Christopher Alexander

Mục lục

SOME NOTES ON CHRISTOPHER ALEXANDER

By Nikos A. Salingaros

[I have tried here to put together a summary of Christopher Alexander’s wide-ranging contributions, utilizing what is already posted on the Web. In-text links are usually to external pages by other authors, which can be looked up on a second reading. Additional pages, listed at the end, explore some topics in greater detail.]

— This page exists in a Finnish translation by Fijavan Brenk.

— Swedish translation by Weronika Pawlak.

— Spanish translation by Chema Bescos.

 

BIOGRAPHY

Christopher Alexander was born in Vienna, Austria, and raised
in Oxford and Chichester, England. He graduated from Cambridge
University, where he studied Mathematics and Architecture. He then
obtained a Ph. D. in Architecture at Harvard University. For his
Ph. D. Thesis, later published as the book Notes on the
Synthesis of Form, he was awarded the first Gold Medal for Research by the American Institute of Architects. Since 1963 he has been Professor of Architecture at the University of California at Berkeley, and Director of the Center for Environmental Structure. In 1980, Professor Alexander was elected member of the Swedish Royal Academy; and in 1996 he was elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Christopher Alexander is a Trustee of the Prince of Wales’s Institute of Architecture. He is now retired and is based in Arundel, Sussex, UK.

 

PUBLICATIONS

Dr. Alexander is the author of numerous books and papers. He
has initiated a new approach to architectural thinking, in which
the same set of laws determines the structure of a city; a
building; or a single room. He has spent most of his life in
searching for these laws. His approach to solving this universal
problem takes advantage of scientific reasoning, and totally
opposes other, unscientific approaches based on fashion, ideology,
or arbitrary personal preferences. This is so different from the
way architecture has been taught since the second world war that
it causes conflicts with established architectural schools.

Alexander offers definitive solutions to the problems of urban
architecture and design. It is a great pity that these were not
adopted when first published. Fortunately, a small number of his
ideas have been incorporated into the “New Urbanism”.
Nevertheless, this very recent movement by no means represents a
wholesale application of his results. Alexander has actually
abstracted the process by which organic and inorganic forms evolve
— which is the same process that governs the growth of a city.
These results lie at the basis of how matter organizes itself
coherently, and are the opposite of the modern planning approach
in which grids, zones, roads, and buildings, based on some
preconceived design on paper, are imposed on human activity. These
results will be expounded at length in the four-volume The
Nature of Order [see Alexander’s Nature of
Order webpage].

A comprehensive bibliography up to 1982 is listed in the
biography by Stephen Grabow: Christopher Alexander: The Search
for a New Paradigm in Architecture, Oriel Press, Stocksfield,
England, 1983. Some of Alexander’s key publications are:

1. Christopher Alexander, Notes on the Synthesis of
   Form (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press,
   1964).
2. Christopher Alexander, A
   city is not tree, Architectural Forum 122 April
   (1965): No. 1, pages 58-61 and No. 2, pages 58-62. Reprinted
   in: Design After Modernism, Edited by John Thackara,
   Thames and Hudson, London, 1988; and in: Human Identity in
   the Urban Environment, Edited by G. Bell and J. Tyrwhitt,
   Penguin, 1992.
3. C. Alexander, S. Ishikawa, M. Silverstein, M. Jacobson, I.
   Fiksdahl-King and S. Angel, A Pattern Language (New
   York: Oxford University Press, 1977). [Review
   by Nikos Salingaros;
   Review by Stewart Brand].
4. C. Alexander, H. Neis, A. Anninou and I. King, A New
   Theory of Urban Design (New York: Oxford University Press,
   1987).
5. Christopher Alexander, The Nature of Order [Alexander’s Nature
   of Order webpage].

Alexander’s own webpage Living Neighborhoods provides a list of downloadable papers and essays, which can be found nowhere else. These include essays, interviews, lectures, and reviews.

A Pattern Language was originally expected to enable
every citizen to design and construct their own home. While that
ambitious objective was not entirely realized, it did result in a
liberation from empty architectural dogma. Armed with this book, a
client can evolve and express his or her own desires for a
building. An architect is no longer the absolute and sole source
of design ideas and solutions. On a larger scale, mistakes in
urban design and planning can be detected and corrected. I believe
that this remarkable shift in power, which enables ordinary people
to understand their environment — often better than the
professionals — is responsible for the harsh suppression of this
monumental work by certain short-sighted members of the
architectural profession.

