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Technische Universität Wien
Institut für Architekturwissenschaften
Fachbereich Architekturtheorie und Technikphilosophie
Wahlseminar - Architekturtheorie
Order[s] in Architecture - 2018S
Univ.-Prof. Dr. phil. Vera Bühlmann
Univ.Ass. Dott.mag. Riccardo Matteo Villa
Laughing Architecture
Humour as a source of critique in architecture
Sebastian Lengauer
01205046
e1205046@mail.student.tuwien.ac.at
+4368184305568Chapters
WTF - What’s the function? 4
Funny Buildings 6
Taking it serious 9
!2So what does irony as a cultural norm
mean to say? That it's impossible to mean what
you say? That maybe it's too bad it's impossible,
but wake up and smell the coffee already? Most
likely, I think, today's irony ends up saying: ‚How
totally banal of you to ask what I really mean.’ 1
- David Foster Wallace
In dieser Erkenntnis hätten wir längst
aufgeben müssen, die Wahrheit schreiben zu wol-
len, und also hätten wir das Schreiben überhaupt
aufgeben müssen. Da die Wahrheit mitzuteilen
und also zu zeigen, nicht möglich ist, haben wir
uns damit zufriedengestellt, die Wahrheit schrei-
ben und beschreiben zu wollen, wie die Wahrheit
zu sagen, auch wenn wir wissen, daß die Wahr-
heit niemals gesagt werden kann.2
- Thomas Bernhard
1David Foster Wallace. A supposedly fun thing I’ll never do again. Essays and Arguments.
London: Abacus, 1998, pp. 67 - 68
2Thomas Bernhard. Die Autobiographie. Der Keller. Eine Entziehung. St. Pölten - Salzburg:
Residenz Verlag, 2011, p. 153
!3WTF - What’s the function?
This text is not supposed to be funny or amusing. It is meant to be a se-
rious and earnest treatise about humour and architecture and the relationship bet-
ween the complex theoretical spheres, that these two worlds can span, when we
think about them. But of course, though the text is not supposed to be funny, you
as a reader may find it very much so and I as the writer only have little control
over this circumstance. Looking at this simple fact, we can already catch a glim-
pse at the role of humour in the field of architecture and also make our first and
very important point, that humour is a subjective sense. We see light, we feel
touch, smell scents, how does humour manifest itself in our consciousness? It can
unfold in individual, cultural and specialised forms and differences. It is also in-
fluenced by a time or situational compound and the personal set of mind. In the
introduction to his text “Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewußten” Sieg-
mund Freud gives a good overview of philosophers and writers - “die glänzenden
Namen des Dichters Jean Paul (Fr. Richter) und der Philosophen Th. Vischer,
Kuno Fischer und Th. Lipps;” 3 - who investigated the topic of comedy and hu-
mour. But to avoid an overly general description and in order to find out what ma-
kes humour distinctive, we shall look at it from a functional point of view, the
view of Henri Bergson.
So gesehen, wäre das Lachen eine soziale Geste. Durch die Furcht die es einflößt, korri-
giert es das Ausgefallene; es sorgt dafür, daß gewisse Handlungsweisen, die sich zu isolie-
ren und einzuschläfern drohen, stets bewußt und aufeinander abgestimmt bleiben, kurz, es
lockert jede mechanische Steifheit, die an der Oberfläche des sozialen Körpers übrig ge-
blieben sein könnte. 4
Bergson sees a correcting function in laughter. Equipped with a sense of
humour we detect things in our surrounding, that are odd or not fitting to the soci-
al norm, or our understanding of what is right and then laugh about it, in order to
correct it. So in this case humour can be seen as a form of critique and we will
find it in fields, where critique plays a special role. Science, as one example, is
trying to create a construct of provable knowledge, in the one or the other way.
Bruno Latour describes the scientific conflict between Robert Boyle, who wanted
3 Sigmund Freud. Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewußten. Fischer Verlag, 1992
4 Henri Bergson. Das Lachen. Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag, 2011, p. 24
!4to prove the possibility of creating a vacuum, by building a vacuum pump and
Thomas Hobbes who was convinced of an ether wave, in the 17th century.
