‘Captions Not Included’. Notes on the Architects and ‘Their’ Images

Abstract

Architects not only produce images of their projects but also take pictures of the reality around them, eventually appropriating of pictures made by others. In particular, this process of mediated assimilation of reality is quite hard to define as it follows many different criteria that tend to turn the pictures themselves into analogical devices oriented to the design development. Often, a fundamental step of the process is to make them wordless images by removing (intentionally or not) the caption. This action opens the pictures to a wide range of interpretations and uses (as well as misinterpretations and abuses) that are part of the omnivorous creative process of the architects. In order to frame the phenomenology of this process in the extended field of the 20th century art production, this article proposes a chaotic assemblage of major and minor episodes whose considerations indirectly reflects both the mostly unconscious process of the architects and the ‘under-construction’ mental scheme of the author. In this sense, this early, partial, subjective map provides no answers but questions and conjectural work-areas to be tested through further connections and developments.

Keywords

• architects’ imagery
• concept design
• visual culture