ABSTRACT
Leonardo da Vinci categorised how an artist sees shadows. His classification includes three types: the shadow cast by an object; the shadow attached to an object; and shading. Architecture is not only about depiction. It is about intervening in, changing, the real world. Shadows in architecture are actual – cast by real light in all its variations – rather than pictorial. Shadow of course plays a role in the visual appearance of architecture too. Through the day shadows move as the sun crosses the sky. One of the most powerful of the ways shadow contributes to place-making – the contained shadow – is illustrated by the dark doorway in the image. The character of a room can be dominated by a shadow frame. The quintessential example is in a traditional theatre auditorium where the brightly lit action on the stage is framed by the darkness of a proscenium arch.
