimenoval fasado simpozij igor kebelPlease welcome our next panellist, Igor Kebel. Igor works in a state of elasticity between Ljubljana and Amsterdam. He studied in Ljubljana and afterwards went to the Berlage Institute in Amsterdam. Together with Mika Cimolini, he now has a split office between Ljubljana and Amsterdam, called Elastik, IK: I will present the relation of structure and geome- try in Plečnik's work. This means that I'm not going to bring into the first plan narratives of Plečnik's archi- tecture but instead I will characterize geometry of his work, with regards to the structural ornament and its capacity within his working opus and broader. The subject of my discussion is the potency - or impotency - of his structural implementation of the ornament. So, since I'm not going to present the topics of the representational geometry but instead I will dwell on the notion of the operational geome- try. I also believe that he was a pragmatic tradition- alist who in practice often didn't really hesitate much to break with the same classical tradition. Let’s take for example two of Plečnik's projects which I consider here the most relevant, Langer House and the Church of the Holy Spirit, both locat- ed in Vienna. Both are dating into his earlier period, and they're both about the space-forming through the ornament and the space-forming through the structure. Langer House, with its refurbishment done by Plečnik, stands out because of the space- forming geometry of the ornament. It's systematic and rigorous in terms of the fasade ambience and its utilisation. For the Langer House (Fig. 1) he created a scrolled and wreathed fasade with embossed win- dows and balconies. The rich and rationally system- atised fasade included designs for the structural fasade openings while bringing new techniques of the embossed fasade ornamentation. Plečnik's other early work has been geometrically systematized and intrinsically elaborated through the matter; for example the Church of the Holy Spirit in Vienna (Fig. 2). The church is the first one intro- ducing reinforced concrete inside of the a religious object where the structure is organising a space, and also where the structure has been ornamented with symbolic qualities which could be geometrically measured. Most radical is the church's crypt, with its slender concrete columns and angular, cubist capi- tals and bases. It's not about the narratives, it's not about what one would forcefully dare to imply, it's not also about the values; on the contrary, it is about what's been calculated, designed, drawn, and built. A bit later, the first real reinforced concrete church in its totality was built in Basel. Plečnik spoke about it through the promoters at that time in Architectura Perennis, that this church was certainly very success- ful from the inside but at the same time, that "hairy skin of the concrete", as he named the materialisa- tion of the fasade of St. Anton Church in Basel , was just not alike the one the should be used for the reli- gious objects. What he meant is that it didn't comply with the representational importance of the pro- gram. According to them, the matter shall not BV: Pozdravimo naslednjega govornika, Igorja Ke- bla. Igor se v stanju elastičnosti nahaja med Lju- bljano in Amsterdamom. Študiral je v Ljubljani in kasneje na Berlage Institute v Amsterdamu. Sedaj skupaj z Miko Cimolini vodi arhitekturni biro Ela- stik, nekje med obema mestoma. IK: Predstavil bom odnos med strukturo in geo- metrijo v Plečnikovem delu. To pomeni, da to- krat v prvi plan ne bom postavil pripovedi v Ple- čnikovi arhitekturi, temveč bom poskušal določi- ti geometrijo njegovega dela glede na struktur- ne ornamente in njihove zmožnosti tako v Ple- čnikovem opusu kot tudi širše. Tema moje disku- sije je torej možnost oziroma nemožnost struk- turalne implementacije ornamenta. Moja tema ne bo geometrija reprezentacije, ampak se bom lotil geometrije delovanja. Verjamem, da je bil Plečnik pragmatičen tradicionalist, ki v praksi ni okleval prelomiti s svojo klasično tradicijo. Mislim, da je postmodernizem Plečnika izrabljal, prav tako kot verjamem, da je bil Plečnik tradici- onalist, ki mu ni bilo preveč mar za tradicijo. Nje- govo delo pa je imelo mednaroden pomen in ši- roko podporo. V širšem nacionalnem kontekstu je bil Plečnik zelo individualen. Bil je del širšega gibanja, ki je slavilo geometričnost podobe, kar je danes zelo sodobno. Za primer vzemimo dva Plečnikova projekta, ki se mi zdita najbolj relevantna, Langerjevo hišo in cerkev Svetega Duha, obe na Dunaju. Oboje sta njegovi zgodnji deli iz dunajskega obdobja in obe govorita o oblikovanju prostora skozi orna- ment in strukturo. Langerjeva hiša in njena obnova, ki jo je vodil Plečnik, izstopata zaradi ge- ometrije ornamenta, ki oblikuje prostor. Kar se ti- če ozračja fasade in njene funkcije, je stroga in si- stematična. Na Langerjevi hiši (sl. 1) je Plečnik ustvaril zavito in polžasto fasado z reliefnimi okni in balkoni. Bogata in racionalna sistematična fa- sada vključuje oblikovanje strukturalnih odprtin na pročelju in pokaže nove tehnike reliefne or- namentacije fasade. Druga Plečnikova zgodnja dela so geometrijsko sistematična in notranje dodelana skozi snov, na primer cerkev Svetega Duha na Dunaju (sl. 2). Dunajska cerkev je prvi religiozni objekt, kjer struktura iz armiranega betona organizira pro- stor in kjer je struktura ornamentirana s simbol- nimi elementi, ki jih je mogoče geometrično izmeriti. Najbolj radikalna je cerkvena kripta s tankimi betonskimi stebri ter kockastimi, kubi- stičnimi kapiteli in podstavki. Tu ne gre za pripo- ved oziroma za to, kar je v strukturi implicitno, niti ne za vrednote, ampak za nekaj, kar je bilo izračunano, oblikovano, narisano in zgrajeno. Nekoliko kasneje je bila v Baslu zgrajena prva res armirano betonska cerkev. Plečnik oziroma tisti, ki so takrat delali pri Architectura Perennis, so izjavili, da je baselska cerkev izredno uspešna v notranjosti, da pa »kosmata« zunanja beton- ska stena, kakor je Plečnik poimenoval fasado simpozij 1 2 cerkve svetega Antona v Baslu, ni primerna za religiozen objekt, češ da se ne ujema z reprezen- tacijsko pomembnostjo programa. Po njihovem mnenju oblikovanje ne bi smelo biti določeno s snovjo, temveč je to domena ustvarjalca. Ironi- čno, saj je to ideološko prepričanje, ki je nastalo v času Loosove razvpite izjave o ornamentu in zločinu. Njegovo zavzemanje za kriminalizacijo nepravilne uporabe ornamenta se je parado- ksalno začelo prav na Dunaju. V širši evropski perspektivi bi rad na kratko poka- zal še en primer nereprezentacijske geometrije. V istem obdobju (v 20. letih, torej pred Berlage- jem ali ravno v njegovem času) je na Nizozem- skem delovala amsterdamska šola. Tu začneta ornamentalno in strukturno porajati izkustvo oblikovanja prostora. Gre za odgovor skupine ar- hitektov, ki se je prizadevala vrniti k arhitekturi vsakdanjega izkustva. Za ta namen so razvili gradbeno strategijo opečnih konstrukcij, ki s svojo natančno gradnjo in vključevanjem dode- lane sheme gradbenih elementov utelešajo in izražajo identiteto zgradbe. Njihov cilj je bil ustvariti vseobsegajočo arhitekturno izkušnjo, ki prenaša družbeni pomen, tako zunaj kot znotraj. Zelo drugačen pa je Plečnikov nasprotni odgo- vor, njegov pozni projekt za slovenski parla- ment, ki je pravzaprav akumulacija geometričnih konvencij na podlagi neke podobe. V tem je po- doben Speerovemu predlogu za nacistično Volkshalle, ogromno stavbo s kupolo, ki spomi- nja na baziliko svetega Petra v Rimu. Poudarek Plečnikovega projekta je na obstoječi predpodo- bi in pomenih, ki jih tej podobi pripisujemo. Ka- kor je izpostavil že Žižek v svojem intervjuju »Karkoli spodbuja fašizem« za Assemblage, tudi v Plečnikovem delu najdemo sestavine za takšno arhitekturno organizacijo, ki se zanaša na pomen in vrednost reprezentacije. Tu moramo poudari- ti, da je ta presenetljiv odmik od zgodnjega ope- rativnega obdobja proti reprezentacijskemu ob- dobju v Plečnikovem delu zelo pragmatičen, saj temelji na specifični geopolitiki srednje Evrope iz sredine 20. stoletja. Njegova dediščina se nekako ohranja, vendar pa moram priznati, da nisem opazil veliko poskusov, ki bi poskušali iti preko reprezentacije v globino in vzpostaviti takšno strukturo, ki bi delovala kot organizacija obliko- vanja prostora, oziroma takšno dekoracijo, ki bi delovala kot izkustvo ustvarjanja prostora. Skočimo v času kakih 90 let naprej, da vidimo, kako je sistematiziran strukturni ornament da- nes. Danes vzorce izračunamo, rečeno bolje, izračunamo vse, kar je mogoče izračunati, torej tudi ornamente. Če ostanemo znotraj discipline, računamo tudi, kako organizirati arhitekturno organizacijo ustvarjanja prostora. Primer siste- matičnega in strogega strukturnega vzorca je predlog za avtomobilski bivalni most v Goudi (sl. 3), delo našega biroja. Razvilo smo urbano predlogo, ki jo je mogoče programirati, tako da je njen program fleksibilen, čeprav je pogojen z inform design, the creator shall inform it instead. Ironically, such ideological believes were estab- lished at the time of the infamous quote of Adolf Loos about the ornament and the crime. His call for the criminalisation of the improper use of an orna- ment, was paradoxically launched in the same city of Vienna. Seen in a larger European perspective, I'd like to briefly offer another example of the non-represen- tational geometry. It's the same period, the 1920s, in Holland, before Berlage, or just about that time, a movement Amsterdam School was in practice. There, the ornamental and the structural starts to yield the spatial and the space-forming experience. It's was also an answer of a group of architects who've been trying to introduce the return back to the architecture of everyday experience. They developed a building strategy of a brick construc- tion with delicate masonry and the integration of an elaborate scheme of building elements that embodies and expresses the identity of the build- ing. The aim was to create a total architectural expe- rience, interior and exterior, that carried social meaning. How very different is Plečnik's later antipode, the project proposal for the Slovenian Parliament, which is an image-based accumulation of geometri- cal conventions, similar to the Speer's proposal to build the Nazi's Volkshallean enormous domed building, based on St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. The emphasis here is, that the work relies on the pre- image of the already existing and on the meanings attached it. What already Žižek elaborated in the interview by Assemblage, “Everything provokes Fascism”, there were ingredients in Plecnik's work for the type of the architectural organisation which relies on its representational meaning and value. One would have to acknowledge here, that such a surprising departure of Plečnik from the early oper- ational period into the representational period has been very pragmatic, due to the specific geo-poli- tics of the mid 20th century in the middle Europe. The legacy somehow remain, admittedly I haven't seen around here many attempts which would be able to dig beyond the representation and which would try to establish a structure operating as space-forming organisation, and the decoration operating as a space-forming experience. Let's take a huge leap forward, nowadays we see the structural ornament getting systematised again. Today, we compute patterns, we compute every- thing what it can be quantified, so we also compute ornaments. Disciplinary speaking, we also compute how to organise the space-forming architectural organisation. An example of a systematised and rig- orous structural pattern is, now from our own work,a proposal for the habitable car bridge in Gouda (Fig. 3). Here, we developed a programma- ble urban template, which is flexible in program but specific to the site, landscape and specific in use. In this case we see a habitable geometry placed in action, where the structural pattern doesn't ask for simpozij lokacijo, pokrajino in specifično uporabo. Tu vi- dimo geometrijo prebivališča