Architecture Commons^™

The Vital Ambiguity Of Surface: Culturally Determined Notions Of Metaphor And Performance In Contemporary Building Material, Christopher T. Campbell

Graduate School of Art Theses

This thesis investigates the systems and information decipherable within a material surface; more specifically, those ideas of value, performance, and function we may infer from the surface of contemporary building materials. When these materials are reduced to their flattened image, the cosmetic facade of a surface has the capacity to inform as well as deceive. Additionally, we may see in materials outward properties, such as color or tactility, the capacity for metaphor and the application of a symbolic personhood. This thesis seeks to comprehend the ways in which these expectations become fodder for complication and paradox, and promote a perceptual …