The book "On drawing architecture" by Janusz Sepiol has a unique genesis - it was initiated by the inaugural lecture that the author delivered in October 2024 at the Faculty of Architecture and Fine Arts of Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski University in Krakow. The lecture, entitled "On drawing architecture," opened the new academic year at the faculty, which educates future architects in the Master Class formula.
In his speech, Janusz Sepiol posed questions that, in the current era of artificial intelligence, CAD software and BIM technology, every architecture student should also ask themselves:
Why does an architect need the ability to draw? In an era of ubiquitous photography and widespread access to graphics programs, does drawing architecture still make sense? Does it have a future? Is drawing just a nice hobby, part of an architect's workshop, or an avenue for self-development?
The questions alone point to the changes that have taken place in the architectural profession in recent decades. As recently as forty years ago, when the Sepiole generation, to which I count myself, was graduating from architectural studies, all drawings were made by hand, on a drawing board. Today, architectural projects are created almost exclusively using computer programs. This leap has taken place in an extremely short time.
Janusz Sepiol, born in 1955 in Gorlice, is one of the better-known figures in the architectural community - he is a politician, local government official, architect and urban planner. A graduate of the Faculty of Architecture at the Cracow University of Technology (1980) and art history at Jagiellonian University, he combines theoretical and practical competencies in the areas of culture, the city, architecture and urban planning. He was marshal of the Małopolska Voivodeship (2002-2006), initiator of many architectural competitions important to Krakow, senator of the seventh and eighth terms, architect of the city of Rzeszow, and for the past year has served as Chief Architect of the City of Krakow.
This variety of roles has allowed him to build his own broad view of architecture - expressed in his publications, which are often illustrated with excellent drawings of his own, which is also the case here.
The book is divided into two parts, the first presenting a selection of twenty-one figures of artists whose sketches and drawings correspond and substantiate the author's main theses. These theses, are contained in short chapters of the second part of the publication and have the character of an orderly summary of the most important features of drawing and the role it plays.
The author begins the first part with a story about the Greek painter Apelles, then moves on to the designer of medieval cathedrals Villard de Honnecourt. Further on appear Jan van Eyck, Michelangelo, Piranesi, Rodin, Otto Wagner, Tadao Ando, Zbigniew Herbert, Romuald Loegler, Konrad Kucza-Kuczynski, to name just some of the artists who used drawing. All chapters are illustrated with reproductions of works and accompanied by short and interesting comments by the author.
The author compiles his conclusions on the importance of drawing in a series of chapters of the second part, entitled: "Thoughts on Drawing." These theses are centered around the thought of Paul Valéry, quoted in the chapter "To draw to see":
There is a huge difference between seeing something without a pencil in your hand and seeing while drawing.
Sepiol elaborates on this thought, arguing that the process of drawing is a fundamental method of learning about an object. It is not merely a documentary technique, but an active process of discovery, involving successive acts of consciousness:
Deepening the skill of drawing is not reduced to making lines more proficiently, but involves refining perception.
This insight places drawing in the context of the phenomenology of architecture - the drawing experience of an object, such as a building, can lead to the discovery of successive layers and the constitution of an architectural work. In this view, the creative act inspired by drawing becomes a form of architectural hermeneutics. This thought is further developed in the chapter "To draw to understand". - drawing allows one to grasp not only the relationships of solids, their arrangements and shapes. At a certain stage, noticing forms and light is combined with recognizing the typology of objects. The author notes:
Those with knowledge are better able [...] to suggest the shape of a Corinthian capitol or a Gothic florin.
This leads directly to the statement:
The primary function of drawing is to depict the understanding of the reality around us.
Another thesis - "To draw, means to translate". - completes the characteristics of a good drawing. A drawing should be an autonomous work, a plastic, two-dimensional equivalent of three-dimensional reality, in which the author's talent, technique and character are expressed.