For a general discussion of Pattern Languages, see “The
Structure of Pattern Languages”, by Nikos Salingaros. Another
recent paper is “Lingua
Franca for Design: Sacred Places and Pattern Languages”, by
Tom Erickson.

A flavor of Alexander’s writings may be obtained from his
presentation entitled
Domestic Architecture at the 1994 DOORS 2
Conference in Amsterdam. The Project for Public Spaces has a nice overview of his work. A list of patterns with extracts from the Pattern
Language is posted HERE. The Pattern Language is now available
on-line for a subscription fee from Alexander’s company patternlanguage.com.
The notes of a review talk given by Jim
Coplien on the Nature of Order, with commentary by Brad Appleton, are highly recommended.

 

BUILDINGS

Remarkably, even though Alexander is recognized as one of the
most important architects of the twentieth century, and has built
many projects in several countries, his buildings are not well
documented. (See the web page in German maintained at the
University
of Weimar, for some graphics). Alexander’s website patternlanguage.com
promises to eventually put up a comprehensive set of pictures.

For an exposition of his major projects, see Katarxis 3, which includes first-time publication of many of his latest work. Alexander’s four-volume The Nature of Order is profusely illustrated with his own work, buildings and paintings.

A 30-minute film on the work of Christopher Alexander was made by an independent filmmaker and highlights Alexander’s approach to building, entitled Places
for the Soul: The Architecture of Christopher Alexander. One can rent or purchase this video. Readers can also find some photographs of his older buildings in the following works:

1. Christopher Alexander, The Linz Cafe (New York:
   Oxford University Press, 1981)
2. Christopher Alexander, “Sketches of a New Architecture”, in
   Denys Lasdun, Ed., Architecture in an Age of Skepticism
   (New York: Oxford University Press, 1984) pp. 8-27.
3. Christopher Alexander, “Battle: The history of a Crucial
   Clash between World-System A and World-System B”, The Japan
   Architect 8508 (1985) No. 8, pages 15-35.
4. Thomas Fisher and Pilar Viladas, “Harmony and Wholeness”,
   Progressive Architecture 6:86 June (1986), pages
   92-103.
5. Christopher Alexander, Thomas Fisher and Ziva Freiman, “The
   Real Meaning of Architecture”, Progressive Architecture
   7.91 July (1991), pages 100-112.
6. Ingrid Fiksdahl-King, “Christopher Alexander and
   Contemporary Architecture”, a+u Architecture and
   Urbanism: Special Issue, August (1993)
7. Kenneth Baker and Mark Darley, “New American Craftsman
   House”, American Homestyle & Gardening, April/May 1996,
   pages 43-47.
8. Alan Powers, “West Dean: a Radical Building in a Rural
   Guise”, Perspectives on Architecture No. 24
   August/September (1996), pages 44-47.

Alexander has developed a practical method of construction,
which combines the responsibilities of architect and contractor.
Although this differs markedly from current practice, it does, in
his estimation, enable the whole form to evolve in a way that is
not possible under the current system. For sample contracts, and a
description of how this method works in an actual project, see
The Mary Rose Museum, by C. Alexander, G. Black, and M.
Tsutsui (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996).

Alexander’s thoughts on interior
design, and especially for the office environment and
furniture, are discussed on a separate webpage.

 

INFLUENCE ON COMPUTER SCIENCE

Christopher Alexander is perhaps having a greater impact on
computer science than on architecture. Alexander’s Pattern
Language is being applied to Object Oriented Programming, and is
inspiring innovative techniques that go beyond it. Theoretical
structures that he defined are now recognized as general
frameworks in which to link objects in programs together in a
co-operative and sequential manner. Already for several years now,
the topic of Pattern Languages is established in software,
and possesses a rapidly growing bibliography. There is a yearly
conference called Pattern Languages of Programming (PLoP).
Christopher Alexander was invited to give the keynote address at
the 1996 Object Oriented Programming Conference OOPSLA.
(PHOTO). An assessment of this talk by several attendees was that “this marks the beginning of a new era in computer science” — see the interesting essay by Linda
Rising.

