The Pleasure of Space

architect Branka Kaminski
written by Silva Kalčić

 

“Do not show your drawings to anybody, so you will keep all the fame for yourself”, was Leonardo da Vinci’s strong recommendation to his disciples. But Branka Kaminski often made drawings for joint competition projects or for other commissioners, wining recognition due to her drawing skill while she was still a student of architecture. Power produces space, being then materialized in the form of a place, or according to Lefebvre, the “social” space is a breakthrough from space as a context of material activities or manifestations, toward the space created by subjectivities and states of mind. The drawings/constructs of Branka Kaminski, frequently made according to historical matrices of urban entities/plots of historical city centres and modernist suburbs (representing the accumulated efforts of past generations) of Croatian inland and coastland cities (the author gained international recognition with the second prize in “The Architectural Review Centenary Drawing Competition” in 1996, for a perspective drawing of the city of Pula with the Roman amphitheatre in the foreground), are based on topographic measurements, showing the motif from a bird’s eye view or from a viewpoint slightly above it.