Architecture’s Aesthetic Categories

The view that I have been presenting suggests that a productive shift needs to occur that would move architecture away from the historic anti-aesthetic discourses of functional, modernist, or neo-Marxist critique to those of aesthetics. If we accept that architecture would benefit from a more direct engagement with aesthetics, and therefore visual appearances, the next step would be to assess the aesthetic positions available for architecture, whether in education, theory, or practice.1 While not claiming to be a definitive list, my intent in outlining the following positions is to help form a more clearly defined set of possible positions between architecture and aesthetics, as follows: Anti-Aesthetic (AA), Suppressed Aesthetic (SU), Communicatory Aesthetic (CA), Formalist Aesthetic (FA), and Speculative Aesthetic (SA). Here are my working definitions for each category, all of which receive in-depth descriptions in the following chapters:

• Anti-Aesthetic (AA) Architecture is not considered with aesthetic intent, as aesthetic qualities are irrelevant to and even harmful to architecture and society.
• Suppressed Aesthetics (SU) Architecture is secretly considered with aesthetic intent, although resulting aesthetic qualities are described as the result of nonaesthetic considerations.
• Communicatory Aesthetics (CA) Architecture is considered with aesthetic intent such that the aesthetic qualities are intended to express a specific meaning that is authored by the architect, whether it be symbolic, metaphorical, narrative, nostalgic, a proof of talent, or meant to convey relevance by being for or against a current architectural “style.”
• Formalist Aesthetics (FA) Architecture is considered with aesthetic intent such that the aesthetic qualities are intended to produce feelings of pleasure in the viewer.
• Speculative Aesthetics (SA) Architecture is considered with aesthetic intent such that the aesthetic qualities convey a gestalt sense of the set of ideals that the designer has for the future of the built environment. This requires an acceptance that architects can never know in advance the social and cultural impact of their work, but that does not mean that their work cannot aim toward just social and cultural goals.