v delovanju, strukturni vzorec pa ne zahteva naknadne inter- pretacije. Vzorci strukture in namerna neučinko- vitost strukture lahko porajajo novo izkustvo ustvarjanja prostora. Izračunavanje ornamenta danes sledi čisto dru- gačnim vodilom in drugim usmeritvam. Primer je fasada trgovine Chanel (sl. 4) v Tokijski naku- povalni ulici Ginza s svojo osvetljeno fasado, ki je pravzaprav zaslon. Ne moremo več govoriti o vr- nitvi k ornamentu, saj je komunikacija zgradbe drugačna. Torej ne gre za ornament niti za tipo- logijo ali za reprezentacijo zgradbe, ampak za način komunikacije. To je nekaj, kar se mi zdi, da si je Plečnik prizadeval doseči s sredstvi, ki so mu bila na voljo. Vrnimo se spet k Plečniku. Verjamem namreč, da je arhitekturni postmodernizem nekoliko napa- čno razumel Plečnika. Prav tako Plečnikovo delo ni povezano z Venturijevo okrašeno kočo, razlo- žil bom, zakaj ne. Z Venturijevimi besedami, okrašena koča je problem, ki se nanaša na situa- cijo, kjer je sistem prostora in strukture neposre- dno podrejen programu, ornament pa je čez na- nešen neodvisno od njiju. Dejstvo je, da Plečnik ni imel možnosti digitalne- ga izračunavanja, bogastvo in sistematičnost njegovih tlorisov pa sta vseeno izredna. Vsi po- znamo njegove predloge za človeško zapisova- nje geometrije in njegovo ambicijo ustvariti vi- zualno poglobljene tlorise. Njegove dvodimenzi- onalne ornamentalne in strukturne študije so pogosto poskušale ustvariti odnos med zunaj in znotraj ter sistematizirati red, izkustvo in snov. Danes je naša arhitekturna motivacija podobna, na voljo pa so nam drugačna sredstva; zapise prenesemo v vzorce in v snov v prostoru s toliko dimenzijami, ko si jih zamislimo. Plečnik je to po- skušal doseči s sredstvi, ki so mu bila na voljo. Vendar pa sta se Plečnikova frivolnost in želja po eksperimentiranju izgubili, ko je prišlo do struk- ture (razen v njegovih zgodnjih delih). Kolikor poznam ozadje Plečnikove izobrazbe, ni bil niko- li deležen šolskega pouka o gradbenih struktu- rah. Ta detajl je morda le moja osebna spekulaci- ja, vendar mislim, da je to razlog, da njegovi or- namentalni vzorci niso nikoli dosegli bivanjske- ga in strukturnega izkustva ustvarjanja prostora. BV: Misel o Plečnikovi sposobnosti strukturiranja, ki si jo poudaril, je zelo zanimiva. Sprašujem se, ali bi lahko sledili razvoju slovenske modernistične ar- hitekture nazaj vse do Plečnika. Le redko smo nam- reč priča tridimenzionalnemu razvoju prostora, ra- zvoju prostora v prerezih. To je nekaj, kar me res ču- di - kako da pri Ravnikarju ni tridimenzionalnega razvoja. Če izpostavim vprašanje, ali lahko tej ne- zmožnosti oziroma pomanjkanju zanimanja za ra- zvoj prostora sledimo vse do Plečnika? the post interpretation. The structural swatches and the deliberate inefficiency of the structure, may start to yield a new space-forming experience. The computation of the ornament may nowadays follows different leads and different directions. For example the Chanel flag store (Fig. 4) on the Ginza Street in Tokyo, an upmarket shopping area with its illuminated fasade. Here, we clearly can't talk any- more about the return of the ornament. What is more significant here is the fact that the building interface has been changed. It is not the ornament, not the typology, not the representation of the building but the interface itself. This is something I believe Plečnik had been trying to engineer heavily, of course with the means that were available in his time. To return back to Plečnik, I believe that his work has been slightly misunderstood at the time of architec- tural post-modernism. His work is by all means not related to the Venturian “decorated shed”, namely in the words of Venturi, the decorated Shed prob- lem refers to a condition where system of space and structure are directly at the service of programme, and ornament is applied independently of them. The fact that Plečnik couldn't compute digitally is granted, yet the systematisation and richness of his floorplans are incredible. We all know well his pro- posals for the man-made scripting of the geometry, and the ambition to produce visually deep and rich floorplans. His 2D ornamental and structural studies especially went often into the ambition to build the relations between the inside and the outside, and trying to systematise the order, the experience, and the matter. Nowadays, we carry on the same disci- plinary motivation, but with different means: we write inscriptions onto the pattern and onto the matter in as many dimensional space as we may want to. Plečnik did that with the means available at that time. However, with the exception of his earlier period, when it came to the structure, the frivolous- ness and experiment disappeared. To my modest knowledge on Plečnik's educational background, I understood that he never got in the school classes on the building structures. This little detail may well be one the speculative reasons, why his ornamenta- tional pattern, never again gained a habitable, structural and space-forming experience. BV: I think the point you made, Igor, about Plečnik's capacity for structuring, is most intriguing. I wonder whether we could trace the development of Slovene Modern or contemporary architecture back to Plečnik. We can hardly see the three-dimensional development of the space, the sectional develop- ment of the space. This is one of the things that really strike me - how come there is no three-dimensional development, in Ravnikar, for instance. Let's take Cankarjev dom as our example - not to exaggerate, but all one can see there are layers wrapped in the cladding. To put forward the question: can this disin- terest or incapability to develop sectionless space be traced to Plečnik? 3 4 simpozij johann bettum BV: Naslednji govornik, Johann Bettum, je biolog in tudi arhitekt, tako da nam bo morda lahko ra- zložil razliko med inovacijo v tridimenzionalnem prostoru in materialnimi dejstvi površine, pokrite z ornamenti. Johann predava na Staatliche Hoch- schule für Bildende Künste v Frankurtu. Je eden od soustanoviteljev omrežja OCEAN, ki poskuša z naj- različnejšimi prijemi, temelječimi na poskusih, ra- ziskavah in preiskavah, izboljšati arhitekturo kot disciplino. JB: Če je gospod Ruby v Plečniku izkušen turist, sem jaz tisti, ki je prišel nazadnje, nekdo, ki pride v mesto, ima kratko razmerje in spet odide. Ple- čnikovo delo sem videl pred nekaj leti v Pragi, vendar so reči, ki sem jih videl tu v zadnjih nekaj dneh, name naredile močan vtis. Humor je zame zelo pomemben in navdušen sem bil, ko sem sli- šal, da je tako pomemben del Plečnikovega dela. Humor je nekaj, kar takoj prepoznam, če mi ga kdo ponudi, res pa je, da je v arhitekturi redek. Nikoli se ne bi želel vrniti v zgodovino, in mislim, da je to tudi zelo nevarno. Zgodovina lahko po- stane težko breme. Ob vprašanju, kaj nam Ple- čnik pomeni danes oziroma kakšna je vrednost Plečnikovega dela za sodobnost, si pravzaprav lažje predstavljam opozorila, česa ne smemo na- rediti, kot pa, kaj lahko naredimo. Rad bi opisal primer. Slavna opazka Adolfa Loosa gre nekako takole: ko se sprehajaš po gozdu, prideš do maj- hnega groba, in to je prava arhitektura. Arhitekti radi mislijo, da s tem misli fizično stvar, sam grob, zaradi vsega, kar predstavlja, in vrednotijo pomen groba v gozdu. Jaz sem to opazko pre- bral zelo natančno in sem prepričan, da je to, o čemer govori Loos, pravzaprav učinek, ki ga ču- tiš, ko skozi gozd prideš do takega kraja in začu- tiš življenje in smrt. Skozi grob kot arhitekturni artefakt doživiš skoraj fizično občutje. Za začetek bom preučil, na kakšen način se Ple- čnik zanaša na Gottfrieda Semperja, nemškega arhitekta in zgodovinarja. Med drugim je Sem- per menda poudarjal pomembnost umetne obr- ti v primerjavi z arhitekturo. Pravzaprav je izpo- stavil željo po olepševanju, ki se je v umetni obr- ti prvič pojavila v obliki vozlov. Nič ni narobe s tem, da ima umetna obrt prednost pred arhitek- turo, gre za enako željo po olepševanju. Semper si je zelo prizadeval, da bi to izrazil v obliki siste- ma. Razvil je zapleten matematičen sistem, ki ga je uporabljal za oblikovanje v arhitekturi na nek splošen, sintetičen način. Mislim, da Plečnik sicer ni deloval na ta način, vseeno pa lahko v njego- vem delu najdemo mnoge značilnosti, ki nas spominjajo na sodobno zanimanje za nekatere tipe sistemov. Življenjske oz. biološke sisteme mnogi že uporabljajo zelo sistematično na meta- forični ali celo tehnični ravni, zato da arhitekturo ustvarjajo na sintetičen način. Prva Plečnikova lastnost, ki me zanima, je njego- vo razkošje. Narava je že v osnovi razkošje, polna je materialnih učinkov, ki kar žarijo. Polna je snov- BV: Our next panellist, Johann Bettum, is a biologist as well as an architect and perhaps he could explain to us the difference between the innovation in the three-dimensional space and the material facts of a new ornamented surface. Johann, too, teaches at the Städelchule in Frankfurt and is one of the co-founders of the OCEAN network that deals in various practices based on experiments, research, and investigation into advances in architecture as a discipline. JB: I am in awe of all the wonderful observations about Plečnik. If Mr Ruby is the inveterate tourist seeing Plečnik then I'm a first timer: I am someone who comes into town, has an affair, and then leaves again. I did see Plečnik's work in Prague a few years ago but the few things that I've seen here during the last couple of days made a very deep impression. Humour is very important to me and I was delighted to hear it was an important part of Plečnik's work - humour is something that when pointed out to me, I immediately recognise; it's also a rare architectural quality. I am sceptical of a return to history; and I think it's very dangerous. History can become a great bur- den and looking at Plečnik's work, I can actually better imagine the warnings, i.e. what not to do, than exactly what he's about whenever there's a question of what Plečnik is worth to us today. Let me give you an example: Adolf Loos, very famous for his observation how you walk in the forest, you come to a small burial mound and, he says, that's architecture. Architects have a tendency to think that he means the physical thing itself, the burial mound, for all it represents - life, death - and they value the meaning of this burial mound in the forest. I read this very carefully and I'm con- vinced that Loos actually speaks about the effect that you feel when you come through the forest to such a place and not the thing itself. At such moments you realise, you experience life and death, almost like a physical sensation through the architectural artefact of the burial mound. I'll start off by looking at Plečnik's own reliance on Gottfried Semper, the German architect and the- oretician. Among other things, Semper seemingly talked about the importance of arts and crafts in relation to architecture. But, he pointed out the impulse for beautification that first came into the arts and crafts through the practice of knotting. There's nothing wrong with architecture being second to arts and crafts - it's the impulse for beautification that is at work. Semper went a long way to pursue this in terms of systems. He devel- oped a classy mathematical system that was to be used for the pursuit of designing architecture in an overall synthetic manner. I doubt that Plečnik worked in the same way, but there are many things that you can see in Plečnik’s work that reminds us of our contemporary interest in cer- tain types of systems. Life systems or systems in biology are already used by many metaphorically simpozij nih učinkov, ki se nam kažejo v različnih ritmih in različnih vrstah odnosov. Narava je polna razliko- vanj. Zdi se mi, da Plečnikovo delo to predstavi vsaj do neke mere. S stališča današnje arhitektu- re so materialni sistemi izredno zanimivi, saj so osnovne informacije za ustvarjanje arhitekture. Ne gre za vodenje arhitekture, v mislih imam bolj način, kako so včasih delali mizarji. Mizar je vedel, da ima kos lesa zelo specifične lastnosti