- Digital Applications of ancient Armenian stone carving for rural housing in Shikahogh -
On
one hand, we have a long established stone masonry tradition in Armenia, on the
other hand we have the Shikahogh village in Syunik province in Armenia that is
in need of improvement and the challenge is to utilize the ancient carving
techniques on the platform of the modern digital applications whilst addressing
the real needs of the villagers.
The initial strategy that I have adopted for reaching this objective looks like
this. Here I have identified the three areas – the target which is the rural
development, the context, which is the resource for the theoretical framework
as well as a data source, and the practice, is where the transition and
transfer between the theoretical and the practical implementations occur. Now
practice employs two vehicles for its realization, and those are the workshop,
where initial prototypes and tests will materialize and the fieldwork which is
the link between the concept and the site and it is the experimental ground for
sampling and built.
On
this slide, I have illustrated the potential timeline for the next 3 years, in
accordance with the key milestones outlined by DRDP. Here you can see the
elements from the project strategy, and additionally I have the on-going
writing up component shaping here as well. With the help of this chart, I can
keep the whole process under control and do performance valuation by comparing
the expected and the actual progress, which I think is very useful.
Armenia
is a landlocked country, bordering Turkey to the West, Iran to the South,
Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh Republic to the East and Georgia to the North.
This is Syunik province, which is where Shikahogh is located and it has a
strategic importance for the country’s economy. Because since 1991 the borders
between Turkey and Azerbaijan have been concealed, thus making communication
with Iran of vital importance for Armenia, which relies heavily on its imports
of energy, in particular natural gas and other commodities. I will come back to
this subject in the later slides.
Armenia
is a land of predominantly volcanic origin, igneous rocks, and it is also
notoriously earthquake prone. There
are 7 volcanos on the current territory of Armenia, the youngest of which is
Arteni with the latest eruption in 1340.
And
this is a beautiful Holocene volcano Aragats, where it is believed one can
still find the Gregory illuminators lantern, according to the myth. In fact
there are numerous myths surrounding all the mountains of the land and people
identify themselves with these mounts. And they do so not only because of the
myths, but because Armenians were archaic mountain cave dwellers.
These
are the man-made caves around the canyons and valleys of the medieval city Ani,
which is where the Armenian masons established the stone masonry techniques by
carving into the fabric of the mountains and creating these
comfortable apartments with sleeping and storage areas and this is where the
tradition was perfected. (Details)Unfortunately
I will not be able to visit this site during my fieldwork because it is on a
territory of modern Turkey. Instead
I will explore the same masonry technique on the Geghard monastery cave, now
this is in Armenia and here the same craftsmanship methods were employed and
developed.
The
only difference is in the functionality of this cave, which is bearing
religious rather than secular residential connotation like the caves in Ani. There
are 2 opportunities in Geghard of studying the stone masonry technique and the
geometric patterns- one is on the big scale of the cave and second is on a
small scale of Khachkar. Khachkar means a stone bearing a cross and throughout
history it played a variety of roles of a book, of a temple, it appeared as a
symbol for the preservation of the Armenian identity and the tradition of
erecting these stones is very much intact in modern day Armenia. The
ancestors of the Khachkars are the petroglyphs, these are the first carved
stones from around 900 BC, which gave birth to the Armenian hieroglyphs that
later become the Armenian written alphabet as we know it today and this is what
I mean by the identity embedded in stone and time permitting it will be curious
to investigate just how much of the written alphabet is influenced by the texture
and the geometry of these stones used to carve on, did the patterns of the
stone participate in the formation of the letters.
Thousands
of these petroglyphs are found on the landmark of the Karahunj (the whispering
stones) which in itself represents perhaps the earliest attempts of the masons
to work with the stone. This site consists of 223 standing stones, possibly
dating back to around 5000BC and it is assumed by archaeologist to be an
observatory, because there are the circular holes on the upper part of the
stones that point to various constellations and planets. The “whispering
stones” is near our village Shikahogh in Syunik province as well, which is
convenient.
Apart
from the anthropogenic geometries and patterns, I have initiated some studies
into the inherent or natural geometric formations, such as this site called
“the symphony of stones” in Garni Gorge. These massive volcanic basalt columns
are shaped into the most efficient of the hexagonal forms. The clustering on
this particular shape is dependent on the lava cooling process and the
collision of the forces of gravity, heat, pressure, density etc. Without
going into too much technicalities, it is worth mentioning that on the
crystalline level of these rocks we see that these efficient geometries
replicate themselves, creating fractal structure. Or perhaps it’s the other way
round where the macro scale replicates the micro.
And
to briefly mention the digital applications aspect, here we have the 3
scenarios- 1st of the natural mathematics- the one created by the
nature then we have the analogue man made carving (this particular example is
from Geghard monastery that I’ve showed you earlier) and lastly the algorithmic
3 axis digital fabrication representations. In the previous slide I have
mentioned about the natural conditions of the forces, gravity, heat, density
etc. all of which take place during natural formations, and in this sequence as
we go from the natural to the machine made, that data, the real time data of
natural conditions is lost, in digital world we don’t have applications of
gravity and material infrastructure, and hence I will be attempting to script
this data into the platform of the digital software that we use.
There
are studies of the acoustics and lighting used with some architectural design
software packages, which is an example of the natural conditions simulations,
and there is no reason why this can’t be taken eve further with integration of something
like seismology for example.
And
whilst I am not suggesting that we should go back to cave dwelling, but there
is an enormous heritage, an expertise of the tactile dialogue between the
creator and the object, a more controlled tangible relationship that could be
utilized, to prevent the computational design and digital fabrication from
drifting into the abstract. On this example we have direct manipulations of the
material and then we have the interface between the human and the design, so
for example with the mouse we have less control, and with the emergence of new
technologies such as the haptic 3d brush, we have more of that sense of
craftsmanship, but still on rudimentary technologies.
Currently,
there are several projects taking place around Shikahogh, the Shikahogh
national preserve and the surrounding villages. Which are seen as controversial
as there seems to be a disagreement between the environmentalist, the government
and foreign investors. So
these ventures are for example an explorative mining project initiated by a
German corporation, which started last year, but some environmentalist oppose
it arguing that there is a bigger potential for eco-tourism in the area. Also
there is the huge railroad project in the pipeline which will be passing through
the Shikahogh and linking 3 countries- Georgia, Armenia and Iran, which is
interesting because only 3 years ago there was already a highway built
connecting Iran with Armenia. But what we are interested here is how the
villagers can benefit from any of these activities, to address the irrigation
and housing issues for example.
It appears that the villagers don’t get much say in these affairs and they are uncertain about what will these changes mean for their lives, their land and their mountains. And these are the questions I will hopefully address during my fieldwork,which I will be undertaking in collaboration with DAP (Develop Armenia Project) within the bigger governmental undertaking of Luys (Armenian translation “to Illuminate”), the aim of which is to provide young scholars and entrepreneurs with an incentive and a platform to acquire specific education and skills and to later implement the knowledge and expertise in the advancement of the country. So I will be looking for collaborative opportunities with other researchers working in fields of archaeology, architecture, engineering etc. My focus at this stage is perhaps a bit more on the housing at this stage, despite the earlier mentioned tendency of people to abandon their rural dwellings, even in Shikahogh there is a housing shortage, and this is a widespread phenomenon, due to the 1988 earthquake that left half a million about 18% of the population homeless, plus again there was no government initiated housing projects delivered after the USSR collapse, and big portion of those building from soviet times, are not suitable for habitation anymore because of seismic regulations.
