The Tectonics of Byzantine Architecture

Abstract

This study is part of an ampler research which seeks to answer the question of how to build Orthodox Christian churches today by investigating the architectural tradition of the past, and more specifically the material means through which identity and symbolism are infused into Byzantine church architecture. One of the facets of this research is to use tectonics - the poetics of construction as defined by Kenneth Frampton - to investigate the material aspects of Byzantine architecture. Frampton makes an important distinction between the ontological (core form for B0tticher, technical for Semper) and representational (artistic form for Botticher, symbolic for Semper) elements of construction. Representational elements may be non-architectural symbols (the altar, iconostasis, or iconographic murals/mosaics in Byzantine architecture) or symbols of hidden structural elements (the undulating roofing revealing the shape of vaults, the blind facade arches representing the structural arches, the decorative facade masonry as a visually appealing facing of the structural masonry behind it). Another important aspect is the play between the tectonic and atectonic architectural expression. Richard Ousterhout makes a case for the former when he demonstrates the structural clarity of Byzantine architecture; he also shows examples of the "manneristic subversion" of structural clarity in late Byzantine churches, but argues they are the exception to the rule. Other aspects of Frampton's theoretical framing of tectonics relevant to the study of Byzantine architecture are the multisensorial experience of architecture, the spiritual and cosmologic symbolism of the act of building, and the phenomenological approach to technology.