in ga je zato pri gradnji treba uporabiti na čisto poseben način. To je nekaj, kar je treba pri Plečniku spoš- tovati in česar ne moremo od njega preprosto prevzeti. Če želimo pokazati razkošje in material- no bogastvo, ki smo mu priča v naravi, se mora- mo stvari lotiti po svoje. Deloma je to možno s pomočjo sistemov oblikovanja, ki so ali zelo avto- matični ali pa izpeljani s pomočjo računalnika. Tri točke, o katerih bom govoril danes, so med seboj povezane. Naslednjo bom poimenoval umikajoči se ovoj. Ovoj v arhitekturi je prvi in za- dnji arhitekturni pogoj, tisto, kar nas ovije, kar nas ščiti, torej stene in streha. Lahko ga imamo za nekaj danega, Semper pa je na primer, poleg drugih arhitektov, o njem razvil teorijo tektonike. Vzpostavil je razlikovanje med spodnjim delom, metatlemi, in tektonskim, to je tistim, kar se vzpenja proti nebu. Teorija je nastala v Nemčiji v prvi polovici 19. stoletja. V Plečnikovem delu je mnogo referenc oz. poigravanja z arhitekturo kot tektonsko prakso. Najbolj zanimivo pa je, ka- ko podvaja, a vseeno ne ustvarja materializirane- ga stanja danosti. V kripti cerkve Svetega Duha na Dunaju (že leta 1910) lahko vidimo zgoden primer; kjer bi pričakovali, da se stebri srečajo s stropom, se pojavi še en dodaten prostor, ki ga omogoči sekundarna zbirka arhitekturnih ele- mentov. O tem je nekoliko govoril Igor Kebel kot o strukturi, ki ustvarja prostor, česar se različni arhitekti lotevajo na različne načine. Nekateri ameriški arhitekti so to že prej iskali kot prostor- ski okvir, danes pa je to bistven del arhitekturne- ga raziskovanja. Pomembno je združiti v osnovi različne pojme v arhitekturi, tako da začnejo delovati skupaj, na primer strukturo in ornament, ali pa zunanjo po- vršino in ornament, ali formo in strukturo. Razli- čne elemente pripelješ skupaj, lahko pa greš še dlje in različne arhitekturne element uglasiš med seboj oziroma postaneš nekakšen dirigent in vse te elemente vključiš v skupno delovanje z dolo- čenim ciljem. O arhitekturi se ni vedno razmišljalo niti se je ni ustvarjalo na ta način. To je predvsem način, na ka- terega delujejo naravni in življenjski sistemi. To je nekaj, kar je dano, kar je živo, kar vključuje prostor in strukturo, in kar je najpomembnejše, kar je zmo- žno delovati, opravljati naloge in obdelovati po- datke. To je točka, kjer se poigravajo arhitekturne danosti Plečnikovega dela v smislu tega, čemur sam pravim odmikajoči se ovoj. Morda je to poi- gravanje igra ironije. Včasih se Plečnik igra igro smešnega z elementi, ki imajo močne simbolne or even technically in very systematically in order to pursue producing architecture in a synthetic manner. The first quality in Plečnik that I'm interested in is opulence. Nature is basically opulent - it's filled with material effects that are radiant. It's filled with material effects that present us with many different kinds of rhythms and many different kinds of relations. There is a range of differences, and this is one thing that Plečnik's work seems to embody these qualities in some ways. In terms of architecture today, there is a great interest in material systems providing the first set of informa- tion for producing architecture. That's not a dic- tating architecture; it providing a set of informa- tion in a way I imagine carpenters would read the material qualities of wood in the old days. Carpenters would know how a piece of wood has very specific qualities and would need to be applied very specifically to a certain place in the building. That's a thing to appreciate that one cannot take from someone like Plečnik. In order to stage the type of opulence or material richness that you witness in nature, we'd have to engage with these things on our own terms. Today they go partly through systems of design, and they're highly automated, or they're highly computerised. The three points I'm making are interrelated, and my second point is about receding envelopes. An envelope in architecture is the first and last archi- tectural condition, one that envelops, that pro- tects us. It's the wall; it's the roof. This architectur- al envelope can also be referred to as a datum, and Semper, among other architects, created what is known as tectonic theory. Semper made a distinction between the lower part of the architec- ture, the metaground part, and the tectonic, i.e. what rose towards the Heavens. This theory was developed in Germany in early to mid-19th centu- ry. I believe that in Plečnik's work there are a lot of references and play around architecture as a tec- tonic practice. What is interesting is how that he multiplies and somehow doesn't produce what we could call a reified condition of these data. In the Church of the Holy Ghost in Vienna (in 1910 already), down in the crypt, there is an early exam- ple: where you'd expect the column to meet the ceiling, there is an additional space enabled by a secondary set of architectural elements. This was partly referred to by Igor Kebel as the space-form- ing structure and it is pursued in various ways by different architects. Some Americans have pur- sued it earlier in terms of the space frame, but it's an absolutely essential part of where the architec- tural interests lie today. Eventually, what is at stake eventually, is bringing together categorically different considerations in architecture in a way that they start to work together, such as structure and ornament, or outer surface and structure, or form and structure. You bring them together, and you could go further and take different elements of architecture and you simpozij vrednoti. Vendar mislim, da je vse mnogo bolj re- sno in mnogo bolj premišljeno, da gre za način, ka- ko se izmenjujejo različni nivoji in različne danosti, kar povzroči popolno spremembo pomena, na pri- mer tako, da je element uporabljen na mestu, kjer ga res ne bi pričakovali. To je tista uganka, tisti način zapletenosti, o ka- terem menim, da se arhitektura v današnjem času ukvarja z njim in da se o njem še vedno lahko mnogo naučimo od nekoga, kot je bil Ple- čnik. Upam le, da bomo to znanje pridobili na pravi način, ne pa da se bomo dali zasužnjiti in omejiti odličnosti njegovega arhitekturnega dela. Vendarle je njegovo delo potekalo v dru- gačnem času in se ukvarjalo z drugačnimi pro- blemi od naših. BV: Zelo zanimiva in spodbudna povezava prime- rov Plečnikovega dela z abstraktnimi stroji in so- dobnimi arhitekturnimi praksami. Za aktivnega arhitekta, kot sem sam, je dobro, če začne misliti, kako lahko odnos med strukturo in ornamentom ter globino površine razvijamo danes, tako da imamo Plečnika hkrati za navdih in za že zgrajen primer. begin to orchestrate them, you become a sort of conductor and make all these elements work in conjunction with one another towards an end. Architecture was not always thought of or pro- duced in this way. But this is very much how nature and life systems operate. This is a datum, it's live, it includes both space and structure, and most importantly, it has the capacity to do work, to perform tasks, and process information. This is where in terms of what I call the receding envelopes there’s an incredible play with the architectural datum in Plečnik's work. It may be that this play is ironic at times and it may be that it even uses elements that have a symbolic value and plays a funny game with them, but I think it's far more serious and far more deliberate. I mean that in the way different levels and different data are shifted, resulting in a scalar shift, i.e. using one type of element in a place where you don't really expect it. This represents the type of intrigue, complexity that I believe our time is about in architectural terms. I think there's a lot to be learned from someone like Plečnik, and I would only hope we would do it in the right way, not to be imprisoned or enslaved by the excellence of such an architect only because he did work quite a while ago and our problems are different than the kind that he addressed. BV: To me, it was very refreshing and stimulating to see examples of Plečnik being linked with abstract machines of contemporary architectural practices. For a practising architect like myself, it's great to be able to start thinking how a relationship between the structure and the ornament, and the depth of a sur- face, could be developed today - using Plečnik's work as a source, as well as an existing, built example. simpozij diskusijaBoštjan Vuga: To start us off, I took it upon myself to choose three examples that show how a project - specifically, Plečnik's church in Prague - can be used as a source for contemporary production. The example shows the relation between the church in Prague and the Baumax shopping centre in Maribor by Njirić & Njirić. The latter project is nine years old and it's almost like Plečnik on The Strip. The ques- tion is, is this like the Decorated Shed using Plečnik as a source or is it taking a subconscious experience from Prague and translating it into a shopping cen- tre wrapping (Fig. 1)? The second example shows Plečnik's church in Prague and the town hall in Scharnhauser Park in Ostfieldern near Stuttgart by Juergen H. Meyer. What's of interest here is that Plečnik is transformed in terms of the detail. The windows are integrated into the angled wall, being on the top like hanging sheets of glass (Fig. 2). Finally, the third example shows the interior of the church tower in Prague and the experiential route in the Arcadia building designed by our office, Sadar Vuga Arhitekti. What we took from Plečnik was the perception and movement by walking up in the Prague church tower, translated into the ramped space of the Arcadia (Fig. 3). I'd like to start off the discussion with the experi- ences and atmospheres that Andreas mentioned in his presentation. It would be interesting to see how this kind of reading that you presented to us could be instrumentalised in the way that others can begin to read it, understand it, and use it - not abuse, but use Plečnik as a source of architectural production. Andreas Ruby: You can use Plečnik as a quarry. Mr Bettum pointed out that the worst thing to do would be to duplicate Plečnik's architecture or to mimic his stylistic moves. We've seen this happen in architecture time and time again and it always turns out that you kill whatever you copy. There needs to be a creative act of appropriation, of interpretation, and then transfiguration. I wouldn't recommend to architects today to literally repeat the manoeuvres that I tried to describe. In the examples by other architects, you could see certain parallels, certain relationships to Plečnik's techniques, but they were not necessarily working with iconographic typologies of architecture, such as different kinds of columns. Now, contemporary archi- tects try to work directly with what we could describe as atmospheres. With the Library project, Plečnik develops the second story by playing with tradition, ironically diverting it, playing with the scale of the column - a small column has a different effect on us than a bigger one. You can almost say that there is a second story that is underneath or above the pro- gramme of the library itself. In the same way, you can see the architects today trying to create a multi-lay- ered landscape of information that a building obvi- ously is by working with the programme and then independently, or as a counter-point adding another story, which can be the atmosphere. This kind of Boštjan Vuga: Za začetek sem izbral tri primere, kako se nova sodobna dela navdihujejo pri enem samem projektu, tokrat je to Plečnikov projekt cerkve svetega Srca Jezusovega v Pragi. Prvi pri- mer je razmerje med praško cerkvijo in trgovino Baumax v Mariboru arhitektov Njirić & Njirić. Pro- jekt je nastal pred devetimi leti in je videti kot Plečnik v Las Vegasu. Sprašujem se, ali gre tu za »okrašeno kočo«, ki išče navdih v Plečniku, ali za podzavesten prevod praške izkušnje v ovoj na- kupovalnega središča (sl. 1). Drugi primer je mestna hiša v Scharnhauser Par- ku pri Ostfildernu zraven Stuttgarta arhitekta Ju- ergena H. Meyerja. Zanimivo