The
Patterns Home Page is a useful repository of information about
the application of Pattern Languages to Computer Science. Here,
one can find a comprehensive bibliography on the subject, which is
constantly being updated. Another compendium posted by Manfred
Schneider and Georg Odenthal contains an updated list of links on
Object-Oriented
Patterns. Three books that apply Alexander’s ideas to
programming are:

1. James Coplien and Douglas Schmidt (Editors), Pattern
   Languages of Program Design (Reading, Massachusetts:
   Addison-Wesley, 1995).
2. Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, and John
   Vlissides, Design Patterns (Reading, Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley, 1995).
3. Richard Gabriel, Patterns of Software (New York:
   Oxford University Press, 1996). With a foreword by Christopher
   Alexander.

We include links to the first web sites that presented more
extensive information on the impact of Christopher Alexander’s
ideas on computer science; by now there are many others.

• Brad
  Appleton gives a lengthy essay on the development and
  definition of Pattern Languages.
• Doug Lea
  provides a detailed overview of the Pattern Language approach
  to Object-Oriented programming. He has also posted a general
  patterns
  discussion from the programmer’s viewpoint.
• Un sommario de los Patrones en Español, por
  Pablo
  Figueroa.

The paper by Nikos Salingaros The
Structure of Pattern Languages is more architectural.
Another recent paper is Lingua
Franca for Design: Sacred Places and Pattern Languages, by
Tom Erickson.

One of the persons influential in the “Patterns Movement”,
James Coplien, has posted a History
of Patterns, and is applying patterns to human
organizations (see next section). A search for the deep
geometrical structures in software that correlate with “beauty”
and “order” in Alexander’s The Nature of Order, is being
documented in a series of articles
published in the C++ Report.

Pattern languages have been developed for many diverse specific
disciplines that relate to computer science, such as individual
applications and computer-human interfaces. Tom Erickson has
collected links to Pattern
Languages for Interaction Design. These include user-interface
pattern languages. The pattern language developed by Jenifer
Tidwell is especially comprehensive, and addresses the
problems inherent in the design of any complex or interactive
artifact. Although, as in all links in this section, this is
written by a computer scientist, it in fact answers questions
about general design first raised in the 1960’s (by people such as
B. Archer, C. Jones, H. Rittel, and H. Simon) that were judged to
be too complex to solve.

 

INFLUENCE ON INFORMATION STRUCTURES
AND ORGANIZATIONS

Some computer scientists have taken Alexander’s ideas beyond
their initial application to the internal organization of computer
programs, into the software development process itself.
Alexander’s results are entirely general, and also apply to the
internal structure of organizations and corporations. This is a
very exciting development in business. Such an innovative (and
entirely logical) application of Alexander’s results points to a
new approach for organizations in the commercial and government
sectors. An Alexandrine analysis and application of organizational
patterns could redesign corporations. This work may be followed on
several web sites:

James Coplien’s
A Generative Development-Process Pattern Language provides a blueprint for the design of software organizations (Chapter 13 of Pattern Languages of
Program Design, Edited by J. O. Coplien and D. C. Schmidt, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts, 1995). Coplien continues to write very interesting articles detailing the application of patterns to software, and their extension to other fields beyond. Many of those patterns, originally derived from software organizations, do in fact scale up to larger, more general organizations. M
G Taylor Corporation is investigating how patterns can help
to reorganize corporations. They are offering commercially a
general pattern language for efficient organizations
(unfortunately, the details are proprietary).

What is not widely known is how some of the most exciting new
developments in organizational ideas today — such as the
best-selling “quantum management”, systems thinking, and the
“self-organizing corporation” — are already implicitly included
in Alexander’s work. Moreover, they are evolved far beyond their
original application. Although not written with business
applications in mind, the Pattern Language and The
Nature of Order may well become essential reading for managers
in the new millennium.

 

INFLUENCE ON ORIENTAL CARPET STUDIES

The rules for putting matter together to form a building are
universal, and apply to all man-made objects. In particular, they
apply to two-dimensional designs such as paintings and textile
patterns. The simplification of having only two dimensions and a
single material (knots of wool) makes carpets an interesting
application of the rules for organized complexity. Alexander
establishes the connection between architectural design and
Oriental Carpets in his fascinating book: A Foreshadowing of
21st Century Art: The Color and Geometry of Very Early Turkish
Carpets (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993). The point
is that he has obtained insight into architectural design from
very early carpets (15th century and earlier).

