es appropriate to enhance these functions. Rudolph applied the same criteria to the design of both exterior and interior space. Internally he was able to control the height of the volume better by varying the ceiling level and to allow the larger and smaller spaces to interrelate as major and minor areas. He pointed out that internal and external space can draw inwards as well as upwards and that the design of architectural space is unique because it consciously moulds the environment not only to accommodate humans, but also to create an atmosphere that activates the imagination. He said many times that he considered architecture to be used space formed to satisfy people’s psychological needs.
At the time of writing his ‘Enigmas of Architecture’, Rudolph was still overwhelmingly preoccupied with the importance of space in the design of his buildings, The Art and Architecture Building at Yale which he had completed over a decade before had space as the heart and body of the design. It was centered around two large volumes with thirty-six different levels of interlocking studio and other spaces. The building was an all-embracing spatial concept. Even the modest entrance was purposely designed to be up a long narrow flight of steps to give an enhanced emphasis to the grand spaces inside. The all-pervasive idea of space-making was so powerful in this building it was jokingly suggested by Joseph Esherick that you could not go to the men’s room without having a spatial experience!
In order to communicate and study the visual impact and proportions of these buildings, containing large spaces and volumes, Rudolph even extended his masterly techniques of graphical presentation that enabled him also to study and design the shapes and characteristics of these important internal spaces. He produced his now unique and famous single-point perspectives, which were built up from accurate sections through key parts of the building. By illustrating in minute detail an exact replica of the interior as it would be seen if the building were sawn in half in a similar way to a doll’s house or model, and by showing furniture, rooms, stairs, ceiling, air-conditioning and inhabitants he was able to portray with brilliant graphical dexterity the spatial proportions of these interior volumes. He included the texture of materials and particularly sunlight and shadows so creating a two-dimensional drawing that showed these three-dimensional spaces and allowed him to anticipate the likely atmosphere within them. These outstanding drawings display a meticulous eye for detail unparalleled by any other modern architect; they were powerfully motivated by Rudolph’s desire to understand how it would feel to be in these spaces before they were built. He always said that the section was the generator of the space because by looking at it he was able actively to study the three-dimensional impact of the building. He also extended this technique to illustrate plans dramatically with a gravity defying single-point perspective looking down to the ground and lifted site plans and isometrics to recreate the third dimension through an indication of height achieved by projecting accurate shadows from the realistic height of the buildings.
All these presentational techniques were developed to give a correct representation of the real spaces in and around his architecture, something that was centrally important to him: ‘We talk about style until it comes out of our ears but to me the dynamics of good-time space are far more important. It is the space inside and that created outside by a group of buildings which is important. I regard the manipulation of scale, the understanding of spaces, the exercise of proportion, the relationship of one material to another and the clarity of expression as all far more important than style.’ (8)
Style seems never to have been a problem for Paul Rudolph who was an individualistic designer driven by his graphical talents to produce drawings which are an art form in themselves, similar to artists in the Beaux Arts tradition who produced