je, kako je Plečnik tu preoblikovan kot detajl. Okna so del nagnje- ne stene, na vrh so postavljena kot viseče stekle- ne rjuhe (sl. 2). Zadnji primer pa je razstavna rampa v zgradbi Arcadia našega biroja (Sadar Vuga Arhitekti). Od Plečnika smo prevzeli način zaznavanja in giba- nja pri vzpenjanju v zvonik praške cerkve in ga prevedli v prostor rampe v Arkadiji (sl. 3). S temi tremi primeri bi rad odprl razpravo o izku- stvih in atmosferi, ki jo je v svoji predstavitvi na- čel že Andreas. Zanimivo bi bilo slišati, kako bi branje, ki nam je bilo predstavljeno, uporabili ta- ko, da ga lahko berejo, razumejo in uporabijo tu- di drugi, ne da bi ga zlorabili. Skratka, kako je lah- ko Plečnik navdih za arhitekturno produkcijo? Andreas Ruby: Plečnika lahko vzameš le kot cilj. Gospod Bettum je izpostavil, da bi bila najslabša možna rešitev ponavljanje Plečnikove arhitektu- re in oponašanje njegovega stila. V arhitekturi smo temu priča znova in znova in vedno se izka- že, da tisto, kar poskušaš kopirati, tako le uničiš. Najprej mora nastopiti aktivno prisvajanje, in- terpretacija, potem pa preoblikovanje. Nikakor ne bi priporočal, da bi si arhitekti danes prizade- vali dobesedno ponoviti manevre, ki sem jih po- skušal opisati. V primerih drugih arhitektov vidimo neke vzpore- dnice, nek odnos s Plečnikovimi tehnikami, ki pa ne uporabljajo vedno ikonografske tipologije ar- hitekture, kot so na primer različni tipi stebrov. Danes poskušajo arhitekti neposredno delati z ne- čim, kar bi lahko opisali kot atmosfero. S projek- tom knjižnice Plečnik razvije neko drugotno zgodbo, tako da se igra s tradicijo in jo preusmeri v ironijo. Igra se z velikostjo stebrov - nizek steber ima drugačen učinek kot visok. Lahko bi rekli, da ima program knjižnice za seboj, če ne celo pred seboj, še eno, popolnoma drugačno zgodbo. Ar- hitekti si danes podobno prizadevajo ustvarjati večplastne pokrajine informacij, tako da najprej obdelajo program tega, kar je stavba na prvi po- gled, potem pa, neodvisno od programa oziroma kot protiutež programu, dodajo še eno zgodbo, ki lahko postane atmosfera. Podvajanje, ne pa ena- čenje različnih tirnic informacij je nekaj, kar se od Plečnika lahko naučijo tudi današnji arhitekti. Ákos Moravánszky: Mislim, da obstaja velika ra- zlika med tem, da Plečnika uporabimo kot najdišče 1a 1b simpozij 2a 2b spektakularnih arhitekturnih podob, in samo Ple- čnikovo arhitekturo. Plečnika je zelo zanimala tea- tralnost, ne le v smislu rešitve, ampak tudi v smislu retorično pravilnega prikaza. Vračam se k Semperju, saj je ta Plečniku pred- stavljal avtoriteto. Ko je ustvarjal arhitekturo za gledališče, je vedno ustvaril odnos med dogod- kom, ki se je zgodil nekoč v preteklosti, in nači- nom, kako ga prikažemo. Dogodek je vedno ne- ka mala posebnost in nima nujno velikega po- mena za družbo. Toda ko ga spremenimo v gle- dališko igro, nenadoma postane mnogo bolj re- levanten. Ne gre več za osebno zgodbo oziroma osebno usodo. Dotakne se me šele, ko razumem pomen dogodka. Med resnico, ki postane spek- takel, ki postane gledališče, in nečim, kar se je dejansko zgodilo, vedno obstaja neka povezava. Semperjev komentar se glasi, da je maskiranje arhitekture sicer dopustno, vendar se mora za masko nahajati nekaj, kar je resnično. Poudaril bi rad, da je Plečnik vedno imel svoje prepričanje. Vedno je vedel, kaj je prav in kaj ne, kaj je pri- pravljen narediti in česa ne. Mislim, da je velika razlika med arhitekturo, ki je teatralna, ki torej verjame v videz in resnico, ki se skriva za njim, ter arhitekturo, ki je le predstava, torej le izrablja po- dobe in ni več motivirana. Če arhitektura posta- ne komoditeta, objekt spektakla, kakor ji je bilo večkrat očitano, si vedno predstavljamo, da mo- ra obstajati neka avtentična arhitektura, ki stoji sama zase, zunaj življenjske realnosti. Vendar pa mislim, da je za Semperja in Plečnika teatralnost ustvarjala povezavo, ki se mi zdi zelo pomem- bna. Za podobami sta vedno Semperjevo prepri- čanje in njegova vera v pravilnost dejanj. Johann Bettum: Popolnoma se strinjam z omembo gledališča, predvsem iz dveh razlogov. Gledališče govori o prostoru v časovnem smislu in opiše nekaj, kar je za materialnimi dejstvi. Mi- slim, da je zelo nevarno, če se zapišemo le podo- bam. To so že izpostavile nekatere predstavitve, mislim pa, da se primerjava z gledališčem temu še bolj približa. Naša kultura, vključno z arhitek- turno, je nasičena s podobami, mi pa jih vsi še vedno uporabljamo. Posledica tega je, da danes arhitekturna produkcija mnogokrat poteka na zelo površinski ravni. Glede prvega primera, trgovska centra, ki nam ga je pokazal Boštjan, se mi zdi čisto sprejemljivo uporabiti Plečnika kot referenco le zato, da ga ci- tiramo: »Na ta način je Plečnik obdelal površino v začetku 20. stoletja in to je naša verzija iz zgo- dnjega 21. stoletja.« Vendar pa se mi ta način ne zdi zelo poglobljen, mislim, da bi se, če bi se le potrudili, od Plečnika lahko naučili mnogo več od tega. Potrebno je stalno akademsko, zgodo- vinsko in teoretsko preučevanje Plečnikovega dela in pisanja. Mislim sicer, da je Plečnik sam ve- liko zapisal. Z delom in projekti se je treba ukvar- jati na skoraj formalni ravni, v smislu formalne analize, zato da bi razumeli nekatere stvari, ki se dogajajo v njegovem delu. duplicity, but not identity of different tracks of infor- mation is something that architects today can learn from Plečnik. Ákos Moravánszky: I think there's a great deal of difference in using Plečnik as a mine for spectacular architectural images and Plečnik's own architecture. He was very interested in the theatrical - not only the solution but how to show it in a way that's rhetorically appropriate. I'm going back to Semper since he was an authori- tative figure for Plečnik. When he made this remarkable architecture and theatre, there's always the relation between an event that hap- pened sometime in history, and the way it's staged. An event is a particular thing that doesn't necessarily hold any importance for a society. But when it's made into a theatre play, then it sudden- ly achieves wider relevance - it's not about person- al destiny or fate anymore; it touches me because I understand the dimension of the event. There's the relation of truth becoming a spectacle, becom- ing theatrical, but it has to do with a connection with something that really took place. Semper also commented on this, saying that masking reality in architecture is all right but behind the mask, there must be something which is true. I'd like to stress that for Plečnik, there was always his conviction, his personal belief of things that are proper and things that are not, and what he's willing to do, and what he isn't. I believe there's a great difference between an architecture that's theatrical, that believes in appearances and the truth that's behind it, and one that's merely spectacular, mere- ly uses images and it's not interested anymore. When architecture becomes a commodity, a spec- tacle object, as it was criticised, one always thinks that there must be some authentic architecture that stands alone, that is outside the realities of life. Yet I think that for Semper and Plečnik, the issue of the theatrical made a connection that's very important for me. Behind the images, there's Semper's conviction and his very deep belief in how to do things properly. Johann Bettum: I completely embrace the refer- ence to theatre, mainly for two reasons. It's very much about space in a temporal sense, and it describes something beyond the material fact. For architectural purposes, it inscribes that which I per- sonally think of it in terms of the spatial effect. I think we run a great danger in subscribing to the images themselves. I know this was emphasised in a couple of the presentations and I think the thea- tre reference comes even closer. We run this dan- ger in two ways: firstly, our culture, including archi- tectural culture, is saturated with images, and yet we all use them nevertheless. As a result, a lot of architectural production today takes place on a very superficial level. Regarding the first example Boštjan showed, the shopping mall: I think it's fine to use a reference to e.g. Plečnik simply in order to quote - that's how Plečnik did this surface, and here's our early 21st simpozij Najslabše, kar lahko storimo je, da mislimo, da obstaja pravilo ali sistem oziroma da obstaja le en način Plečnika. Moja najljubša metafora za ar- hitekturno produkcijo je kuhanje. Kuharja nihče ne sprašuje po njegovem receptu. Če imaš re- stavracijo s slavno kuhinjo ali če si slaven kuhar, potem imaš svoje skrivnosti in imaš svoj način dela, ki ga v receptih ni vedno mogoče opisati. Vendar pa obstaja nek način dela, ki zaznamuje jedi, tako da bo poznavalec vedno prepoznal ku- harja, saj bo ta v hrani pustil svoj pečat. To je lah- ko okus, aroma, skratka tisto »nekaj«. Takšen je tudi običajen način dela v arhitekturi. Vseeno pa, še posebno v zvezi z arhitekturnimi šolami in akademijami, pogosto mislimo, da je arhitekturo mogoče povezati in izreči v obliki bolj formalne- ga sistema v smislu »če narediš tako, če uporabiš tisto, bo končni izdelek uspešen«, čeprav v resni- ci to sploh ne drži. BV: Lahko najdeš recept in si dober kuhar, pa je jed na koncu vseeno neokusna, čeprav bi jo bi- lo mogoče po istem receptu pripraviti tudi zelo okusno. Zanima me, če bi se dalo objaviti publi- kacijo o pristopih k Plečniku, ki bi bili uporabni za arhitekturno produkcijo. Seveda ne govorim o Plečnikovi kuharski knjigi. Na primer Plečnik in urbanizem - lahko ga bere- mo kot serijo urbanih elementov, ki jih sreča- mo, ko gremo v mestu od točke A do točke B, in nas prevzamejo. Tako jih sicer opišemo, natan- čneje pa jih predstavimo s pomočjo risbe, dia- grama ali zapisa, tako da postanejo produktiv- ne in uporabne. V Plečniku vidim tako ikoničnost kot tudi izku- šnje. Ko razpravljamo o Plečniku, ponavadi go- vorimo o ikoničnosti njegovega dela, torej o tem, kar lahko zagrabimo, vidimo in izkusimo, vendar tako ne sežemo v globino njegovega de- la. Omenili smo imaginarno in omenili smo iko- ničnost. Ikoničnost podobe lahko prevedemo v prostor zgrajenega objekta, če je ikoničnost te podobe večplastna. Pri Plečnikovem urbanisti- čnem delu se lahko na primer sprehodimo od Tr- novskega mostu do Tromostovja in vidimo zapo- redje nekaterih elementov, ritem ponavljajočih se vertikal. To lahko beremo na dva način - kot element urbane atmosfere ali pa kot ikoničnost urbanega. ÁM: Odprlo se je vprašanje možnosti za nasle- dnje publikacije o Plečniku. Strinjam se, da bi bi- lo zelo zanimivo slediti Plečnikovemu preobliko- vanju form. Strinjam se tudi, da o vprašanju ozra- čja v zvezi s Plečnikom še nismo dovolj razprav- ljali, saj se nekako vedno osredotočimo na vizu- alni aspekt njegovega dela, medtem ko ozračje zadeva čisto druga čutila. Pa tudi če preučimo le vizualne učinke - gospod Hrausky je predlagal nekaj podobnega, ko je omenil motiv skodelic za kavo. Gre za to, na kak- šen način uporabiš element v drugačnem kon- tekstu. Presek Plečnikovega dela bi pokazal, sko- zi kakšne metamorfoze gre določena forma, od century version of it. I just don't think it's very pro- found, and I think there are many more lessons to be had from someone like Plečnik if one is willing to engage with it. There needs to be a continued academic, historical, and theoretical research on the body of work and the writing; I understand Plečnik didn't write very much himself. I also think there's a need to engage with the work and the projects almost on a formal level, in terms of a for- mal analysis in order to understand some of the things that go on. Boštjan, when you asked, "how can we do it, how can we go about an engage- ment", the worst thing that we can do is to think that there is a rule, that there is a system, that there's one Plečnik. My favourite metaphor for architectural production is cooking - no-one will ask a cook for the one recipe. If you have a restaurant, a very good kitchen, or you're a famous cook, you have secrets, you have ways of doing things, and you may not even