Alexander’s carpet book is of immediate interest to architects,
even those who are not particularly interested in oriental
carpets. The reason is that the first section summarizes results
that form the core of the The Nature of Order, whose
publication has been delayed. Here, the “Fifteen Fundamental
Properties” and the “Field of Centers” are outlined (if only very
briefly). Carpets as examples of human creations that have some
measure of “life” are discussed in the following articles:

1. Christopher Alexander, “A New Way of Looking”, HALI: The
   International Magazine of Antique Carpet and Textile Art
   56 (1991): pages 115-125.
2. Nikos A. Salingaros, “In Defense
   of Alexander”, HALI: The International Magazine of Antique
   Carpet and Textile Art 78 (1994): pages 67-69.
3. Nikos A. Salingaros, “The Life
   of a Carpet: An Application of the Alexander Rules”, paper
   presented at the 8th International Conference on Oriental
   Carpets. Oriental Carpet and Textile Studies V,
   1999.

This work is generating a considerable amount of controversy in
the oriental carpet community. Some people are disturbed that a
mathematical theory can successfully measure the degree of “life”
in a carpet. But that is precisely what happens, and the results
agree to a remarkable extent with our deepest intuitions. Also,
the very use of the word “life” is misunderstood — it represents
design steps that are taken to achieve a coherent design. The same
steps are followed whenever organic forms develop. Life in a
man-made object is achieved by following the same rules (though in
a vastly more intricate setting) that nature follows in creating
biological life. The direction is the same, and that is the beauty
of the theoretical result.

Christopher Alexander has put together a collection of very
early Turkish carpets in which he finds a large degree of life.
All the carpets are illustrated in his book, which serves as a
catalog of the collection; and some of them appear in his article.
His carpet collection was exhibited at the de Young Memorial
Museum in San Francisco during the 6th International Conference
on Oriental Carpets, 1990. Many persons who attended this show
described it as a very moving experience. Even those in the
Oriental Carpet community who disagree with Alexander’s analytic
approach to carpet designs praise him for being among the first to
see the extraordinary power of Seljuk and other very early
carpets, and for having the courage to collect them.

 

PHILOSOPHICAL CONTRIBUTIONS

Alexander’s architectural writings at the same time develop a
philosophy of nature and life. He proposes a more profound
connection between nature and the human mind than is presently
allowed either in science, or in architecture. Alexander sees the
universe as a coherent whole, encompassing feelings as well as
inanimate matter. This strongly Taoist viewpoint was first
developed in his book The Timeless Way of Building (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1979). To some readers, this is a
book on architecture written in a philosophical style; to many
others, it is a book on philosophy with architectural examples. A
large number of people have embraced the philosophy of the
Timeless Way of Building, finding in it universal truths on how man interacts with the world.

In both the Timeless Way and the Pattern
Language, there are sections of text in which the language
itself assumes a peculiarly imprecise, poetic quality. It is
exactly at those instances, when Alexander the mathematician
appears to be abandoning his customary precision, that Alexander
the philosopher is communicating on an entirely different and more
fundamentally emotional level. The unconventional syntax he
employs is merely a means of conveying deeper philosophical
meanings. (It helps to read those passages aloud). Some people
readily find a spiritual content in his works. From such people,
who may be otherwise indifferent to either architecture, or
computer science, Alexander has won a deep and lasting
respect.

Many of the patterns in the Pattern Language provide guiding points for Alexander’s philosophy. There is an emphasis throughout on the potential of the individual; the importance of a spiritual connection to the built world; the need for cooperation among people; the empowerment of individuals or small groups of people to shape their environment. All of this is elaborated further in The Nature of Order, and has
far-reaching social and political implications which may be
alarming to some and inspiring to others.

Alexander insists that his philosophy is inseparable from his
architectural theories. This point worries architects used to
doing things in a certain way, as it does potential clients who
think conservatively. Some of Alexander’s staunchest supporters
argue that, in order to facilitate their adoption, his
architectural method ought to be decoupled from the accompanying
philosophy. After all, in an imperfect world, every architectural
project represents a series of compromises. Alexander warns
against a superficial application of his method that misses the
fundamental point. He has stressed repeatedly in his writings that
achieving coherence between built forms and people has to be
accompanied by changes in our basic outlook.

The fourth volume of The Nature of Order approaches religious questions from a scientific, rather than mystical direction. Alexander has discovered deep ties between the nature of matter, human perception of the universe, and the geometries we construct in our buildings, cities, and artifacts. As this work is becoming better known, it may well revolutionize our society, by providing a crucial link between traditional beliefs and our most recent scientific advances. Only time will tell, but this aspect of his work may surpass his architectural contributions.

