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Sanford Kwinter through this essay tries to expand and subvert in a way, the idea of conventional formalism, one which describes an emphasis on form over content. He presents the idea of ‘Extended Formalism’ which asks us to reimagine the notion of form, and this in a way blurs the line between form and content. He does so with the use of crisp and loaded language in his text, of which the vocabulary itself speaks a lot. Firstly, with his explanations that use words like coming-to-be, formation, accumulate, appear, emergenc and generative, Kwinter points out the importance of the mechanisms of formation, the ontological aspect of there being various factors responsible for bringing something into being. According to him, a true formalism is a method which demonstrates the process of configuration of these forces into figures of order and shape. Secondly, with his arguments which use words like indeterminacy, continual, dynamic, open, oscillating, computational, transformative, ever changing, and resonance, he brings to our attention the ever ephemeral nature of being, the classical (heraclitus to deleuze, and beyond) idea of Becoming. A true formalism, he proposes, is also a method of diagramming the proliferation of these fundamental resonances.These ideas attack the conventional understanding of what Formal analysis is and they open up a much needed extensive field of questions and possibilities. Formalism remains no longer married to the objects and their physical formal properties, making it fascinating to speculate and pragmatically think of the outcome that would arise after applying these ideas to the contemporary conventional formalistic practice. What would a practice of extended formalism look like When something extends beyond itself into a territory that it openly rejected and never considered a part of itself, it is not only a mere extension. It is a sort of deterritorialization. Kwinter’s ideas before being an extension to formalism, they first and foremost are a rupture, which break down and loosen its understanding in a fundamental way. This loosening of the rigidity then allows for the extension. So Kwinter is also an anti-formalist but it would be horribly wrong to say so.

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This debate of 1982 between Eisenman and Alexander offers an exciting conversation, where these two architects put forth their opinions and ideological positions on the topic of harmony in Architecture, in a constructive manner. These arguments are greatly enriching as they reveal the theoretical grounding and basis for their own practice and attitude. As the conversation goes on, one can see a clear binary getting formulated between the two distinct positions, which are generally understood as contrasting ideas of harmony in Architecture, contesting with each other, or as the editor says, diametrically opposing each other. Alexander speaks of maintaining harmony in conventional sense and working in sync with the nature of order, while Eisenman has a completely different approach, one of creating disharmonies and incongruencies, a destructive character, in order to realize harmony. Eisenman emerges as an intellectual from a highly modernist and rationalist tradition that favours concepts and theories, whereas Alexander is seen holding a little conservative attitude of preserving and maintaining order and balance. They even agree that Eisenman is of the ‘thinking type’ and in contrast, Alexander is of the ‘feeling type’. These progressions evoke Nietzsche’s ‘The Apollonian & the Dionysian dichotomy’, a classic binary opposition between the rationalist and impulsive forces. Such a situation creates the notions of right or wrong, good or bad, and so on, and they ask one to choose a side, and cancel out the other. What is helpful in such a situation, is to put an end to this fight by inserting a typical deleuzian approach of resolving a binary opposition by removing ‘or’ out of it and replacing with ‘and’. So it’s no more the question of who is right, Eisenman or Alexander? It is Eisenman and Alexander both, as both approaches hold immense value and both are important depending upon the highly contextual and specific space, place and time. The two distinct opinions although contrasting to each other, they should be grasped together and allowed to coexist.

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Through a rigorous historical analysis of Peter Eisenman’s work, and the process of decoding diagrammatic representations, Lucia Allais deals with the idea of the Real and the Theoretical, their relationship with each other, and highlights the positions and understandings that lie around these two autonomous concepts. Lucia begins the paper with a historical analysis which shows how the two different institutions sought to take advantage of the massive amounts of capital available under the label "urban", while addressing the open secret that this label was essentially a social- scientific euphemism for "black." The New York Urban League attempted to get black youth involved in urbanism, while the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies attempted to get architects involved in black affairs. Once the opportunity passed, "urban" became a euphemism once again. While explaining these events and politics that lie around them, Lucia goes further in the second part of the paper to explain how the discourse of ‘Theory’ came into a legitimate existence in the context of American Architecture in 1968. This intellectual turn set aside and rejected the traditional understanding of theory and form, both being unreal while the practice and function, both being understood as super real. In turn it advocated the theoretical intellectual speculation against a multivalent call for a return to the sociological real. This attitude held by Eisenman and others with him suggested a pointed dismissal of certain empirical claims to reality, and proposed a cultural valuation of theoretical practice instead. The highlight of the paper remains Eisenman’s suggestion that “the value of reality” needed neutralization. And it was not education that needed to be reformed, but the reality that needed to be educated. The beauty of the paper lies in Lucia’s research that exposes the political and economic context in which these developments took place and reveal the reappearance of the architecture’s pragmatic dimension, which was as she claims “set aside, for a moment,” circa 1968.