grasp that recipe. And yet there is an underly- ing way that a cook will work so that a connoisseur could probably recognise the cook regardless of the dish that the cook made because there would be some kind of a signature in there, a flavour, a taste - something. In architecture, this is very much the way we go about doing things and too often, we end up thinking - particularly in relationship with academies and the teaching of architecture - that it's actually possible to relay, tell, or communi- cate some sort of a more formal system, something like "as long as you do this, then everything is OK,” and it's not like that. BV: You can have a recipe and you can be a good cook and still make a tasteless dish at the end of the day, even though you could make it really tasteful with the same recipe. I wonder whether it's possible to come up with a sort of a publication that would showcase different takes on Plečnik, which would be then useful for architectural production. I'm not talking about a Plečnik cookbook. It's all about the way that you present a reading. Let's take Plečnik and urban planning; one can read it as simply several urban elements in the town and as you move from A to B, you'll see this and that and be overwhelmed. We can thus describe it but hope- fully, there's also a way to present it with a drawing or a diagram, or by means of scripting, which would then become productive and usable. In Plečnik’s work I see both, the iconic qualities and the experience. When we discuss Plečnik, we usually talk about iconic qualities of his work, essentially - what can be grasped, seen, and per- ceived, but it's not taken to a really deep level. Before, we mentioned imaginary and iconic quali- ties - we can take an iconic quality of an image and then translate it into space as a built product, whereby it takes on multi-layered iconic qualities. For Plečnik's urban work, you can take a walk from Trnovo bridge to the Triple Bridge, which is basi- cally a sequence of certain elements, a rhythm of repetitive verticals; one can read this as a pure 3a 3a simpozij kod izhaja (zanimiv je že izvor sam po sebi) in ka- ko se pojavi v različnih dimenzijah, od velikih do majhnih. Monumentalnost pogosto nima nič opraviti z velikostjo objekta, ampak je način, ka- ko objekt nekaj pomeni. Prav tako je v Plečnikovem delu zelo pomembna pozornost do čisto banalnega in način, kako se z banalnim igra, ga spreminja in preizkuša njego- ve meje. Najbolj zanimiva Plečnikova kuharska knjiga, če ji tako rečemo, bi pokazala rekonstruk- cijo oblikovalskega procesa, ki je skrit pod razli- čnimi plastmi njegovega dela. Andrej Hrausky: Najprej bi rad nekaj dodal k razpravi o atmosferi. Dobri arhitekti vedno ustvarijo atmosfero, ki je primerno prostoru, ki ga načrtujejo. Zdi se mi na primer izredno zani- mivo, kako se atmosfera stopnišča v NUK-u spre- minja, ko se vzpenjaš proti čitalnici. Pri vhodu vlada monumentalno ozračje, ki je ustvarjeno s pomočjo različnih trikov, od uporabe materialov do osvetljave in akustike. Plečnik nam omogoči, da čutimo ponos, ker smo vstopili v pomembno stavbo, v kateri je spravljeno vse znanje nekega naroda. Atmosfera pa se spremeni takoj, ko vsto- pimo v čitalnico. Tam se je treba namreč osredo- točiti na knjige, ki jih bomo brali, torej mora biti atmosfera drugačna. To je zame prava arhitektu- ra - služi kot ozadje, na katerem poteka življenje. Arhitektura mora ustvarjati interierje, ambiente oziroma atmosfero, v katerih lahko dobro počne- mo to, kar hočemo početi (oziroma kar si je arhi- tekt zamislil, da bi počeli). NUK je prikaz simboli- čnega vzpona od teme k svetlobi, vanj vstopimo, da kaj preberemo in tako postanemo modrejši. Mislim, da se arhitekture ni mogoče naučiti iz knjig, učimo se je, ko se odpravimo na sprehod oziroma potovanje in si jo ogledujemo. Pro- blem je, da ljudje prevečkrat in preveč dobese- dno posnemajo forme, ne pa le konceptov ozi- roma etike. Potrebna bi bila poglobljena študija dela Edvar- da Ravnikarja. Bil je Plečnikov študent, njegovo delo je dobro razumel, iz njega se je ogromno naučil, nikoli pa ga ni le preprosto posnemal. Njegovo delo je nadaljeval na drugačni, mnogo modrejši ravni. Če se torej želimo naučiti, kako brati Plečnika, si moramo le ogledati Ravnikarja. JB: Popolnoma se strinjam z tem branjem knji- žnice. Toda z enakimi besedami bi lahko opisali tudi Asplundovo knjižnico v Stockholmu. Da bi lahko bolje razumeli Plečnika, moramo biti zelo specifični. Plečnik se je verjetno ukvarjal s čisto drugimi vprašanji kot Asplund. Plečnik se je zate- kal k zelo specifičnim strategijam (verjetno jim sam ne bi rekel tako) in v prostoru uporabljal ze- lo specifične elemente, zato da bi z njimi dosegel zelo specifičen učinek. Zato pa je pomembno, da vzgajamo in razvijamo raziskovanje Plečnika na različnih ravneh, torej teoretsko, zgodovinsko pa tudi čisto analitično oz. formalno. Igor Kebel: Zanimivo bi bilo tudi vedeti, kako je Plečniku uspelo zbrati denar za javne zgradbe, atmospheric or urban device, or one can read it as an urban iconic quality. ÁM: You began with the question of the possibility of a publication about Plečnik. I agree that it would be a very interesting idea to trace the transforma- tions of forms. I agree that the issue of atmospheres is not really discussed in connection with Plečnik because one is so strongly focused on the visual aspects of his work, whereas the atmospheres address all the other senses. But even if one considers only the visual aspects, it would still be a very interesting aspect. Mr Hrausky suggested this when he introduced the motif of the coffee pot, i.e. how an element is taken and then appears in different context. You could make this kind of section across Plečnik's work in order to show what kinds of metamorphoses a certain form goes through, where it's taken from - the origins themselves are interesting - and how it appears in very different dimensions, e.g. very small or large. Monumentality has got nothing to do with the sheer size of the object; monumentality is the way it's transformed into something meaningful. In Plečnik's work, this kind of attention towards the banal is very important, and also the manner in which you can play with it, distort it, and test the limits of this form. For me, the most intriguing Plečnik cookbook, so to say, would be one where we could see that process reconstructed because it's hidden under different layers in his works. Andrej Hrausky: I'd like to add something to the discussion about the atmospheres. A good architect always creates an atmosphere that's appropriate for the space he's designing. I find it very interesting, for instance, how the atmosphere in the main stair- case of the National Library changes as you ascend it towards the reading room. The atmosphere starts as very monumental. With various tricks, from the use of materials to lighting and acoustics, Plečnik enabled us to feel proud as we enter a building this important, a building that contains all the knowl- edge of our nation. This atmosphere changes immediately as you enter the reading room - once there, you're supposed to be focused on books, you're about to begin to read and the atmosphere is completely different. For me, this is real architec- ture, a backdrop to life. Architecture must create interiors, ambients, atmoshperes, if you like, where we can do what we want to do (or what the archi- tect indended us to) there well. In the Library, we have this symbolic view from darkness to light, we go there to read and to get wiser. I don't think you can really learn architecture from a book - we learn architecture when we walk around or travel and we look at various things. The problem is that people copy too much and too literally. They copy forms instead of concepts or ethics. I think there should be a very profound study of Edvard Ravnikar. He was Plečnik's student, he under- stood his work quite well, he learned a lot from his work, but he never simply copied from Plečnik. Instead, he continued his legacy on another, much simpozij česar si danes ne moremo niti predstavljati. To vprašanje je v praksi zelo relevantno, o njem bi res lahko napisali knjigo. Knjigo bi lahko napisali tudi o strukturi Plečnikovih projektov, neučinko- vitost njegovih struktur je namreč po svoje ču- dovita. Še ena knjiga bi lahko obravnavala Ple- čnika s stališča stranskih vhodov. Kje točno se pojavijo te vhodi, ki so pravzaprav taktične stra- tegije, ki določajo, kakšne so stavbe danes? In če že govorimo o urbanih strategijah, kakšna javna in družbena politika je dovolila Plečniku postavi- ti vhod v knjižnico, kjer je danes? Če se vrnem k vprašanju urbanega - katera poli- tika, kakšne razmere, katera skupna oblast je Ple- čniku omogočila, da je mesto razvijal v takšnem obsegu, da si tega danes ne moremo niti pred- stavljati? Če se oddaljimo od Plečnikove politi- čne pomembnosti, če se torej posvetimo le po- datkom in raziščemo sile, ki so usmerjale njego- vo delo in jih poskusimo razumeti, se lahko goto- vo veliko naučimo. BV: Če se spomnim cerkve Svetega Duha na Du- naju, omenjene v Igorjevi predstavitvi, je zelo za- nimiv odnos med ornamentacijo, strukturo in ustvarjanjem prostora. Kako lahko strukturo uporabimo za ustvarjanje prostora, ki je sam po sebi ornament? V svoji predstavitvi si na primer nakazal, da mnogi elementi za strukturo sploh niso potrebni. Kako lahko ta projekt beremo v lu- či sodobne prakse? IK: Dunajska cerkev je eno Plečnikovih najmanj samozavestnih in morda zato najboljših del. Tu je dovolil, da je snov informirala njegovo geo- metrijo. Cerkev je primer operativne geometri- je, kjer sta pomen in ozračje vpisana v snov - v tem primeru v betonski steber. Plečnik je geo- metrijski genij. Ker je tako sistematičen pri vzpostavljanju oblikovnih sistemov, ki organizi- rajo in oblikujejo snov, lahko z njimi namerno oblikuje prostor. Ne vem, zakaj je to kasneje opustil, in to tudi obžalujem. AH: Zelo pomembno je, da gre tu za cerkveno kripto. Zato se pod oltarjem strop nekoliko zviša, kar je zelo pogosto v starih cerkvah, še posebno v Italiji. Zgoraj so okna, ki od zgoraj spuščajo po- gled v kripto. To je tudi razlog za takšno kon- strukcijo, stebri so dvojni le pod oltarjem. Tako kot je Plečnik dojemal stebre in proporce, se mu ni zdelo primerno, da bi bili stebri pod oltarjem višji. Zato se je odločil za dvojne stebre. IK: Plečnik je imel za to cerkev zelo omejen pro- račun. Stoji v takrat precej zanemarjeni dunajski soseski. Vseeno pa mu je uspelo vanjo vložiti po- dobe in navodila, kako organizirati prostor. Še več, njegova rešitev je zelo celostna, ta pristop je pozneje opustil. Kasneje je uporabljal tehniko mash-up in tako dekriminaliziral ornament, kar mu je Loos tudi očital. AR: Če skušamo umiriti Plečnika, tako da ga na- knadno harmoniziramo in mu odvzemamo nje- govo divjost, smo zgrešili nekaj izredno pomem- bnega. Vedno obžalujem, da se ni mogoče vrniti wiser level. So if we want to know how to read Plečnik, we can just look at Ravnikar. JB: I think you're absolutely right about the reading and the Library. In fact, you could just as well be describing Asplund's library in Stockholm with these same words. But in order to better under- stand Plečnik, one needs to be extremely specific. Most likely, there would be different things at work with Plečnik than with Asplund. Plečnik employed very specific strategies (he probably wouldn't call them that) where very specific elements are used, staged within the space in order to produce a very specific range of effects. This shows the importance of nourishing and developing a continued Plečnik scholarship on several levels - theoretical, historical, as well as on a purely analytical, formal level. Igor Kebel: It would also be great to know how to raise a budget for such public buildings that, to an extent, go beyond our wildest imagination nowa- days. This is a highly relevant question in practice - you could write a book about that. You could also write a book on structural work in Plečnik's projects, his structural inefficiency is just beautiful. This next book could