brian,
>
> i didn't know this, and it doesn't seem to be the professional
> interpretation of 'architecture', even legally, here, as it seems
> to focus on the word 'architect' rather, and issues of liability
> related to the design of a building and its consequences, if
> something should fail- that the architect to be responsible.
> in this sense, 'architect' is a legal term that cannot be used
> by someone just making ideas (architectural works, say) and
> architectural works, also, would seem in another very broad
> realm of 'building'
yes, this would be the narrow reading, on the other hand, you can read the
IPR as saying
"architecture" -> having to do with buidling
"architecture" -> must be recorded on tangible media
by "tangible media", one would mean some kind of a representation-bearer
(buildings, drawings, disks, computer programmes), and "building" is
ambiguous, it is not said that the building is a structure, comprising of
walls (individual standard features are in fact excluded) the same applies
to spaces (they can be topologies, for example). i thought it was
well-languaged, in that it doesn't really deny the possibilites you mention
in the same way as the indian law (which explicitely reduces architecture to
buildings with an 'artistic' content -- not all buildings are architecture,
in other words). so i am not sure if your law reduces it to the architect,
rather, it goes to tangible media -- which means, architecture is
transmissible by default. and going further, it can be copied, and deriative
works created, much the same as software etc., under GPL.
i thought it was a rather generous definition, not up to par with the
cutting edge, of course, but that one can't really expect, no?
> have no real legitimacy within the current way
> of considering the field-- well beyond buildings, and back
> to basic questions of the field. in a sense, it is a locked-in
> perspective, a view that has become predominant and at
> once bureaucratized (professionalized/managed)-- this is
> likely in a different way from what you are writing about,
> yet one need only look at the WTC & memorial to see the
> state of 'professional' architecture establishment and its
> architectural 'products' in the .US today. they are less of
> 'works' as ideas than 'works' as marketed commodities by
> design specialists/stylists. which leaves little 'architecture'
> in its richness, in the culture, to be foundational for tapping
> into issues related to it (such as, say, global warming and
> building design, but not trapped in the language of style,
> or ideology of period movements or schools of thought).
yes, but one just has to look at Libeskind (not only for the reasons you
take). i thought this essay actually well embodies the scope of architecture
as envisaged in the IPR document, and it can be extended:
"We contrast two distinct threads in the architecture of Daniel Libeskind --
the geometry employed in his Holocaust Memorials, and the geometry of those
buildings whose purpose is life and regeneration. We find no difference
whatsoever between the two types, thus concluding that Libeskind's buildings
cannot serve to bring architecture to life."
http://www.architexturez.net/sub.gate/subject-listing/000122.shtml
as you can see, the inquiry is not really centred on building (well, it has
one foot in building), and at the same time, overcomes the broad realm of
building. it does talk about DNA and Cloning buildings -- :-) -- as if they
were a-life forms.