Womit aber antwortet Boyle? Er entschließt sich, sein Experiment noch weiter zu verfei-
nern, um zu zeigen, welchen Effekt der von Hobbes postulierte Ätherwind auf einen
Detektor - eine simple Hühnerfeder! - hat, in der Hoffnung, damit die Theorie seines Ver-
leumders zu entkräften. Für Hobbes ist das lächerlich.5 6
If we think about the correcting function proclaimed by Bergson again, it
is logical and understandable, that we see a very cautious handling with humour
and laughter in areas and fields, that try to create a certain consensus, or are of
high importance to our social needs. We can furthermore assume, that we will find
laughable scientific results or ridiculous political decisions only during an opini-
on-forming process, or when a theoretical construct is fighting with an inherent
insecureness, but rarely as final conclusion.7 According to Bergson, humour can
only be found in human traits, in the sense that nature or the objective reality itself
is not funny and only if it is manipulated and gets in touch with humans, humour
can develop. Convictions, opinions or estimations that are of a more subjective or
human nature can therefor be criticised easier, or as Latour writes: “Die Kritik
wird sich über euch Totlachen!” 8
In the way different norms or opinions were established, conspicuous par-
allels and intersections become visible in the fields of science, politics and archi-
tectural theory, throughout history. Taking this into account on the one hand and
Bergson’s correcting theory on the other, we can now see, that humour has always
been an essential voice, that helped creating a certain way of thinking, for the
5 Bruno Latour. Wir sind nie modern gewesen. Versuch einer symmetrischen Anthropologie. Frank-
furt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2017, p. 33
6Latour’s main anthropological field of investigation in this chapter can be summarised, as the
process, of how different mind sets in western, pre-modern science clashed together and the im-
pact and influence this conflict had on future generations of science, but also how science is then
correlating with the rest of society, politics and our whole world view. Humour is not considered
directly by Latour, because it is not relevant for his point.
7 Of course humour is involved in science and especially in politics, but it is then, in most cases,
intentional, easily recognisable and demarcated from the „actual“, „serious“ consensus. If this line
becomes blurred, the consequences can hardly be anticipated. It could be suggested, that politici-
ans being satirical are trying to show themselves as society’s correcting function and therefor legit
in their position of power, while at the same time the possibility of using humour as an excuse for
making false, forged or insincere statements and decisions, makes humour a very efficient seman-
tic tool.
8 Id., p. 54
!5function of humour, as Bergson explained, is deeply embedded in the fundament
of our social structures and professions.
[…] daß es auch eine Berufslogik gibt. Darunter sind Denkweisen zu verstehen, die man
sich in einem bestimmten Milieu aneignet und die für das Milieu richtig, für die übrige
Welt aber falsch sind. Der Gegensatz zwischen der besonderen und der allgemeinen Logik
bringt ganz spezielle komische Effekte hervor, und es dürfte von Nutzen sein, etwas länger
dabei zu verweilen. 9
The way architects think is just as specialised, as in any other group of oc-
cupation and in the case of architecture, the results of this specialised thinking can
become evident and visible for the whole public and manifest themselves as buil-
dings and constructions in our reality and consciousness. By not understanding
the specialised thoughts and ideas that lay behind these manifestations they will
become hard to comprehend and possibly perceived as odd. But when we look at
a finished building and understand it, as a social conclusion, as the final, serious
and honest product of human thought and work, it becomes nearly impossible to
see something funny about it, with the rare exception, that the building was pur-
posely built to be funny, or if we as observer find human thought and work itself
funny, which would make us cynics10. But are there ironic churches, or ridiculous
residential buildings, do laughable bridges exist? It seems, the relationship bet-
ween architecture and humour is as vague and volatile as humour itself and it will
again be useful, to think about the social role architecture is playing in our world
and by empathising a functional view, maybe a clearer perspective can be achie-
ved.
Funny Buildings
If we constitute architecture as a part of our social body and then interpret
our built environment as another social gesture or as the embodiment of our social
needs, how should architects react to these requirements? The possible approaches
are in fact countless. Looking at individual projects, it comes down to individual
decisions, that will determine how the finished intervention will formulate itself.