take a backdoor perspective. Where are these specific entries, you can call them tactic strategies, that make a building as it is nowadays; if we talk about urban strategies, what public and social policies were in effect that allowed Plečnik to put the library entrance where it is? If we go back to the urban planning- what policies, what conditions, what public forces made the development in a city on an urban scale that goes beyond the imaginary nowadays? If you move away from Plečnik's political importance, if you go beyond being intimate with him into the pure datum and dig into the forces that instrumentalised his work and try to understand them, you can learn a lesson. BV: The project you used in your presentation – the Church of Holy Spirit in Vienna, I was quite intrigued by the relation between ornamentation, structure, and spatial production. How structure can be employed to produce the space itself as an orna- ment. You demonstrated in your presentation that there are many elements here that are not struc- turally necessary. How can one, while reading this project, actually transform it into contemporary practice? IK: I think this church one of his most insecure and perhaps most brilliant works. Here, he allowed the matter to inform his geometry. The church is an example of operational geometry with meaning and atmosphere encoded in the matter - in this case in a concrete column. Plečnik is a geometrical magi- cian. By being so systematic in establishing very formful systems that would shape and organise the matter, he deliberately organises the space. I don't know the reasons for his departure later on but I find it quite unfortunate. AH: But the really important thing is that we're look- ing at the crypt, Bellow the altar, the ceiling level rises a bit. You can find this in many old churches, simpozij v času in začutiti sodobnega vpliva nekega dela. Prepričan sem, da vsi poznamo ta občutek, vsaj v zvezi z razstavo impresionistov leta 1870. Ljudje so se nad njo zgražali in nekatere slike so celo na- padali z noži - na primer Manetovo Berthe Moris- sot - saj so se jim zdele žaljive. Mislim, da je tudi v Plečnikovem delu nekaj, kar nas ne zadene več tako, kot je zadevalo njegove sodobnike. Ali lah- ko danes še vedno za nazaj trdimo, kaj je bilo pri- merno - mislim na ozračje v NUK-u, ki naj bi bilo primerno za branje? Mislim, da se percepcija te- ga, kakšna atmosfera je primerna za nek prostor oziroma program, zelo spreminja. Konkretno, ko so Plečnikovi sodobniki videli pokopališče Žale, ali se jim je lahkotno ozračje zdelo primerno za prostorsko artikulacijo prostora smrti? Verjetno je prava moč zgodovine, da spreminja vrednote v skladu z razmerami. Zato mislim, da bi Plečniku morali dati tudi možnost, da ostane neprimeren. ÁM: O tem vprašanju se je že veliko debatiralo. Cerkev Svetega Duha so na Dunaju mnogi zav- račali, češ da je popolnoma neprimerna za cer- kev. Loos je bil pri tem izjema in je Plečnikovo delo občudoval, celo kljub njegovi uporabi or- namentov. Vsekakor gre za zanimivo vprašanje, ki se delo- ma nanaša tudi na dejstvo, da danes zgradbe na- stanejo skupaj z izčrpno razlago uporabljene iko- nografije. Mercedesov muzej arhitektov UN Stu- dio je denimo opremljen z množico detajlov o Mitosovi rampi. Pri delu Petra Eisenmana je teo- rija del same arhitekture, zato da se bolje trži. V Plečnikovem primeru pa nimamo popolne razla- ge in zato nam vedno ostaja občutek, da smo še nekaj zgrešili, kar pušča možnosti različnih ra- zlag. Dejstvo, da ga ni mogoče popolnoma razu- meti, je verjetno tudi eden od razlogov, da o njem še vedno razpravljamo. Vedno nam ostane še nekaj, tudi v primeru dunajske cerkve. Vseka- kor drži ideja o racionalnem strukturiranju, ki jo je omenil Andrej. Toda ko si v cerkvi in opazuješ arhitekturo, se nenadoma znajdeš na začetku nekega jezika, ki ga ne moreš razumeti, ker je ta- ko daleč. Njegova pomembnost in monumental- nost sta kakor latinščina - še vedno jo cenimo, čeprav je ne razumemo več. JB: Drugače kot Igor ne bi želel uporabljati pre- več sodobnih izrazov za opisovanje Plečnikove- ga dela. Konec koncev je bilo ustvarjeno pred skoraj celim stoletjem. Danes imamo svoja vpra- šanja in uporabljamo drugačne besede in kon- cepte, ki se mi ne zdijo primerni za opisovanje dela v času, ko je nastajalo. Še vedno pa lahko iz- koristimo priložnost, da v Plečnikovem delu vidi- mo stvari, ki so bile tam mišljene ali pa tudi ne. V tem smislu, naj bo namerno ali po naključju, pa Plečnikovo delo kaže v prihodnost. V mnogih pogledih je tako bogato, da dopušča možnost, da se k njemu vračamo in v njem najdemo nav- dih ali celo primere za nadaljnje delo. Navdušen sem bil tudi nad tem, kar smo izpo- stavili kot igro ali humor oziroma nad tem, kako especially in Italy. The glass panes allow you to look down into the crypt from the church. This is there- fore the reason why the construction was done this way - it's only under the altar that the columns are higher. The way Plečnik saw columns and propor- tions, he wouldn't consider it appropriate to have the columns under the altar significantly taller. This is why I believe he decided to make double columns. IK: He had a limited budget; at the time, this was a completely run-down Vienna neighbourhood. Yet, we see the encrypted images and instructions on how to organise the space. And even beyond that, it is an integral solution - this is not the approach that he often used later. Later on he was doing mash-up , he decriminalised the ornament. That was basical- ly Loos's attack on his work later on, as well. AR: I have a feeling that we're somehow missing something, as if we're pacifying Plečnik in the sense that we're post-harmonising him and taking the wildness out of him. I always regret that it's not pos- sible to go back in time and feel the contemporary sensation of a work. I'm sure you know this feeling, too, when you read about the initial reactions to the Impressionists' exhibitions in the 1870s. People were scandalised to the extent that they attacked paintings with a knife, e.g. the portrait of Berthe Morisot by Manet because they found it so insult- ing. I have a feeling that there was something in Plečnik's work, as well, that today no longer strikes us as it struck his contemporaries. I wonder whether today, we can still make the claim of what is appro- priate for something else in a trans-historical way – i.e. the appropriateness of the atmosphere in the reading room for the act of reading. In my opinion, the perception of what sort of atmosphere is appro- priate for a certain space or programme changes a lot. To give a concrete example, I wonder whether Plečnik's contemporaries, when they first saw the Žale cemetery, found the light-hearted atmosphere appropriate to the spatial articulation of the memo- ry of death. Perhaps that's the real power of history, that it changes the values according to different conditions. This is why I would suggest that we also give the chance to the inappropriate. ÁM: There were many debates centring about this very issue. The Vienna church was rejected by many in Vienna as totally inappropriate for a church. Loos took an exception and appreciated Plečnik despite Plečnik's use of ornaments. It's an interesting issue and a part of it is also the fact that nowadays, a building comes with a full icono- graphy explanation, e.g. the Mercedes museum by UN Studio comes with all the details about the Mythos ramp. In Peter Eisenman's work, the theory is part of the packaging of the architecture in order to market it. In Plečnik's case, there is no full explanation and you have the feeling that there's always some- thing left that cannot be grasped and that's up for very different explanations. That's probably one of the reasons why we're still discussing it, because it resists full understanding. There's always something simpozij lahko uporabimo arhitekturo za prikazovanje simbolnih form na nekoliko perverzen ali suge- stiven način. Omenil pa bi rad še eno idejo. Ple- čnik gotovo pomeni zelo veliko za Slovenijo in še posebno za Ljubljano - v izgradnji in obliko- vanju identitete tako v arhitekturnem kot v ur- banističnem smislu. Sicer sem nekoliko zadržan do teorije »genus loci« (čeprav jo je razvil Norve- žan Christian Norberg Schulz), saj se mi zdi v več pogledih omejujoča. Hkrati pa ne morem ube- žati dejstvu, da obstajajo lokalne - ali morda re- gionalne oziroma nacionalne - lastnosti Plečni- kovega dela, ki si zaslužijo našo pozornost. BV: Plečnika lahko seveda razumemo kot prelom s tradicijo, še posebno v smislu tega, kar je obsta- jalo pred njim. V mestu je zgradil čisto novo plast. Mislim, da ni prav mnogo evropskih mest 20. stoletja, ki bi jih imenovali po enem samem arhitektu. En sam arhitekt, ki v mestu ustvari klju- čno plast, ki določi njegov identiteto, je nekaj ze- lo posebnega, celo frustrirajočega, če nekoliko pretiravam. AH: Ko govorimo o tradiciji, je najpomembneje, da ne obstaja ena tradicija. Tradicija se nikoli ne razvija v eni sami neprekinjeni liniji, vedno so pri- sotni prelomi in revolucije, v arhitekturi ravno to- liko kot v drugih umetnostih. Barok je bil naspro- tovanje renesansi, renesansa je nasprotovala go- tiki. Kar je tradicionalnega, je spomin na stvari, mi pa bomo nadaljevali tradicijo prelomov. Niti najmanj ne dvomim, da je Plečnik stalno kršil pravila - spomnimo se le kipa Marije, ki ga je po- ložil horizontalno. Pojavilo se je vprašanje, kako so Plečnika spreje- mali v njegovem času. Zanimivo je na primer, da je oblikoval tudi oblačila duhovnikov za otvori- tev Žal. Obleke so bile zelo pisane, podobne ti- stim, ki jih je Michelangelo oblikoval za švicarsko gardo v Vatikanu, kot da bi želel spodbuditi ne- kaj veselja. Na celotnih Žalah je gotovo mnogo humorja. Kapel je toliko, kot je cerkev v Ljubljani, in še ena dodatna. Zadnja je kapela Adama in Eve, ki je namenjena tistim, ki tako kot Adam in Eva ne verjamejo v Boga. Kapele predstavljajo ra- zlične arhitekturne stile: etruščanski tumulus, gr- ški tempelj, pravoslavno cerkev, otomansko arhi- tekturo, islamsko arhitekturo itd. Imenujejo se po ljubljanskih cerkvah, kar izpade precej sme- šno, še posebno ko najdeš svojo domačo cerkev in ugotoviš, da je pravzaprav tumulus ali mošeja. AR: Danes je na nas, da v Plečniku odkrijemo bo- jevnika, ki leži za vsemi temi plastmi odobrava- nja, ki so se kot prah usedle na njegova dela. Če bi bil danes še živ, bi ga zelo rad vprašal po njego- vem mnenju o preobrazbi dvorišča Mestnega muzeja arhitektov Ofis. Šokiran sem bil, ko sem slišal, da projekta rampe, ki bi v prvem nadstropju odprla še en vhod, niso mogli izpeljati, ker spo- meniško varstvo ni dovolilo posega v zid. Zakaj sodobni arhitekturi ne dovolimo, da bi postala pravo nadaljevanje preteklosti, ampak dovoljuje- mo shizofreno razlikovanje med precenjenim more there, even in the case of this very church. When you go inside, the rational idea of structuring that Andrej mentioned is definitely true. But if you're there and you look at the architecture, then you sud- denly find yourself at the beginning of a language that you cannot understand anymore because it's so far away. The importance and monumentality of it are like Latin; they're still appreciated even if you don't understand the words anymore. JB: Unlike Igor I wouldn't want to use too many con- temporary terms so as to describe Plečnik's work. After all, it was designed and built almost a century ago; we have our own preoccupations now and we use a set of words and concepts that I don't find appropriate to describe his work as was conceived. We can still take the opportunity to see things in Plečnik's work that he may or may not have intend- ed to be there. In this sense, either by coincidence or by design, his work that pointed into the future. It's so rich in so many ways that it allows for the pos- sibility for us to go back to this work and find inspi- ration or even examples of things. I was also delighted with what was pointed out regarding play and humour, and even what brings architecture over using symbolic forms in a slightly perverse