 

THE NATURE OF ORDER

The Nature of Order has been in preparation for over thirty years, and encapsulates all of Christopher Alexander’s theories. During its course of writing, The Nature of Order expanded into its present format of four large volumes. In my estimation, this is one of the Twentieth Century’s most important documents. My own modest contribution has been to help Professor Alexander edit the manuscript during the last fifteen years prior to its publication. In this monumental book, Alexander develops a comprehensive theory of how matter comes together to form coherent structures. Paralleling, but not copying, recent results from complexity theory, he argues that the same laws apply to all structures in the universe; from atoms, to crystals, to living forms, to galaxies. Human beings apparently have a built-in (though subconscious) understanding of these laws. Man’s creations have the option of following the same laws, or violating them. Those that follow them result in our greatest achievements, either as artifacts, as buildings, or as cities.

This book promises to be of interest to computer programmers, and in the words of some enthusiasts, could define “a new paradigm for programming”. This is remarkable, since the book is written primarily in the interest of architects (of buildings, not software). It turns out, however, that the same organizing principles apply to computer programs as to buildings. This connection was made recently by several visionary programmers, and is being pursued in the PATTERNS movement. A good overview is the book by Richard Gabriel, Patterns of Software (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996; with a foreword by Christopher Alexander). There are notes of a review talk given by Jim Coplien on the Nature of Order, with commentary by Brad Appleton, which are highly recommended. Jim Coplien is writing a series of articles outlining the possible applications of the Nature of Order to software.

Far-reaching results on urban planning were given some years ago in Alexander’s famous article “A City is Not a Tree” (see the article by Roger Evans in the Urban Design Quarterly), and in the Pattern Language and A New Theory of Urban Design. His solutions were abstracted from and checked against urban sites that work, which is sufficient reason to apply them to urban sites that don’t. He goes much further in The Nature of Order, showing that the rules governing the growth of neighborhoods and cities arise from fundamental laws of nature. Alexander has discovered the process that governs the growth of a successful city — which is the same process by which organic and inorganic forms evolve. Surprisingly, the law concerns the process; not the form or plan. This whole approach might seem unfamiliar to urban planners who think in terms of static images, though biologists will immediately recognize it. These universal laws apply not only to “traditional” cities — they apply to all cities, in every age and in every culture, that enhance human activity.

The first two volumes should be appreciated as a new approach to understanding structure, both natural and man-made. They span aesthetics, science, and architecture, and are relevant to any complex process. Volume 3 is of immediate interest to architects and urban planners, as it contains a large number of examples of the building process from the largest to the smallest scale. I am most deeply moved, however, by volume 4 of the Nature of Order, which is a deeply spiritual work. The last of the four volumes transcends architecture, and plunges into what it is that connects us with our universe. It reveals how superficial our century has been in addressing the fundamental qualities and needs of human beings. This volume promises to have a profound impact on our society; even our civilization. For that reason, it might ultimately be the most revolutionary aspect of the entire work.

 

REVIEWS OF THE NATURE OF ORDER

The Nature of Order offers a golden thread that connects the innermost center of who we are as humans with the physical environment that we have the potential to create. It is an intimate journey which reunites our internal experience with the external world so as to create wholeness in the reader. It is written in painfully precise language in which the future of society has the potential to be written.
Peter Block, author and Organizational Consultant, Connecticut.

A couple of years ago I read the unpublished manuscript of the Nature of Order and found it to be remarkable — one of the most important books I’ve read.
Ken Foster, architect, Austin Texas.

The Nature of Order is not only a summa summarum of what Oxford University Press has called “The World of Christopher Alexander”, but it is surely one of the most ambitious books ever published. If its profound argument — that order in both nature and in what we build are essentially the same — is ultimately understood and accepted by serious readers it may prove to be one of the most consequential works Oxford has published in all its 500 years.
William McClung, special project editor for Oxford University Press, former senior editor of the University of California Press.

My personal opinion is that this book will be recognized as one of the twentieth century’s most important documents. Although I am admittedly biased, the same opinion is expressed by those who have had a chance to read copies of earlier drafts.
Nikos Salingaros, Professor of Mathematics, San Antonio Texas.

The Alexander books are the most exciting thing I have read in a long time, and I think Alexander has made a SIGNIFICANT contribution to modern philosophy in general. … my unbounded thanks to Alexander for this great seminal work …
Christopher Skelly, President of Insight Resource Inc., New York.

