Body &

Notes & Commentary Society

2017, Vol. 23(1) 91–95
ª The Author(s) 2017
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of Architecture: DOI: 10.1177/1357034X16676540
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A Short Introduction
to Juhani Pallasmaa

Tomoko Tamari
Goldsmiths, University of London, UK

Abstract
This piece focuses on the work of Juhani Pallasmaa who introduces phenomen-
ological aspects of kinesthetic and multisensory perception of the human body into
architecture theory. He argues that hand-drawing is a vital spatial and haptic
exercise in facilitating architectural design. Through this process, architecture can
emerge as the very ‘material’ existence of human embodied ‘immaterial’ emotion,
feelings and wisdom. Hence, for Pallasmaa, architecture can be seen as an artistic
practice, which entails multisensory and embodied thought in order to establish
the sense of being in the world.

Keywords
architecture, phenomenology, senses, kinesthetic, embodiment, Juhani Pallasmaa

Juhani Pallasmaa (1936* ) has written extensively on art, architec-

ture theory, cultural philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience. In
one of his widely acclaimed books, The Eyes of the Skin: Architec-
ture and the Senses (Pallasmaa, 1996),1 he attempts to introduce
phenomenological aspects of kinesthetic, haptic and the multi-
sensory perception of the human body into architecture theory. The
key question he addresses is why ocularcentrism has become so
dominant in both architectural culture and in everyday life. He cri-
tically argues that living with modern technology flattens our multi-
sensory capacities. More precisely, digital or computer rendered

Corresponding author: Tomoko Tamari. Email: [email protected]

Extra material: http://theoryculturesociety.org
92 Body & Society 23(1)

images tend to weaken our main sensory modes (except for sight),
which together are vital for our capacity to develop the imagination
and creativity.
The human implications of the development of modern technology
have been discussed for a long time. McLuhan claimed ‘[T]he effects
of technology do not occur at the level of opinions or concepts, but
alter sense ratios or patterns of perception steadily and without any
resistance’ (1967: 27, cited in Baudrillard, 1998: 123). This suggests
that technologies have been integrated into the human perception of
the world so that they have contributed to our knowledge system and
influenced our imagination. Hence technologies such as computer
imaging can be seen as a beneficial tool for expanding creativity; but
Pallasmaa argues that the computer creates a gap between the
designer and the object, because the computing design process is
often passively manipulated by the retinal model of vision. In con-
trast, drawing by hand ‘put[s] the designer in skin-contact with the
object’ and ‘ultimately the object becomes an extension and part of
the designer’s body’ (Pallasmaa, 2009: 97).
In this way, drawing by hand can be seen as a vital process for
maintaining a haptic contact with objects and their environments. The
complex relationship between spatial perception and haptic sensation
is also investigated by Mark Paterson, in his article, ‘Architecture of
Sensation: Affect, Motility and the Oculomotor’ (Paterson, 2017),
where he builds on Pallasmaa’s work to critically point out some
limitations of phenomenological approaches to contemporary archi-
tectural theory. Instead of focusing on ‘hands’, he deliberately sets
them aside to focus on ‘feet’. For Paterson, it is impossible to fully
comprehend a multisensory architecture experience without consider-
ing not only the oculomotor subject with rapid eye saccades, but also
the vestibular system in the ears and the ‘pedestrian sensation through
the feet’ (Paterson, 2017). These ways of understanding the body’s
irreducibility resonate well with Merleau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of
Perception, which emphasizes the fact that ‘[t]he body is our general
medium for having a world’ (Merleau-Ponty, 2003: 169), something
we can grasp not through our intellect but through the mediation of
bodily experience.
For Pallasmaa, as a thinker, an artist and an architect, sketching
and drawing by hand are spatial and haptic exercises which allow
him to ‘fuse the external reality of space and matter, and the internal
Tamari 93