or suggestive manner. There's another idea I'd like to introduce; clearly, Plečnik must've meant a great deal to Slovenia and especially to Ljubljana in terms of building identity, and forming an identity both in architectural and urbanistic terms. I take a certain reservation towards any "genius loci" type of theory (even though it was a Norwegian, Christian Norberg-Schulz, who devel- oped it) I find it somewhat oppressive in its many forms. Yet at the same time, I can't escape the fact that there is a local - or perhaps regional, national - quality to Plečnik's work and I think it warrants our attention. BV: One can certainly consider Plečnik as a breach in tradition in terms of what was being built here before him - he set up a new layer of the city. I don't think there are many European cities or towns of the 20th century that are called after a single archi- tect. One architect giving an identity layer to the city is a very specific thing - in a way, it can be even frustrating, to exaggerate a bit. AH: When we talk about tradition, the most typical thing is that there is no one tradition. Tradition never develops in a straight line - there are always many breaches and revolutions, in architecture as much as in other arts. Baroque, for example, was very much against the Renaissance, and the Renaissance was against Gothic. A thing that's tradi- tional is a memory of something, and we will con- tinue our tradition of breaches. I have no doubt that Plečnik was constantly breaking all the rules - just remember the statue of Virgin Mary that he placed horizontally. There was the question of how this particular work of Plečnik was accepted at the time. For example, he also designed the clothes to be used for the opening ceremony of Žale cemetery. These simpozij mestnim telesom in nepomembnimi koščki, ki mu jih lahko dodamo? Še posebno, če se spo- mnim, kako močan vtis je napravilo Plečnikovo vključevanje obstoječih gradbenih substanc v svoje projekte. To je zelo velikodušno in prav ve- likodušnost glede zgodovine je nekaj, kar se mi pri Plečnikovem delu zdi zelo radikalno. Mislim, da se njegovo delo preveč pogosto dojema kot delo loščilca knjig, ne pa tako, kot ga obravnava- mo danes na okrogli mizi, ko v njem resnično vi- dimo kuharja, ki različne substance spreminja v nekaj novega. BV: Danes smo videli, kako večja Plečnikova cer- kev pogoltne manjšo. V zvezi s tem, kar je prej iz- postavil Igor, sprašujem, kakšne so bile kontekstu- alne razmere, ki so dovolile takšno transformaci- jo, takšno inovacijo, tolikšno radikalnost. Ne trdim, da kaj takega danes sploh ne bi bilo mogoče, zdi pa se mi, da bi bil tak prevod danes veliko težji, če bi želeli doseči podoben učinek, podobne pogoje ali pa podoben odnos do pre- teklosti. Naj navedem le en primer. V natečaju za Tobačno je naš biro predlagal, da bi novo stavbo postavili na vrh obstoječe, ki ni prav veliko vre- dna. Vendar pa naš predlog ni bil sprejet kot do- dajanje vrednosti obstoječi zgradbi, ampak sko- raj kot zločin, kot bogokletstvo. Za konec bi rad povprašal vse vas, kako vidite Plečnika v Evropi tistega časa. S katerimi njegovi- mi sodobniki v času njegovega delovanja, zno- traj evropskega družbenega, kulturnega in geo- grafskega konteksta, bi ga lahko primerjali kot osebnost in kot arhitekta? Kako vidite Plečnika glede na takratna vprašanja? JB: Mislim, da je eden od razlogov, da danes tu razpravljamo o Plečniku, to, da je bil enkraten. Ko se sprašujemo, s katerim arhitektom svojega časa je bil povezan, se obračamo nazaj v nekaj, čemur mislim, da bi se morali izogniti. To je Ple- čniku kot nekakšnemu artneauvojevskemu arhi- tektu, Plečniku kot nekakšnemu slovenskemu Gaudiju. Vsi smo dotaknili teme povezovanja Plečnika s sodobnimi arhitekturnimi vprašanji, tudi jaz v svoji predstavitvi. Plečnik pa me vse- eno še vedno zanima z regionalnega in nacio- nalnega stališča. Ne da bi delal neposredno pri- merjavo, lahko v delih švedskega arhitekta As- plunda prepoznam nekatere podobnosti. Nika- kor si teh lastnosti ne bi upal poimenovati, ven- dar pa so nekaj, kar napravi delo obeh arhitek- tov zelo posebno. AR: Gre za vprašanje, kakšno delo moramo opra- viti. V tej razpravi se nam zastavljajo vprašanja o predpostavkah, ki jih moramo upoštevati, da imamo Plečnika lahko za sodobnega in ga ne vi- dimo le kot zgodovinsko osebnost. Njegovo de- lo ima velik potencial. Če iz njega izluščimo te- hniko in ga olupimo zdaj že konvencionalne vi- zualne retorike, lahko produktivno investiramo njegov genij na čisto sodoben način. Kot primer rad navajam glasbo, saj imamo v glas- bi vedno opraviti z kompozicijo in interpretacijo. garments were brightly coloured, like the ones that Michelangelo designed for the Swiss Guard in Vatican, as if he wanted to introduce some happi- ness. There's certainly a lot of humour throughout Žale - for example, there are as many chapels as there are churches in Ljubljana, with an addition- al one. The last chapel is called "Adam and Eve", intended for those who don't believe in God, just like Adam and Eve. The chapels represent each a different architectural style: there's a tumulus, a Greek temple, some elements from the Orthodox church, a bit of Ottoman architecture, Islamic architecture, etc. And they're named after the churches in Ljubljana, which I find humorous - you can find the name of your local church and disco- ver that it's in fact represented by a tumulus or an Islamic church. AR: I guess it's upon us today to unearth the rebel in Plečnik that lies behind all the layers of agreement that seem to have settled like dust on his work. If he were alive today, I'd love to ask his opinion on the transformation of the Museum's courtyard, the pro- ject by Ofis. I was shocked to learn that the project of the ramp, which was meant to create another entry sequence on the first level, couldn't be con- structed and had to be stopped at the wall because the conservation department wouldn't allow it to be touched. Why do we not allow contemporary architecture to be a real continuation of the past, why do we make this schizophrenic split between the glorified body of the city and the little pieces that we can add? Especially if I remind myself of the really powerful incorporation of existing built sub- stances in some of Plečnik's projects. That's gener- ous, and it's this kind of generosity towards history is something I find absolutely radical in Plečnik's work. I think his work is too often - quite unlike here today, when we can really see the cook, the one that transforms substances into something else - pre- sented as if he as a sort of a book polisher. BV: Today we saw how the smaller church gets eaten up by the bigger one by Plečnik; in reference to what Igor said before, what were the contextual conditions that enable that kind of transformation, that kind of innovation, that kind of radicality? I'm not saying that it wouldn't be possible today but to do a translation is much more difficult if you want to achieve a similar effect, a similar condition, or a similar relation to the past. To give an example: in the competition for the Tobačna, our office pro- posed a new building to be built on the top of the existing one, which is not an awfully valuable build- ing. Yet our proposal was received not as adding value to the existing building but almost like a crime, a blasphemy. To conclude, I'd like to ask each one of you how you see Plečnik in Europe at that time, who of his con- temporaries would you compare him to, as a figure and as an architect - in Europe, in different social, cultural, and geographical conditions at the time of his production. How do you actually see his work in relation to contemporary topics? simpozij Delo J. S. Bacha je bilo nekaj desetletij po njego- vi smrti pozabljeno za skoraj stoletje. Ko je leta 1750 umrl, se romantiki na noben način niso že- leli ukvarjati z njegovo glasbo, saj jim ni bila všeč. Šele sredi 19. stoletja so ga znova odkrili in imeli za zanimivega, saj so vrednost njegove glasbe občudovali drugi skladatelji, ki so si zastavljali drugačna vprašanja. Pri Plečniku se znajdemo pred podobno nalogo - ponovno ga je treba pre- gledati in najti tiste njegove revolucionarne la- stnosti, ki so veljavne in potencialno uporabne za nas danes. IK: Če se ne spuščam globlje v analogije z glasbo – to, kar je bilo pri Plečniku matematičnega in ne mehaničnega, je organizacija snovi skozi geo- metrijo, saj je bil Plečnik mojster teh strategij in taktike. Danes se za to živo zanima mnogo sodo- bnih arhitektov - ne teoretikov, ampak praktikov. Treba je natančneje raziskati, katere načine je pri tem uporabljal. Vrnitev h geometriji bi bila dobra lekcija o taktikah, ki jih je predlagal in se jih držal Plečnik, še posebno, kar se tiče staranja njegove- ga dela. Naj odgovorim na Boštjanovo vprašanje. Stri- njam se z gospodom Bettumom, da je težavno, če ne celo bogokletno iskati osebo Plečnikove dobe. Morda bi bila bo bolj politična debata kot pa razprava znotraj arhitekture. Če bi danes po- skušali biti specifični glede kake posamezne te- me Plečnikovega dela, če bi se vanjo poglobili in povezali z njeno snovjo, potem bi v njej gotovo odkrili velike kvalitete. ÁM: Mislim, da bi lahko to vprašanje preobliko- vali in se ne spraševali, kdo je bil Plečnik v resni- ci, za kaj mu je šlo in s kom naj ga primerjamo, ampak o naših konstrukcijah Plečnika, o naših primerjavah Plečnika z arhitekti podobnega sta- tusa in pomena. Seveda bi lahko našli arhitekte, ki imajo podobne lastnosti, vendar pa mislim, je bolje poiskati oziroma konstruirati Plečnika kot arhitekturno pozicijo, ki nam lahko nekaj sporo- či. Šel bom še dlje in izjavil, da je Plečnik med dvema pozicijama, ki se pojavljata danes. Prva tr- di, da če razumeš pogoje in parametre in jih vsta- viš v stroj, potem dobiš rezultat, ki ima določeno samostojnost, ne nosi individualnega podpisa (saj ga ne potrebuje kot znak) in je gotovo ustre- zen predlog, ker je ustvarjen z razumevanjem vseh zahtev. Na drugi strani pa imamo drugačen predlog, na primer Gheryja, arhitekta in umetni- ka, ki na papir nariše bežno skico, ki se jo potem izvede z zapletenimi akrobacijami statikov in po- dobnim. Srednja pot pa je pot eksperimentira- nja, predlogov, ki še niso dokazani, in preizkuša- nja reči, ki še niso bile preizkušene. Tak je deloma tudi moj koncept Plečnika. Torej Plečnik kot ne- kdo, ki preizkuša zmožnosti forme in prevzema tveganje z uporabo novih form. BV: Kako pa bi lahko vse to predstavili kot nek materialni proizvod? Katera je naslednja stvar, ki jo lahko v zvezi s Plečnikom naredimo v dana- šnjem času? So to potovanja v Ljubljano, Prago JB: I think one of the reasons we got together today to discuss Plečnik is because he was unique. By ask- ing what architect of his time he related to, we'd be reverting back to something I think we should avoid - Plečnik as a kind of Art Nouveau architect, Plečnik as the Slovenian answer to Gaudi. We all touched upon topics how of relating him to contemporary problems in architecture, which includes some of my thoughts through the three points, yet Plečnik in regional and national terms also interests me a great deal. Without making a direct comparison, if you look at the Swedish archi- tect Asplund, one could go through works of many architects and recognise a very distinct quality. Without my actually even daring to name that qua- lity, it's something that makes an architect's work very distinct. AR: It's a question about the kind of work that is needed. This debate poses the question of the pre- conditions that are needed in order to Plečnik con- temporary again so as to not see him only as a his- torical figure. There is so much capacity in his work that if we manage to extract the techniques and strip him of the now-conventionalised visual rheto- ric, we'll be able productively invest Plečnik's genius in a contemporary way. I like to use music as an example because in music, there's always a composition and an interpretation. Take the work of J.S. Bach - a couple of decades after his death, his work was forgotten for almost a