When I started searching for connected books to the book „Synopsis architecturae civil eclecticae“ by Johann Jacob Schübler I learned right away how important it is to chose a topic of conversation on Alice. For my first searched I typed in „perspective view drawing“ while using the Xenotheka brain, without choosing a topic, and Alice came up with a book that used these words, but in a completely different context. It was a philosophical book from Ludwig Wittgenstein and didn’t really had anything in common with my architecture book.
After I changed the topic to architecture, I started searching for geometry cause I think geometric illustration plays a big role in Schülers book. Searching geometry led me to a book by Kohlhaas, called elects of architecture. Although there might be big differences I think it has interesting connections. Coming from different times but with similar topics. Kohlhaas book is of course more modern and connects architecture drawings with photographs. It focuses on the
fragments of the rich and complex architectural collage, so like Schüler it chose illustration of complex architecture. The books are not connected in the topic of time but in other interesting ways. The main idea presenting architecture good, clearly and accurate is the same.
Koolhaas, Elements of Architecture
1958 Ruled geometry: sketches illustrating the geometric derivation of the Philips Pavilion, a complex surface made of precast parts.
A book which appeared first when I typed in several texts was „Modern architectural Theory“ by Harry Francis Mallgrave. It is so called the first book to provide a comprehensive survey of architectural theory, primarily in Europe and the United States, during three centuries of development.
I am not sure why this book always came up first while searching but probably because of the wide time spectrum it deals with many topics so it is easy to find simalrities. A sent from the book which I found conntected pretty good was: „Geometry underlies structure in architecture; geometry is what he calls the “grammar” of form.“
I then changed the topic to „draw“ and tipped in „perspective architecture drawing“ as I could not really find connecting books for these words before with architecture as the topic. Alice came up with a book from Harrison Wood Geiger called „Art in Theory“ 1648 1815.
In the book it says that „drawing requires knowledge of perspective“ which in my eyes connects pretty good to Schüblers book as he is writing a lot about perspective drawings. Also in different parts of his book he talks about the importance that geometry and perspective can have.
All in all it was a pretty interesting journey to see all the possible connections Alice could find and to see the big range of research there is behind Alice and Xenotheka.