ng 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 design drawings as an artistic accomplishment in addition to the purpose of creating a building. Rudolph has been categorized by historians as a Late Modernist because he refined his Harvard training under Walter Gropius. He was initially influenced by Le Corbusier’s sculptural approach to architecture as indeed was Richard Meyer, who shares some similar design ideals. Rudolph’s visual eye for good proportions and high-quality detailing considered that Le Corbusier’s building could be more refined and did not always sit well on the site. He was more impressed by Frank Lloyd Wright whom he considered handled the important interior space, use of materials and transition between the building and the ground so much better.
Rudolph was an independent-minded Modernist convinced of his design priorities; an architect who throughout his career saw no reason to revise his fundamental philosophy but did pragmatically broaden his ideas to respond to the realities and opportunities created by his major commissions. He considered that the rules governing small buildings were inherently different from those governing large.
He recognized the importance of two design ingredients he found in architecture and which he grew to revere. These were the internal control of light and space in a memorable manner and the external influence of the surrounding context on a design. Both these aspects were, he appreciated, derived from historic links and were in essence the art of architecture which had developed through the ages, but he also found these features in fine modem buildings as well. In addition to evolving spatial features in his projects, he also developed a better understanding of contextualism. This he preferred to call urbanism, because his major projects were usually in large urban areas and not isolated, unlike many of his earlier houses in Florida. These schemes needed to be related to their surroundings. It was not sufficient, therefore, only to reflect the solids and voids, to express the structural system and articula