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Isn’t an Architect by default an Illusionist? Isn’t every act of building, form making and creating space, about constructing an Illusion? If all constructed space is an illusion, there where does lie reality? Is being deluded forever by the Illusion, the destiny of our reality? The text presents these ideas of mirroring and reproducing reality by producing a theatrical space that is understood as an illusion, a simulation. What Architects produce is Simulacrum.¹ And Simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth—it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true.² This idea allows us to transgress the binaries of reality and illusion, life and theatre, and so on. The question that arises then is what kind of, nature of reality(illusion) can one create, and with what notion sets of ontology, aesthetics and ethics? The Architecture of Bavarian Rococo, the context here being that of a church, attempts at creating such Illusions, in a conscious and literal manner, intended to make accessible the realm of the divine. The approach is very specific to the program, the heavy presence of ornamentation in the vocabulary of architecture of that period, and the practices of frescoes and stuccos and panel paintings. This approach here is questioned by the modernist rationalist attitude being obsessed with utility and efficiency, here is seen to loosen the bond that once had tied the Aesthetic, the Ontological, and the Ethical function of art together. It lays accusations upon the ornament and its legitimacy, and upons up a case for investigation, which can only be resolved once we have something to replace the religious orthodox morality of the church which modernism attacks.

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The question of what might constitute of a critical practice today, is an important aspect of the discipline of Architecture. A critical way of engagement is essential, for a practice in order to not be in a passive compliance with the cultural milieu, the time and space it finds itself in, but to be able to hold a potential of resisting, questioning and/or transforming the forces of cultural production, as per the requirement? The debate presents us with two positions which consider themselves having such a critical stance. Rem Koolhaas, dealing on a global scale with socio economic and cultural aspects by engaging into the questions of space with programmatic interventions. While Peter Eisenman, dealing with the ideas of form, syntax and semantics through strict rigorous formal exploration. Both these positions being critical in their own different but also somewhat similar way, critical of each other as well, provide with multiple approaches that an Architect can have. The discussion reveals with the idea of being critical, various aspects of Architecture, like Autonomy and Engagement, Individuality and Commitment, Ideology and Participation, Content and Form, Diagram and Figure, Building and Urbanism, and so on. These are grounds upon which an Architect can navigate and position herself/himself, and develop a stance with a discourse which justifies its relevance. A position which is not a result of unintended heedlees wandering, but one that is determined, with a strong opinion that is capable to resisting, questioning and subverting what stands against it. Once we have that, we can come together like these amazing gentleman and discuss our unique positions and criticize them as well, but let’s not forget to remove our cloaks of narcissism before we do that.

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Medium is the message, thus one must take into account the tools, techniques, methods, devices and softwares responsible for producing the discourse. The medium is not just the tool but itself is the discourse. Once done acknowledging the importance of technology and the fact of it being intrinsically associated with knowledge, data or thought, that it carries, stores and produces, one must reflect back upon and rethink one’s approach towards the exponentially developing technology that surrounds us, or rather engulfs us. It seems that we have arrived at a state where the technology that we use subscribes to a post orthographic way of thinking, a realm of electric automation that surpasses linear thought and throws us in an unfamiliar zone of probabilities and multiplicities that are continuously speculated producing a schizophrenic effect. The only way to retain sanity in such a time, at the risk of being perceived as a conservative prick, is to: Resist the idea that everything is already an Image. Resist being reduced to just a pixel. Resist moving ahead of orthography. Resist seeing only what is shown to you. Resist the idea that drawing by hand is passé. Resist the thought that one cannot draw anymore. Resist becoming machines. Resist automation. Resist being driven and consumed completely by technologies that surround us. Resist technology becoming an organic extension of being. Resist the arrival of a technological singularity. Resist thoughtlessness. Only then one can produce a meaningful discourse in a context where everything is almost already an Image. Almost.