DESIGNMIND: NAPKIN SKETCHES

On the 19th of May, NewSchool's chapter of the American Institute of Architecture Students held the annually held Napkin Sketch auction. The auction raised $3,800 to enable students to attend conferences in the industry. In this year's event there were the drawings of 36 to 20 architects among them NewSchool the president Marvin Malecha, who contribute five sketches. Here's his view about napkin sketch sketches.

The napkin sketch has an important spot in the art of design. It's a medium which is simultaneously a source of fun as well as the vehicle for soaring designs. The napkin paper is an ephemeral object. It's a fragile material perfect for thoughts that are in vogue. When working on designing a project, it can be attractive to utilize any means that are available to communicate or capture an idea. It is crucial to recognize the personal biases of the person who is attracted by such media.

I've had personal experience of a pivotal architecture and design concept that was recorded on a napkin which was the basis for the work of the team in a complex client group. The sketch was used as an informal or formal basis for a consensus regarding the direction and progress of the Chancellor's Residence in North Carolina State University after an extended and painful search for appropriate phrase. But for me, this drawing on napkins is a unique situation. I have a variety of pencils and paper that mark the practice of sketching on a big pad, as well as more professional communication that is recorded in notebooks. A napkin sketch can be a game of play as well as free-daydreaming. Do not think that I am a fool: free daydreaming is among the most vital routine activities that creative people can engage in.

This is the most effective method to explain the sketch, dubbed "Temple To Wishful Thought" or "Beach Folly." The sketches are simply musings on life and place both sacred and irrelevant.

The search for the notion of the sacred is depicted in the sketch's title as "Path to a Sacred Place." This sketch is more ferocious than the previous two because it depicts the struggle uphill, usually at least in the less ideal locations, to achieve the sacred in the form of the bright light at the top of an upward climb. The bright light is a frequent feature in my sketchbooks of daydreams. It is my conviction that the best will always be ahead, even though the darkest of places must be overcome. This optimistic outlook is reflected in the title greeting the sky. The tower that rises through the darkness as the light at the end of the road, is an expression of hope.

The sketch that I have drawn, "'Interwoven Trees' of Life," is a regular exploration for me. It's an old symbol of family and power that comes from a mature family unit. The natural shapes derived from the trunks of trees connected to form a united canopy of trees is the way nature uses to show the ideal model of the human family.

Does the napkin sketch look like a joke? Yes. It is only through free exploration that the folly offers that serious subjects can be pursued. Like gazing out an open window in a classroom and being drawn by the beauty of spring, foolishness is, after all, serious business.