9 Henri Bergson. Das Lachen. Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag, 2011, p. 125
10 Cynicism in the sense of seeing reality in an ironic way, as something not to be taken fully se -
rious from any perspective, wether it is a realistic, constructivistic or structuralistic one, would
suggest that, even though (in contrast to a nihilistic view) there may be purpose, everything is fla-
wed to begin with and therefor laughable.
!6Individual decisions are again influenced by forces outside of the individual, by
what is au vogue, what seems logic, what does not seem ridiculous or laughable at
the time. Only as time passes and as our perspective and awareness mutates into a
new (collective) consciousness, can we see something that used to be absolutely
logic and right, as ridiculous. In relation to this Bergson writes about fashion and
how fashion relates to the person wearing it. 11
Ja, man könnte fast sagen, jede Mode habe irgendwo etwas Lächerliches an sich. Das gilt
auch für die jeweils herrschende Mode, nur haben wir uns so sehr an sie gewöhnt, daß
wir ein Kleidungsstück und seinen Träger als eins empfinden. 12
Architecture is something planned and/or built by humans, in a certain
context, which is created by a specific background (e.g. economic, political),
which is ever changing and challenging. The fashion one wears and the buildings
one builds can be hilarious for those who do not see or understand the specific
context, or in other words, only from a specific view.
Stellen sie sich dagegen ein Original vor, das sich heute nach der Mode von gestern klei-
det. Unsere Aufmerksamkeit wird sogleich auf das Kostüm gelenkt; wir sehen es vollstän-
dig losgelöst von der Person; […] und das Lächerliche an der Mode wird sogleich offen-
kundig.13
Similar to fashion, buildings that are of our time, can blend in with their
surrounding, because we do not see them as special or remarkable. But in contrast
to fashion, buildings are durable and preserved and are sometimes used for centu-
ries and therefore also stay in our consciousness. Our cities are conglomerations
of different buildings from different epochs with specific styles and ideas. Every
building bears information on its formation history, as an allegory we could say
that every museum is in some way an exhibit itself. As time passes we either get
used to them, or the buildings get out of touch with their context and they start to
seem arbitrary.14
11The similarities between fashion (or clothes in general) and architecture have been theorised
often in architectural theory and in this text, some parts of this train of thought will be considered
as self evident in modern architecture. In the context of humour inherent in all trends and styles,
special consideration should be taken, when thinking about the social or individual needs that clo-
thes and buildings have to meet.
12 Henri Bergson. Das Lachen. Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag, 2011, p. 35
13 Idib.
This is a narrow and simplified view, since the possibility of a holistic and unexpurgated argu-
14
mentation is questionable per se and would exceed the frame of this paper.
!7New revolutionary and radical thoughts and ideas will often stand in con-
trast to this complexity of meaning and are often characterised by an optimistic, in
many cases utopian naivety, which can only be sustained, because parts of the
context are not taken into account. This view or position is one of the main cri-
tique points postmodernism came up with, as a reaction to the absolutistic and hy-
per-rational ideas of orthodox modernist architecture and urbanism.
I like elements which are hybrid rather than 'pure,' compromising rather than 'clean,' dis-
torted rather than 'straightforward,' ambiguous rather than 'articulated,' perverse as well
as impersonal, boring as well as 'interesting,' conventional rather than 'designed,' ac-
commodating rather than excluding, redundant rather than simple, vestigial as well as
innovating, inconsistent and equivocal rather than direct and clear. I am for messy vitality
over obvious unity. I include the non sequitur and proclaim the duality.15
Instead of eliminating humour by pure rationalisation, postmodernism in-
vites it into its midst. In the thinking of post-modernism, an infinite space opened,
which could be filled with irony, references and citations, which lead to a renais-
sance of ornamented buildings, forms and styles, that were washed up from past
centuries and reinstalled into new context. For postmodernists architecture can be
all those things Venturi praised and therein lies a risk. If humour is allowed to be
relevant and included in the discourse, not only as a form of critique, but becomes
part of the conclusion, if an idea does not take anything, not even itself serious,
the question arises, what should be taken serious? And as an ironic twist, postmo-
dernism itself breaks out of the versatile context, praised by its devotees. Most of
all when it comes to the scales of urbanism, the difficulties of a philosophy that is
driven by complexity and contradiction become obvious, for adding components
and ingredients to a radical notion does not necessarily lead to less radical results.
