Antoni Gaudi
Antoni
Plàcid Guillem Gaudí i Cornet was a Spanish architect born in Reus. Antoni
Gaudi (25/06/1852 – 10/06/1926) has a background in sculpture and painting and studied at
the Provincial School of Architecture in Barcelona. He is well known for his nautical themed and natural form inspired architecture.
Casa Batllo 1904-6
Barcelona
Antoni Gaudi
The Casa Batllo consists of a contoured – wave like tiled
roof and a mosaic turret. The Ocean was a heavy influence of Gaudi’s work and
it is evident in Casa Batllo, the roof of the turret is a plain, cream coloured
shell like form that’s simplistic shape and colour scheme contrasts with the
bright and busy surrounding ceramic roof tiles and mosaic. Gaudi has left the
‘shell’ plain because it balances the composition –if every part of the roof
was bright and busy it would not be aesthetically pleasing to look at and also
it would take the attention away from the buildings focal point which is the
tiled roof. I think this is also the reason why the mosaic on the turret uses
small tiles, because when looking up at the turret from the ground the colours
blend together which adds subtle colour to the element without decreasing the
visual impact of the tiled roof. I think
the ‘shell’ has a calming influence on its busy surroundings, this could
represent the calmness Gaudi – or the viewer feels when they look out across a
still ocean. The ceramic tiles on the roof (which can be seen on the front
facing view) look like fish scales, they have a smooth shiny surface and in the
colours of a dream-like mythical sea creature of blues, purples, and greens,
this could be Gaudi’s way of conveying his wonder of sea life and how beautiful
the natural word is. The roof is also contoured which looks like body of a sea
animal, continuing the oceanic theme. The ridge along the roof runs in a wavy
line like the sea waves or sea weed and there are ceramic shell like forms that
run along it. The blue shells and orange ridge are complimentary colours and
create contrast and emphasises the line of separation between the roof and
space. I like Gaudi’s ocean inspired work and I could incorporate this into my
‘Natural Forms’ designs, I could experiment with creating ceramic forms
influenced by the shapes and textures of sea animals, shells and sea plants. I
also like his use of curved lines and not many straight lines, it gives the
architecture a free flowing feel, which is something I could try to replicate
the feeling of ‘flowing movement’ into my designs. I could also use
complimentary colour pairings to emphasize certain areas of my designs.
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