A very important aspect of drawing is presented in the chapter "To draw to remember". The author cites the statement of Professor Viktor Zin, who claimed that drawing assisted his learning process:
if he drew something, it was already his, virtually forever.
Part two of the publication ends with the chapter "Draw to create", which deals with an aspect relevant to architectural studies - the sketch remains the basic tool of a designer's conceptual work. It is a graphic record of the spatial idea of the project, conducting a quick dialogue with the imagination. It also provides a record of concrete thoughts and inspiration for further development of the concept. For a skilled architect, the concept sketch still remains a key design tool, faster and more efficient than computer-aided design methods. The question of how much longer remains open.
It is worth noting that the book was published at a moment of significance for the Krakow architectural community. After all, Janusz Sepiol is also the originator and curator of exhibitions, including the recently opened "Architectural Sketches" exhibition at the new headquarters of the Małopolska Regional Chamber of Architects. The publication of the book, as well as the thematically related exhibition, is a very valuable reflection on the architectural profession formulated from the position of an art historian and experienced practitioner. Both architecture students and architects will find in this book a clear encouragement to deepen their skills and knowledge through drawing. Additional motivation can be provided by carefully selected illustrations - examples of drawings and sketches by painters, sculptors, architects, as well as figures outside this professional circle. The book is written in clear, accessible language. The essay-like character of the text is interspersed with personal anecdotes, which adds lightness and authenticity to the reading.
Prof. Krzysztof INGARDEN
Architect, dean of WAiSP UAFM. Winner of the SARP Honorary Award, co-founder of Ingarden & Ewý Architects. Author of, among others, the ICE Congress Center and the Malopolska Garden of Art in Krakow, the Polish Pavilion at the 2005 World Expo in Aichi, Japan, and - together with Pritzker Prize winner Arata Isozaki - the "Manggha" Center for Japanese Art and Technology in Krakow
"[...] nowhere like in a drawing can one sense the trace of the artist's presence". - writes Janusz Sepiol in a collection of texts "On drawing architecture", just published by Austeria publishing house. The book - is a tribute to the art of designing, but also to reading architecture.
"Those used to be times," one would like to exclaim, while leafing through the volume "On drawing architecture" by Janusz Sepiol. For the book - even at a cursory glance - takes you back to a time when at the core of architecture was a vision and its hand-made, preliminary, sketchy image. And it's not about technical architectural drawings, but visual notes made by the hand of the architects themselves, pictures, even if sketched in a superficial way, reflecting the atmosphere, the mood of the future building, and at the same time the style of the author.
Drawing, perhaps more than writing, makes a graphological identification of the author - it is a personal and unique style
- Sepiol writes, and it's hard not to agree with these words.
Today, it is extremely rare that we have the opportunity to interact with works made by hand by designers. Meanwhile, as Janusz Sepiol proves in the book, in doing so we are missing out on something much more important and valuable than just contact with the drawing craft.
The ancient Egyptians set up libraries to house architectural drawings; the builders of Gothic cathedrals created sketches, just as they were well aware of the importance of precise architectural drawings and diagrams; as early as the 16th century, Andrea Palladio's drawings were reproduced and distributed as a kind of pattern books for imitation; the real revolution came with the invention of lithography at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, which allowed the mass multiplication of sketches and drawings. It is also easy to distinguish a collection of drawings created by the hand of architects, which today are part of art history, iconic and universally recognizable images. These include Piranesi's imaginary prisons, Newton's visionary tomb, which was drawn by Étienne-Louis Boullée in 1784. It's also Antonio Sant'Elia's futuristic sketches of cities of the future "La Citta Nuova" from the early 20th century, or Le Corbusier's not much younger and still controversial urban concepts of Ville Radieuse. All of these drawings remained unrealized visions, yet no one doubts how much influence they had on the development of architecture around the world. There is a private Museum of Architectural Drawings in Berlin, founded and run by the Tchoban Foundation, which aims to support and nurture the tradition of this field of art and design.