 

THE NATURE OF ORDER
by Christopher Alexander

Book One: The Phenomenon of Life

• The art of building and the nature of the universe
• On order
• The phenomenon of life
• Degrees of life
• Wholeness and the theory of centers
• How life comes from wholeness
• Fifteen fundamental properties
• The fifteen properties in nature
• The personal nature of order
• The mirror of the self
• Beyond Descartes: A new form of scientific observation
• The impact of living structure on human life
• The awakening of space
• Mathematical aspects of wholeness and living structure

Book Two: The Process of Creating Life

• The principle of unfolding wholeness
• Structure-preserving transformations
• Structure-preserving transformations in traditional society
• Structure-preserving transformations in modern society
• Living process in the modern era: 20th century cases where living process did occur
• Generated structure
• A fundamental differentiating process
• Step-by-step adaptation
• Each step is always helping to enhance the whole
• Always making centers
• The sequence of unfolding
• Every part unique
• Patterns: generic rules for making centers
• Deep feeling
• Emergence of formal geometry
• Form language and style
• Simplicity
• Encouraging freedom
• Massive process difficulties
• The spread of living processes throughout society: making the shift to the new paradigm
• The role of the architect in the third millennium
• A small example of a living process

Book Three: A Vision of a Living World

• Living processes repeated ten million times
• Belonging and not-belonging
• Our belonging to the world
• The hulls of public space
• Large public buildings
• The positive nature of space and volume in three dimensions on the land
• Positive space in engineering structure and geometry
• The character of gardens
• People forming a collective vision for their neighborhood
• Reconstruction of an urban neighborhood
• High-density housing
• Necessary further dynamics of any neighborhood which comes to life
• The uniqueness of people’s individual worlds
• The character of rooms
• Construction elements as living centers
• All building as making
• Continuous invention of new materials and techniques
• Production of giant projects
• Ornament as part of all unfolding
• Color which unfolds from the configuration
• The morphology of living architecture
• The world created and transformed

Book Four: The Luminous Ground

• Towards a new conception of the nature of matter
• Our present picture of the universe
• Clues from the history of art
• The existence of an “I”
• The ten-thousand beings
• The practical matter of forging a living center
• Recapitulation of the argument
• The blazing one
• Color and inner light
• The goal of tears
• Making wholeness heals the maker
• Pleasing yourself
• The face of God
• A modified picture of the universe
• Empirical certainty and enduring doubt

 

An excerpt from Book 4 of the Nature of Order.

“The structure of life I have described in buildings — the structure which I believe to be objective — is deeply and inextricably connected with the human person, and with the innermost nature of human feeling. In this fourth volume I shall approach this topic of the inner feeling in a building, where there is a kind of personal thickness — a source, or ground, something almost occult — in which we find that the ultimate questions of architecture and art concern some connection of incalculable depth, between the made work (building, painting, ornament, street) and the inner “I” which each of us experiences.

What I call “the I” is that interior element in a work of art, which makes one feel related to it. It may occur in a leaf, or in a picture, in a house, in a wave, even in a grain of sand, or in an ornament. It is not ego. It is not me. It is not individual at all, having to do with me, or you. It is humble, and enormous: that thing in common which each one of us has in us. It is the spirit which animates each living center.

I believe that the ultimate effort of all serious art, is to be making things which connect with this I of the person. This “I,” not normally available, is dredged up, forced to the light, forced into the light of day, by the work of art.

My hypothesis is this. That all value depends on a structure in which each center, the life of each center, approaches this simple,forgotten, remembered, unremembered “I.” That in the living work, each living center really is a connection to this “I.”

. . .

I believe that this is true; not just a nice way of talking. As I try to explain it, quietly for all its grandeur, and try to make the artist’s experience real, I hope that you, with me, will also catch a glimpse of a modified picture of the universe.

For I believe it is the nature of matter itself, which is soaked through with I. The essence of my argument in Book 4 is that the I, the thing I call the I, which lies at the core of our experience, is a real thing, existing in all matter, beyond ourselves, and that we must understand it this way in order to make sense of living structure, of buildings, of art, and of our place in the world.

That very difficult intellectual path, is the path which lies before me.

I shall try to persuade the reader that this is literally true”.

— Christopher Alexander

 

— are discussed in detail on a separate page.

 

This site is
maintained by Nikos A. Salingaros. It was
honored as the Hot Pick of the Alamo PC Organization in
February 1997.

 Salingaros’s papers on architecture,
complexity and urbanism.