The complexity of the Maison à Bordeaux might be given by its ambiguous relation to temporality: the ephemeral and the permanent. If the ephemeral vanished, disappear, re-appear, change, it is constantly moving or at least, is movable. However, the movement of an object is not an action on its own, it is related to a set of spatial references that allow the mind to describe this movement. Such references are identifiable objects, permanent entities that become landmarks and then create a tri-dimensional coordinate system in which the temporary object move. If we stick to those objects, we can analyse the speed, the effect, the time, the materiality of the ephemeral. The interplay between those two temporalities becomes a dynamic spatial scenography.
If an object moves inside a non-referential system, it becomes impossible to say whether it is really moving or not: a white dot on a black background is fixed as soon as another visible element shows-up in motion. And there is the trick, how can we say what is moving from what? Is the initial point or the new object in motion the reference? It is a subjective question in a way, that really depends on the physical situation of the observer. If the house was initially designed for accommodating the wheelchair of J-F Lemoine, other users, family related, have their own spatial experience. The referential system is different for everyone depending on their mobility. Considering the house as its own coordinate, forgetting about terrestrial gravity, Lemoine could say that is not the platform that moves through the different floors but the house that moves to him. We can say so because of the physical status of the platform: it is not an elevator, but literaly a piece of floor, which goes beyond the elevating device replacing the vertical circulation of the stairs. Looking at the bedrooms plan configuration, each member of the family has its own space, with different access, adapted to their morphology and capacity: the man, the woman, the children. There is an ambivalence, an intersection of realities, or parallel dimensions. Going back to temporality, if the movement is subjective to the situation of the observer, the same goes for time. If the platform creates ephemeral spatial situation inside the permanent building, it could also be the opposite depending on where you stand: the building creates an ephemeral situation around the permanent platform. The former becomes temporary where the latter is fixed in time and vice-versa.
Yet, where the platform, as a solid object, has its own tectonic quality, its own structure, its own system, sliding elements add another temporal dimension. To a certain extent, we can suppose that the platform could be build without the house or the other way round, whereas, the sliding windows, doors or curtains – that we may describe as sliders – are dependent of the rails they are fixed in, themselves integrated into the thickness of the structure. The movement of the former is predetermined by the latter. The coordinate system is pre-established, no matter the situation of the observer, without impacting the spatial dynamism produced. If the morphology of the platform or other solid elements is given and constant, the shape or the position of sliders remains free inside the physical limits of their container. Instead of drawing lines, Koolhaas establish parameters, set of possibilities, set of temporalities. It allows a variety of encounters; situations where temporary configuration happens inside a substantial shell. If vertical coordinates are multiples and subjective, horizontal system is homogeneous and objective, in the way every observer agree on the possible movement. The combination of the two leads to a complex imbrication of time and spatial systems.
That is where the structure, as the “combinator”, is fundamental. Composed of three independent objects, the transversal beam, the concrete stairwell, and the lateral stabiliser, none of them interrupt the visual complexity of the house. Instead, it is adding complexity when we realise that they all react to statics in different ways: flexion (horizontal forces), compression (vertical) and tension (structural moments switching from a horizontal position to vertical). Instead of supporting, they are attracting poles in the same way Einstein relativity explains gravity as the bending of space-time. All the forces of the solar system, and the universe in general, are balanced to accommodate life on this planet. The building is the product of forces that provide a dynamic environment of social interaction, demonstration and movement. It creates a new form of collectivity.
The structure then becomes a multi-directional spine that articulates different coordinate systems working with their mutual relation to time and space. Every user, therefore, evolves in a multiverse that intersects at some point to create what we could call a multi-stage. The concept of the multiverse in science is a very abstract idea inherited again from the Greek, which is hardly visualised, and relies on the existence of several worlds ruled by other entities than gravity and time, other referential systems. It might be a bit extreme to relate it to architecture, but it is in line with the “complexity” of the Maison à Bordeaux.
So how do we go beyond the visual quality of the actual object of the house to reveal graphically the complexity of its virtual object or system? Looking at the axonometry technique, explored at the time by OMA team working on the project, we will try to unveil this articulation of space-time dimension stretching around attractors. The axonometry indeed go beyond the hierarchical illusion of perspective, providing a drawing “without depths”, displaying every information on the same level. But drawing an axonometry using formal pattern would be an inefficient copy of what has already been done. To describe objectively the nature of each system and their intersection, we would refer to scientific diagrams, vectors, coordinates, data as a mathematical spatial understanding.
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