hundred years. When he died in 1750, the Romantics couldn't relate to his music in anyway, they hated it. Only in mid-19th century, it was found worthy and interesting again because other composers with different agendas could appreci- ate the music for its values. Similarly, we've got a job to do, i.e. to review Plečnik and find those revo- lutionary aspects that are valid and potentially instrumental for us today. IK: Without going further into musical analogies, what is not mechanical but mathematical in Plečnik's work is organising matter through geome- try. Plečnik was a master of these strategies and tac- tics and it needs to be properly investigated what policies he established. There are many contempo- rary practitioners - not theoreticians - that have a vivid interest in that. A return to geometry would be a valuable lesson in the tactics proposed and taken from Plečnik, especially in regard to the ageing of the work and its quality. To answer your question, Boštjan, I agree with Mr Bettum that it's tricky if not blasphemous to find a person in his age - maybe in a political debate rather than in disciplinary discourse. Nowadays, if we can be specific about one topic in Plečnik's work, dive into it, connect it with the matter, we might redis- cover some great qualities. ÁM: I think one could rephrase your question in this sense and not ask who Plečnik really was, what he was about, and whom to compare him to but about our constructs of Plečnik or personal compar- isons of other architects of his status and relevance. simpozij in na Dunaj, da bi si ogledali njegova dela ter jih prebrali, zaznali in izkusili, je to branje knjig o Plečniku ali kaj čisto drugega? JB: Treba bi bilo zasnovati program za poletno Plečnikovo srečanje. Trajalo bi štiri do šest te- dnov v Ljubljani, pritegnili bi skupino znanih strokovnjakov, ki bi razpravljali o Plečniku, in mnoge, ki bi se udeležili delavnic in na njih po- skušali eksperimentirati. BV: Osebno bi rad videl Plečnikovo delo pred- stavljeno na drugačen način, na način, ki bi bil uporaben kot navdih za sodobno prakso. Morda je slišati malo preveč lahkoverno, toda razmišljal sem v smeri priročnika z navodili. Če bi se kdo lo- til projekta in ne poskušal interpretirati ali pisati o lastnih izkušnjah, ampak analizirati prostorske in materiale značilnosti in jih predstaviti v obliki diagrama, zapisa ali celo scenarija, potem bi lah- ko Plečnikovo delo uporabili kot vir. Obstajajo priročniki z navodili o Miesu ali Le Corbusierju in katerikoli študent ali arhitekt jih lahko ima za re- ferenco svoje konceptualne metodologije, iska- nja tega, kar je sodobno zdaj in kar bo sodobno tudi še čez dvajset ali petdeset let, tako da si za primer vzame delo nekega arhitekta. ÁM: Rad bi poudaril, da so vedno potrebne nove raziskave. Ogromno raziskav so že opravili gos- pod Prelovšek in mnogi drugi, kar pa nikakor ne pomeni, da so nam ostale le še interpretacije in iskanje novih zanimivosti. Nove zanimivosti so tukaj, vendar bi morale sprožiti nove raziskave iz drugačnih perspektiv. To je vsekakor velika nalo- ga za prihodnost in mladi arhitekti, mladi zgodo- vinarji bi morali še naprej preučevati Plečnika. AH: Ko smo leta nazaj začeli pisati o Plečniku, smo začeli s preprostim vprašanjem, kaj je Ple- čnik sploh ustvaril. Ko smo preučevali njegovo delo in ga do neke mere analizirali, je lani de- cembra izšla velika siva knjiga Jože Plečnik: Du- naj, Praga, Ljubljana. Knjiga je namenjena širše- mu občinstvu, ne arhitektom. Zlasti profesor Koželj in njegovi sodelavci smo poskušali razlo- žiti arhitekturo z laičnimi termini. To strategijo smo izbrali, da bi razbili mit, da nihče noče bra- ti o arhitekturi in da si je nihče zares ne ogleda. Naš cilj je bil navadnemu Slovencu pomagati razumeti, zakaj je Plečnikova arhitektura dobra. Naslednji, upam, da uspešen, korak je ta okrogla miza in tematska številka revije AB, katere glavna ideja je pritegniti mlajšo generacijo k Plečniku. Mislim, da bo mlada generacija nekoč presodila, ali se od Plečnika lahko česa naučimo, ali je pri njem še kaj uporabnega. Dolgoročno pa bi radi povečali zanimanje javnosti ne le za Plečnika, ampak tudi za sodobno arhitekturo. Ljudi je zelo dobro učiti skozi Plečnika, z njegovim delom jim lahko odpreš vrata, vendar pa je treba ceniti tudi sodobno arhitekturo, saj bo brez podpore javno- sti izginila. AR: Plečnika bi bilo zanimivo prikazati s čisto su- him diagramom, ker je sam tako bogat v tekstu- rah. Zanimivo bi bilo preučiti njegove zgradbe v Of course, one could argue that there similarity with certain architects but I think it's really about finding out and constructing Plečnik as a position in architecture that has something to say. I'd go even further and say that's in between two posi- tions that are present today: one is that if you understand the conditions, the parameters and you feed them into a machine, you end up with a result that has a certain viability and doesn't have an individual signature, it doesn't need it as a sign on its own but as a fitting proposal because it was constructed with an understanding for all the requirements. On the other hand, there's the other proposal - let's say Gehry - an the architect and artist who draws a light sketch on the paper, which is then realised with a great deal of static acrobacy, etc. The middle path is one of experimentation, of making proposals that are not yet proven and try- ing out things that were not tried out before. That would be a part of my concept of Plečnik, Plečnik as somebody who tests the capacity of forms and risks a great deal to try new forms. BV: How would you present that in a material prod- uct? What's the next thing that we can produce on Plečnik in this day and age? Is it taking trips to Ljubljana, Prague, Vienna to see the work, to read it, perceive it, experience it, is it reading books about it, or is there something else? JB: You should formulate a programme for an annu- al summer Plečnik meeting. It would last four to six weeks and take place in Ljubljana, you'd attract a number of good scholars that would discuss Plečnik, invite a lot of people to take part in work- shops to just experiment. BV: Personally, I'd love to see Plečnik's work pre- sented in a different way, in such a way that it could be taken as a source of contemporary practice. It might sound frivolous, but I'm thinking in the form of an instruction manual. If one gets into a project and begins not to interpret or write a text about one's experience, but analyse the spatial or material qualities and present it as a diagram, a script, or even a storyboard, this can then be used as a source. There are instruction manuals on Mies and Le Corbusier, in different books, and any student or practitioner can find them as a reference for con- ceptual methodology: how to extract that which is contemporary, and which will be contemporary in twenty or fifty years' time by taking a specific work from a specific architect as an example. ÁM: I'd like to stress that new research is always required. A tremendous amount of research has already been done by Mr Prelovšek and many oth- ers, but this doesn't mean that the rest is just inter- pretation and new interests. The new interests are there, but these should generate new research from new perspectives. It's certainly a serious task for the future; and young people, young historians should continue to look at Plečnik. AH: When we started writing about Plečnik many years ago, we started with the simple question of what did Plečnik actually do. As we studied his work simpozij skladu z različnimi parametri, na primer glede or- ganizacije programa - pomislimo na programske diagrame, ki pokažejo, kako je program porazde- ljen, kako je organiziran sistem kroženja, kakšna je volumetrična logika arhitekture itd. Vsi ti razli- čni vidiki nam preprečujejo, da bi zagrabili celo- to, pokažejo nam le dele, ki jih lahko beremo na različne načine. Johannova ideja o Plečnikovi akademiji je zelo zanimiva, vendar pa se mi sploh ne zdi nujno, da bi potekala v Ljubljani ali pa bilo treba vsaj pova- biti tudi strokovnjake od drugod. Spomnimo se knjige Bruna Tauta o palači Katsura v Kyotu in te- ga, kako je našel gen za moderno oblikovanje prostora v tej tradicionalni, zgodovinski zgradbi. Morda mu je ravno kulturna razlika (Nemec na Japonskem, ki se je znašel v čisto drugačnem kontekstu znanja) pomagala poiskati ta novi pri- stop. Zato bi bilo zanimivo, če bi preučeval Ple- čnika na primer brazilski arhitekt, čisto brez kul- turnega ozadja. Morda pa iščemo to, kar je François Truffaut iskal v knjigi How did you do it, Mr. Hitchcock. Želim si, da bito bilo možno tudi s Plečnikom, vendar ga na žalost ni več med nami. Miha Dešman: Mislim, da smo prišli do točke, ko je treba zaključiti današnjo okroglo mizo. Rad bi se vsem zahvalil za udeležbo: občinstvu, vsem udeležencem in Boštjanu Vugi, ki je okroglo mi- zo vodil. Seveda pa se moram zahvaliti tudi na- šim sponzorjem: podjetju Givo, Mestnemu mu- zeju Ljubljana, Mestni občini Ljubljana in podžu- panu prof. Janezu Koželju za njihovo prijazno podporo. Hvala. and analysed it to a certain degree, the big grey book "Jože Plečnik: Dunaj, Praga, Ljubljana" was published last December. It's a book that's meant for the general public, not architects. We tried, espe- cially prof. Koželj with his contributions, to explain architecture in laymen's terms. This was a strategy against contributing to the myth, that no-one reads about architecture and no-one goes to look at the architecture. Our goal was to help a normal Slovene understand why this is good architecture. The next step is hopefully happening at the moment with this round table and AB magazine, and the main idea is to get the younger genera- tion more involved with Plečnik. I believe the younger generation will eventually tell whether there is something to be learned from Plečnik, or something useful about him. In the long run, how- ever, we'd like to widen the public interest to include not only Plečnik but also contemporary architecture. It's all very well to teach people through Plečnik, you can open the door with his work, but in the end, our contemporary architec- ture should also be appreciated, because without public support, it will disappear. AR: It would be interesting to apply dry represen- tation to Plečnik since he's so rich in texture. It would be very interesting to study those buildings according to various parameters, such as the organisational programme - think of programmat- ic diagrams that show you how the programme is distributed, how the circulation system is organ- ised, the volumetric logic in the architecture, etc. These are all aspects that prevent us from grasp- ing the entire thing, only parts of it, so as to look at it in different ways. Johann's idea of the Plečnik academy or field work- shop was very interesting and I don't think it would necessarily have to take place in Ljubljana, or you should at least invite scholars from other places. You know Bruno Taut's book on the Katsura palace in Kyoto and how he found the gene code of mod- ern space organisation in this traditional, historic building. Perhaps the cultural difference, a German going to Japan and engulfing himself in a totally dif- ferent context of knowledge, was helpful in con- structing a new way. It would be therefore interest- ing to have a Brazilian architect study Plečnik with- out the cultural background, and then to take another look at him. Perhaps the moment we're looking for is like the one in François Truffaut's inter- view book, "How did you do it, Mr Hitchcock?" I wish that was possible but unfortunately, Plečnik is no longer around. Miha Dešman: I suppose we have come to the point when it is time co conclude our round table. I would like to thank you all for coming here today. Our thanks go to the audience, all the panellists, to Boštjan Vuga for hosting the round table and of course the sponsors, the company Givo, City Museum of Ljubljana, the City of Ljubljana, and to prof. Janez Koželj, the vice –mayor, for their kind support. Thank you.