In order to get into architectural studies, you still have to pass a drawing exam. However, the art of drawing has long since both at universities and in studios no longer plays an important role. To put it in a slightly simplified way: architects hardly draw anymore; if they do, they treat it not as an element of creative work, but as a hobby (as evidenced, for example, by the Plener Circle operating at the Warsaw Branch of SARP, which "brings together those architects for whom art is a passion and a form of expression of their personality"). On a daily basis, however, pencils, charcoal and watercolors have been replaced by digital tools that are precise and devoid of the finesse of the human hand. The author of the collection "On drawing architecture" does not refer to technological changes, does not condemn modernity, but reading his reflections and to such a reflection: how much has architecture changed, since all stages of its creation, not only technical, but also those more ephemeral, conceptual, are created digitally?
The collection "On drawing architecture" consists of two parts. The first is a mini-series, for which the starting point were drawings by famous architects, past and present. The second part of the book - "Thoughts on drawing". - consists of short texts accompanied by sketches and drawings by the author. And it too can be considered a tribute to the art of drawing and an appeal for the renewal of the tradition of creating such sketches by architects. An appeal not expressed explicitly, but which can be inferred from the author's personal experience described here and the rational and convincing arguments he cites.
Drawing has always had and still has educational value. Careful, analytical looking allows one to realize structural relationships and proportions [...]. It allows one to understand how shadows are arranged on various complex shapes and textures, the importance of the type of light, air, time of day and year on the perception of an architectural work. Drawing thus leads to an understanding of both the structure of an object, sometimes hidden, and how it functions in context
- Sepiol writes.
And each of the texts in the second part of the book is a praise of drawing and an indication of further benefits of this activity. As the author proves, drawing allows you to see, understand and remember the architecture you are looking at, and thus translate, transform and create your own concepts.
Janusz Sepiol's collection of texts, however, should not be placed among the publications taken out of sentiment for the old days or complaining about his successors in the profession. The author does not complain, criticize or lecture. He takes readers on a "walk" among eras, attitudes and architectural themes, for which drawing is the common point. The first part of the book, "Masters," is a story about architecture, for each of its chapters the starting point was a different drawing. Drawn by the hand of one of the masters, from Michelangelo to John Ruskin, from Carl Scarpa to Stanislaw Noakowski, there are tales derived from drawings by Romuald Loegler, Otto Wagner, August Rodin, Boleslaw Stelmach or Leon Krier. Each text touches on a different theme, each drawing brought the author a different inspiration, but in each a masterful sketch plays first fiddle.
These intellectual stops on the road of the history of drawing can be interesting not only for architects, but also for any sensitive person, for designers, but also for those who use their works. They bring knowledge of history, philosophy, art history and architecture, and allow one to look at the design process and its effects in a different, broader way. Especially since the selection of works around which Sepiol's texts revolve is rich - there are also drawings closely related to architecture, but made by the hands of other artists. Such as the works of Jan van Eyck, for whom sketching with clockwork precision every detail of Gothic masses was a way of conveying New Testament content rather than reproducing existing edifices, or the drawings and sketches of Napoleon Orda, who used this method to try to document, record, but also make an apotheosis of the Polish landscape and monuments.
Janusz Sepiol quotes John Ruskin:
If you desire to draw so as to be able to depict what you love, you will make progress quickly and surely; if you desire to draw so as to make your drawing beautiful, you will never make it.
After reading the collection "On drawing architecture," these words can also be paraphrased to apply to the audience, the users of architecture. The ability to "read" drawings develops sensitivity, and even the most sketchy works can really carry a lot of content.
Anna Cymer
Architectural historian involved in the popularization of knowledge about architecture. She is the author of the books "Architecture in Poland 1945-1989" and "The Long Years of the 90s: Architecture in Poland in the Time of Transformation."
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