New Ontologies of Architecture and Architectures of New Ontologies

Abstract

The aim of this article is to highlight the relationships between contemporary tendencies in the humanities (the new ontologies) and contemporary architectural practices. The author articulates the distinction between the optics of the «old ontologies» and the the new ontologies. The ontologies considered to be new ones are flat, free from classical opposition between the whole and the parts and based on modality of possibility, but not obligation. Objects and practices traditionally referred to as architecture appear to be based on the principles of the «old ontologies». For them human being is an extraordinary object compared to others, the part-to-whole relationships appear to reflect either the superiority of the whole (society) or the superiority of the part (individual), finally, they are aimed at creating an "it has to be this way" picture. The new ontologies seem to be impossible to apply to architecture in its traditional meaning. Nevertheless, a two-fold link between the new ontologies and architecture can be posed. On the one hand, the former offer a new language to describe the variety of traditional architecture and accept that all of directions, styles and buildings are ontologically coordinate. On the other hand, the new ontologies enable some new architectural practices (computer architecture, architecture of virtual space and speculative architecture) which do not substitute for traditional architecture, but accompany it.