ABSTRACT
While spectacular lines of view or possibilities of optical illusions have always been referred to in architecture, the discussion of the concepts of the controlling or voyeuristic gaze seems to be a relatively more recent one, and of growing importance, as Foucault pointed out: ‘The gaze that sees is a gaze that dominates; and although it also knows to subject itself, it domintes its masters.’ 1 Stimulated by poststructuralist thinking about subjectivity, theorists began to examine the gaze as a powerful tool of subject versus object relationships, surveillance versus privacy and the impact of architectural structures to foster such optical relations. Already some 50 years ago, there was a heated debate in the press kindled mainly by two buildings which are by now regarded as masterworks of the twentieth century; the Farnsworth House (1945–51) by Mies van der Rohe and the Glass House (1945–49) by Philip Johnson. In an article published in House Beautiful in April 1953, Elizabeth Gordon wrote:
The much touted all-glass cube of International Style architecture is perhaps the most unliveable type of home for man since he descended from the tree and entered a cave. You burn up in the summer and freeze in the winter, because nothing must interfere with the ‘pure’ form of their rectangles – no overhanging roofs to shade you from the sun; the bare minimum of gadgets and possessions so as not to spoil the ‘clean’ look; three or four pieces of furniture placed along arbitrary pre-ordained lines; room for only a few books and one painting at precise and permanent points; no children; no dogs, extremely meagre kitchen facilities – nothing human that might disturb the architect’s composition. 2
