J. Krzysztof Lenartowicz

The paper presents an outlook on the entire creative designing in architecture, defined as arranging space according to human needs. The categories of the Vitruvian Triad and Post-Modern Meaning and Ecology are applied here to analyze architectural works. Individual authors in particular cases and in varied proportions apply the factors resulting from these categories, depending on their creative attitude, ability, fashion, view of the world and so on. Common threads may be discerned in individual creations that form broader narratives in time. Two distinctly different and contrasting timeless meta-narratives emerge, named here Architecture and Building. The two lasting general tendencies define edges of the research area encompassing all actions and works of architecture. Historical and contemporary examples are described as belonging to the both meta-narratives.

The paper deals with artefacts – material works of architecture and sculpture – that are raised on battlefields to commemorate a military action, a victory, or a single hero. In the Mediaeval times churches and chapels were built on battlefields devoted to God in gratitude for victory, places of prayer for the fallen. The 19th c. in its rationalism operated with sculptural creations sometimes at a large architectural scale. Objects often were representations of meritorious persons. The 20th c. commemorates the victims with large cemetery complexes and monumental building arrays. Works dated in the 21st c. relate to situations of earlier history and no more are traditional figural monuments but try to create a spatial system of multisensory influence on the viewer. The paper presents cases of battlefields commonly concerned as historically most important. Existing commemorative arrays are characterized and their typology is proposed. Reflections on political manipulation with meaning and form of a monument are raised.

The article presents an alternative approach to the composition of architectural space. Physical structure (building’s construction depicted by conventional drawings) has been contrasted with its functional structure (usage depicted by graphs). Dual graphs of the floor plans serve to abstract the functional structure of a house (March & Steadman 1974). Manors and other detached houses are an important position in the work of Józef Gałęzowski (1866–1963), a prominent representative of the Cracow school of architecture. Gałęzowski designed 40 such buildings, 20 of which were built. Floor plans of chosen houses designed by him are analysed in this paper.