REFLECTION AND MAKING IN THE 'COLLECTIVE SHOP'

One of the greatest illusions of the architectural profession is the idea of the lone architectural genius. Lewis Hyde brilliantly states that ‘genius’ needs to “tinker in a collective shop”. In architectural education the ‘tinkering’ is the interlacing of ‘reflection’ and ‘making’ and the ‘collective shop’ is the studio environment.
The value of both ‘reflection’ and ‘the collective’ needs to be intentionally reaffirmed in multiple ways throughout the architectural curriculum in order to counteract the perception of creativity as either a spontaneous event or an individual pursuit. The design portfolio is traditionally the evidence of a good architectural education and the graduates’ competency. Thus ‘reflection’ in the design process is only valued so much as it results in an outstanding visual product.
In an architectural education ‘the collective’ tends to mean the hypothetical client or clients versus one’s immediate community of peers. Whether the client is an individual, a cultural group, or the human race, the entity generally does not easily contribute to the creative process.
In the sciences, one is taught early on that scientific research must yield results that are relevant to prior data, assumptions and discoveries. Authorship, while sometimes contested, is a clear goal. The authorship is accepted and celebrated within an accepted larger context. In the arts, one is taught early on that talent is innate; one is either creative or not.
I suggest that we don’t question the value of creating; we struggle with the act of sharing. There is great value in the fingerprint. The challenge is the cultural ability to perceive one’s fingerprints alongside a complexity of other multiple fingerprints, and to feel comfortable with not always being able to distinguish which fingerprints are whose. I believe that the authorship lies in the ability to articulate a stance or a position within a larger framework and to recognize that it is simply one stance among many, not the definitive answer.
With concepts of both individual and collective creativity in mind I coordinated a year long freshman design curriculum entitled Imagination and Technique, which incrementally introduced 2D analysis, 3D representation, and a full-scale construction to first year architecture students. This paper will outline the course work and demonstrate and assess outcomes of student work in the context of reflection and the collective as well as NAAB required curricular outcomes.