Proportion

Definition

The doctrine that architectural harmony is achieved — and made demonstrable — through simple numerical ratios governing the relations of a building's parts to each other and to the whole. In the Renaissance version Summerson condenses: "The purpose of proportion is to establish harmony throughout a structure – a harmony which is made comprehensible either by the conspicuous use of one or more of the orders as dominant components or else simply by the use of dimensions involving the repetition of simple ratios." Proportion is thus the mathematical ground of the classical claim that architecture's aim is "a demonstrable harmony of parts," and the orders are "in themselves demonstrations of harmonious composition."

Summerson's two cautions frame the concept's limits:

• On the doctrine itself: "A vast amount of pretentious nonsense has been written about proportion."
• On its efficacy: "To what extent rational systems of this kind do produce effects which eye and mind can consciously apprehend I am extremely doubtful. I have a feeling that the real point of such systems is simply that their users (who are mostly their authors) need them; that there are types of extremely fertile, inventive mind which need the tough inexorable discipline of such systems to correct and at the same time stimulate invention." Such systems "rarely survive their authors and users and the next man of fertile genius invents his own."

Key Instances

• Renaissance ratio theory — harmony "analogous to musical harmony"; arithmetically simple, mutually related ratios.
• Le Corbusier's tracés régulateurs — "lines of control" re-assuming "a kind of control which... belongs essentially to the Renaissance and was fundamental to the work both of Alberti and of Palladio"; applied from his first Perret-style house (1916) onward.
• Le Corbusier's Modulor (1950) — "a system of space-notation" fusing "module" and section d'or (golden section), scaled from the human body to town planning; Summerson judges that "interest in it has rather receded" and that its real importance was "as part of its author's mental furniture — enabling him to embark on projects as wildly original... as his chapel at Ronchamp... always secure in his complete grasp of rational procedure."

Key Thinkers

• summerson-john — the definition of classical proportion, the "pretentious nonsense" warning, and the psychological-functional reading of proportional systems.
• le-corbusier — the twentieth century's great systematizer: tracés régulateurs, Purism's "mathematical discipline," the Modulor.
• Alberti and Palladio — the Renaissance exemplars of control by ratio (per Summerson's account).

Related Concepts

• beauty — proportion as the classical answer to what makes beauty objective ("demonstrable" harmony vs. Kantian disinterested judgment).
• classical-orders — the orders as built demonstrations of proportional harmony.
• architectural-language — proportion as the grammar's deep structure.
• primitive-hut — Laugier's rival grounding of truth in construction rather than ratio.
• modernism — rational procedure as classicism's "last, and certainly not the least legacy" to modern architecture.

Source Support

Sources in the wiki that discuss this concept:

• The Classical Language of Architecture — ch. 1 (the Renaissance concept of proportion) and ch. 6 (tracés régulateurs, the Modulor, and the "users need them" thesis).

Open Questions

• If proportional systems "rarely survive their authors," is proportion a property of buildings at all — or a property of design processes?
• Summerson doubts the eye apprehends ratios: is the "demonstrable harmony of parts" perceptible, or is its demonstrability entirely discursive?
• Does parametric and computational design constitute a new proportional rationalism — and would Summerson's "users need them" thesis apply to algorithmic control?