Alvar Aalto

SO what’s a boy to do on a wet Bank Holiday Monday? Instead of dismantling my Corby trouser press, I took myself off (after a vicious beasting by my personal trainer) to the Barbican for the Alvar Aalto exhibition. Alto was one of the leading architects of the 20th century, although not a name I had come across previously. The exhibition focussed on several key buildings, plus his furniture, light fittings and door knobs. It seems he was particularly well known for the shape and construction of his stools.

One of the buzz words at the moment is neuroplasticity (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroplasticity?dm_i=113838564) or, as the Nintendo generation know it, Dr Kawashima's Brain Training. Well Doc Grebson prescribes a different (bad) medicine, which is getting out there, learning knew things, learning to see properly again. I don’t have a lot of knowledge about architecture but what I got out of the exhibition was some heightened perception of the nature of architecture – Aalto’s achievements, so it seemed to me, were about introducing organic shapes, bringing natural light into buildings, and bridging the urban with the natural world.

I particularly liked his Villa Mairea which encapsulated his belief that a building should have different moods in different parts, just as a play has different acts or a symphony different movements. For example, the forest outside the villa was mirrored inside by the different spacing of banisters and columns.

I took this awareness back into the lovely concrete forms of the Barbican: as the weather changed during the day from overcast to bright sunshine, so new views and vistas opened up, which despite the many hours I have spent in the Barbican, were new to me.

Alto was also (one of or the) first to bend pieces of wood into chairs in that Scandinavian style – he noted that a chair was about the meeting of the horizontal and the vertical. Unfortunately, like almost every other designer, he failed to notice it was also about posture and support. I enjoyed watching several Japanese visitors wincing as they tried out one of his classic designs. Earlier in the day, I had found myself not enjoying a particularly hard stool.

All in all, a pleasant afternoon finished off with a nice cup of coffee and some cake.