Some sort of optimism is palpable in Venturi’s writing, but it is lived out in a
mostly comparing way, in a criticising way, seeking affirmation in the void of iro-
ny and self-proclaimed superiority, over the past.
Orthodox Modern architects have tended to recognize complexity insufficiently or incon-
sistently. In their attempt to break with tradition and start all over again, they idealized
the primitive and elementary at the expense of the diverse and the sophisticated.16
It is convenient to analyse, compare and criticise from a temporal distance,
because to some extend theories and ideas behave similar to styles and fashion
15Robert Venturi. Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture. New York: The Museum of Mo -
dern Art, 1977, p. 16
16 Id. p. 17
!8and we can again see Bergson’s theory gleam through. 17 Of course, wether we
think about theories, buildings or fashion, the closer they are to our own set of
mind and arguments, the less ridiculous they will seem to us. As proclaimed befo-
re, humour is dependent on individual perception and in how far this perception is
congruent with the decisive cultural norms and rules of a population. These norms
and rules are part of society’s ethical fundament, which are created collectively by
all participating, subjective individuals and by the objective reality surrounding
them. We can, just for the sake of argument, imagine to be in the position of pla-
ning this ethical structure, just as an architect would plan a building. Now the
question arises, to what extent this moral system would coincide with the society
we actually live in and where the lines between humour and seriousness are
drawn.18
Taking it serious
Das Leben verdankt all seinen Ernst unserer Freiheit. Unsere Gefühle, unsere Leiden-
schaften, die Taten die wir bedacht, beschlossen, ausgeführt haben, kurz, was immer aus
uns stammt und uns zu tiefst eigen ist, das ist es, was den manchmal dramatischen und
jedenfalls meist ernsten Lauf unseres Lebens bestimmt.19
We are at a point in time, where countless epochs, wars, ideas and ideolo-
gies, styles, meanings, philosophies, “game-changing” events and whole cultures
lie behind us and have formed our society and worldview. Keeping in mind that
we are part of a phylogenesis not only in a biological, but also in a psychological
and theoretical sense, we should consider that logically every new generation has
more theoretical substance to reflect about. 20 In architecture, tendencies and mo -
vements like historicism, constructivism, modernism, structuralism, postmoder-
17Similar to the way Venturi analyses and criticises orthodox modernism, this text attempts to ana-
lyse and criticise postmodernism and also Venturi from a temporal distance, to make a point about
humour and the relevance of time and historical context. It should also be noticed that humour is
not used directly as a form of critique in this text, though it could probably be included easily.
18 As a precedent for social norms and ethic assumptions, that are not god-given and/or monarchi -
cal rulings, but the result of a subjective/collective design “The Universal Declaration of Human
Rights”, acknowledged in 1948, will serve as an example. The word “freedom” is used seven times
in the preamble alone. In this context it is interesting, to consider the relation of “Freiheit” and
“Ernst” in the following citation of Henri Bergson in the main text.
19 Henri Bergson. Das Lachen. Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag, 2011, p. 62
20 In this contemplation the timeline of human history is seen as a highly affected and affecting
flux of consciousness.
!9nism, decunstructivism, minimalism and so on, determine the way we think about
architecture today. They can be described as the unconscious ocean breakers, that
form our ideas and buildings. By forgetting or leaving aside the historical context,
questioning these epochs and not taking them serious, we will not become free of
them and risk plunging into a creative vicious circle. Bergson concludes that we
need to be free, in order to be earnest, but can we free ourselves from our past?
Criticising the past can be tantalising and is probably meaningful and instructive
in order to reflect and resume in new ways, but our past is highly intertwined in
our present thinking and perception, so much so, that the picture of an ouroboros
comes to mind.
New technologies, ideas and problems determine the way we think, the
way we interact and the way our future will unfold and though we may not fully
understand their influence yet, we have to decide, which ones we are ought to take
serious.