reality of perception, thought and mental imagery into singular and

dialectic entities’ (Pallasmaa, 2009: 89). He suggests that there are
three different sets of images in the process of sketching and drawing:
‘the drawing that appears on the paper, the visual image recorded in
my cerebral memory, and a muscular memory of the act of drawing
itself’ (Pallasmaa, 2009: 90). In this process, ‘the draughtsman forgets
both hand and the pencil, and the image emerges as if it were an
automatic projection of the imaging mind’ (Pallasmaa, 2017). This
is ‘the ecstasy of work’ (Pallasmaa, 2017).
Barbra Maria Stafford (2009) refers to a similar feeling of the
ecstasy of work in creative processes in terms of biological activities
in her article, ‘Thoughts not our own: Whatever happened to selec-
tive attention?’ Taking in neuroscience and cognitive research, she
argues ‘what is significant from both the artistic and the scientific
standpoint is how equivocal imagery or ambiguous forms (belonging
to two or more different categories or susceptible to several inter-
pretations depending on the viewer’s perspective) elicits perceptual,
cognitive and even bodily motion in the observer’ (see Stafford,
2009: 282). She explains, ‘[w]hen activated, the limbic system’s
non-topographic color and motion maps bind wavelengths coming
from geographically separated features in our field of vision. This
temporary conjunction of distant points elicits a pleasurable kines-
thetic sensation’ (Stafford, 2009: 282, emphasis added). The impor-
tant point we should be aware of here is that a process of binding
wavelengths provokes affective pleasure, which simultaneously
occurs in physical and mental processes of recognition. Stafford
further claims that in biological activities ‘the associative jump to
connect resembling, not identical, formal features is enabled,
because of the deep neurophysiological correspondence between the
phenomenal and noumenal systems’ (Stafford, 2009: 282).
Both Pallasmaa’s ‘the ecstasy of work’ and Stafford’s ‘pleasurable
kinesthetic sensation’ are evoked by a process of making sense of
the world, in other words, a knowledge-embodied process. The
knowledge-embodied process always engages with filtering, discon-
necting and reconnecting information though multisensory reflec-
tions in order to establish the sense of being-in-the-world.
Such ‘embodied modes of thinking’ are vital factors in artistic and
creative work. According to Pallasmaa, architecture as an art form
and artistic practice entails multisensory and embodied thought.
94 Body & Society 23(1)

‘These modes of thinking are images of the hand and the body, and
they exemplify essential existential knowledge’ (Pallasmaa, 2009:
19). Hence, architecture can be seen as a product of ‘existential and
metaphysical philosophizing through the means of space, structure,
matter, gravity and light’ (Pallasmaa, 2009: 19). For Pallasmaa, then,
architecture can emerge as the very ‘material’ existence of human
‘immaterial’ emotion, feelings and wisdom. If we need to understand
how we humans function, we should recall our capacities as multi-
sensory neuropsychological beings. Hence Pallasmaa proposes that
rediscovering the thinking hands is a crucial process to restore a
fuller understanding of the potential to realize ‘a dignified life’ (Pal-
lasmaa, 2017).

Note
1. Pallasmaa is the author/editor of numerous articles and books, includ-
ing, The Thinking Hand: Existential and Embodied Wisdom in Archi-
tecture (John Wiley and Sons, 2009) and The Embodied Image:
Imagination and Imagery in Architecture (John Wiley and Sons, 2011).

Bibliography
Baudrillard J (1998) The Consumer Society: Myths and Structures.
London: Sage.
McLuhan M (1967) Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man.
London: Sphere.
Merleau-Ponty M (2003) Phenomenology of Perception. trans. Smith
C. London: Routledge.
Pallasmaa J (1996) The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses.
Chichester: John Wiley and Sons.
Pallasmaa J (2009) The Thinking Hand: Existential and Embodied
Wisdom in Architecture. Chichester: Wiley.
Pallasmaa J (2017) Embodied and Existential Wisdom in Architecture –
the Thinking Hand. Body & Society 23(1).
Paterson M (2017) Architecture of Sensation: Affect, Motility and
the Oculomotor. Body & Society 23(1).
Stafford BM (2009) Thoughts not Our Own: Whatever Happened
to Selective Attention? Theory, Culture & Society 26(2–3):
275–293.
Tamari 95

Tomoko Tamari is a lecturer in the Institute of Creative and Cultural

Entrepreneurship and member of the Centre for Urban and Community
Research, Goldsmiths, University of London. She is managing editor of
Body & Society (Sage). Her long-standing research interests focus on con-
sumer culture in Japan and Japanese new women, which will be discussed
in her forthcoming book entitled, Women and Consumer Culture: The
Department Store, Modernity and Everyday Life in Early Twentieth-
century Japan (Routledge). She has recently published ‘Metabolism: Uto-
pian urbanism and the Japanese modern architecture movement’ (Theory,
Culture & Society, vol. 31 (7–8)). She is currently working in the following
areas: body image and prosthetic aesthetics, Olympic culture and cities;
human perception and the moving image; probiotics and immunity.