Experiencing Architecture - Chapter IV: Architecture Experienced as Color Planes

• We do not perceive everything as either mass or void. Distant objects appear two-dimensional and flat.
• Venice was built right out into the shallow waters with brightly painted palaces completely pierced by windows and columned loggias. Instead of emphasizing weight and solidity, Venice allured with gaiety and movement.
• Venice had and idealized image of the Orient and they cherished the wealth of colorful merchandises from three continents.
• The people of Venice adorn there windows with costly rugs to create an atmosphere of splendor, which can still be seen today during festivals.
• The mosaic floors in S. Marks are costly carpets fashioned of colored stones.
• The Doges' Palace has massive walls above and completely pierced below; however, there is no feeling of top heaviness. The effect was achieved by facing the walls with white and rend marble in a large checkered pattern, while the columns are so thin that appear like edgings and no longer like supporting elements.
• By the late Renaissance, new architectural ideals were brought into the city. Buildings no longer depended on color planes for effects but on relief, on massiveness and dramatic shadows.
• Many buildings in Venice were made to appear lighter than they really were by using color; however, by the late Renaissance, buildings which appeared light was no considered real architecture because it was thought that buildings should be solid and look solid. So in order for an edifice to appear grander weight and ornament were added.
• It was not until this century that architects concentrated their efforts on the creation of a weightless architecture.