[… ] Jean-François Lyotard den einige wohlmeinende Wissenschaftler baten, über die
Verbindung zwischen Wissenschaft und menschlicher Gemeinschaft nachzudenken: “Ich
behaupte das die wissenschaftliche Expansion nichts Menschliches hat. Vielleicht ist unser
Gehirn nur der provisorische Träger eines Prozesses der Komplexitätssteigerung. Es wür-
de sich also nur noch darum handeln, diesen Prozess von seinem bisherigen Träger abzu-
lösen. […] Informatik, Genmanipulation, Physik, Astrophysik, Robotik - diese Disziplinen
arbeiten schon an der Aufrechterhaltung dieser Komplexität unter Lebensbedingungen,
die vom Leben auf der Erde unabhängig sind. […] Daß dieser >a-humane< Prozeß neben
seinen destruktive Auswirkungen auch einige positive Nebeneffekte für die Menschheit
haben kann, daran zweifle ich keine Sekunde. Aber das hat nichts mit der Emanzipation
des Menschen zu tun. 21
We have presumed that architecture is a projection of social needs and
demands and thereby factored out the material or objective aspect of architecture,
not necessarily in the sense of physical limitations, but referring to the purport
transferring tendencies of natural sciences. In a multidimensional, interdependent
spectrum, architecture can be seen as a magnetic field attracted by different poles:
objectiveness and subjectiveness, natural and social sciences, originality and time
dependence, perfection and deficiency, seriousness and sarcasm. To realise the
tendencies and directions our thinking and working takes, we need indicators that
shed a light on this process. Humour can be one of these indicators, a mediator
showing us that there is something in what we create, that is part of this spectrum.
21Bruno Latour. Wir sind nie modern gewesen. Versuch einer symmetrischen Anthropologie.
Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2017, pp. 82 - 83
!10If we attempt to erase humour22 from the equation, changing the whole process to
a system independent of human subjectiveness, emotions, feelings etc., we will
need new indicators, new forms of interventions. Until it is coalesced into this
new abstract amalgam, humour will still play a crucial role.
As humour is part of the engine that forges our social norms, it is in-
extricable involved in a network of abstract processes that create individual and
inter-individual realities. Focusing on the functional aspects of humour once
again, we can now see how humour can help us to understand architecture in a
different, a more holistic way. Humour seems to indicate something that is hard to
describe, but seems so very obvious, when it is felt. It challenges our personal,
individual construction of reality. If we want to understand this phenomena, we
will have to see ourselves, our doing and our thinking in a multidimensional con-
text and as part of a social collective. The conclusion, that humour is connected to
such serious topics as morality, responsibility and integrity, may almost seem iro-
nic. As for architecture and the building industry, it means that we can laugh about
and criticise new projects, as long as they are “hand-made” and the result of a
creative process, which will confront our expectations. It should be considered, if
our reactions indicate underlaying and underestimated social value. If on the other
hand opinions, reactions, feelings, impressions and popular meanings are calcula-
ted, taken into account and computed automatically and independent from human
thought, the highest approval and approbation, the highest efficiency and overall
propriety should be the result and hopefully future generations will get a great
laugh out of it.
22 Humour as one of the unconscious, highly subjective remnants, that make us critique things, that
still influences us in our doing and how we perceive reality, even in the most objective scientific
disciplines.
!11Bibliography
BERGSON, Henri. Das Lachen. Ein Essay über die Bedeutung des Komischen. Hamburg:
Felix Meiner Verlag, 2011
BERNHARD, Thomas. Die Autobiographie. Der Keller. Eine Entziehung. St. Pölten -
Salzburg: Residenz Verlag, 2011
FREUD, Sigmund. Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewußten. Fischer Verlag, 1992
LATOUR, Bruno. Wir sind nie modern gewesen. Versuch einer symmetrischen Anthropolo-
gie. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2017
VENTURI, Robert. Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture. New York: The Muse-
um of Modern Art, 1977
WALLACE, David Foster. A supposedly fun thing I’ll never do again. Essays and Argu-
ments. London: Abacus, 1998
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