Megaform
Megaform is a new theoretical constant.
There is a common definition of the whole variety of forms from the position of megaform presence in them.
Megaform either is or is not present, regardless of physical scale and application. Although the scale is able to reveal its presence (or absence) and significantly enhance its impact.
Megaform is a qualitative criterion of form evaluation. The process of finding megaform is not methodological, but still intuitive. There are no rules, only a feeling. Therefore, it, megaform, may be accessible to a completely untrained person, and even more so than to a sophisticated connoisseur with a rather clouded and bound consciousness by all kinds of semantic constructs.
Mega-form is the meaning of form, its reason for being.
Such spheres of activity as sculpture, architecture, industrial design are directly connected with the creation of megaforms. In these industries, everyone ideally dreams of creating their own megaform, but they are not aware of it. The megaform is enormous and ubiquitous, but because it is unmarked and unformulated, it is invisible to the mind as if it were a ghost.
Such a field of fine art as sculpture, in theory, is a scientific discipline closely examining the megaform. It is in the sculptural vocabulary that such terms as “large form”, “solid form” are found, and the definition of “sculpturalism” implies the presence of the megaform. The term ” Large Form” implies the basic, dominant form of an object to which all other details are subordinate. A large form is a prerequisite for a good sculpture. It is what gives wholeness and sculpture to the work. However, the term megaform, although very close in meaning and essence, goes beyond sculpture and has a wider application. Mega-form has a direct effect on the viewer, bypassing any narrative. Without touching the intellect, it penetrates the subconscious and instincts. It is like a kind of spatial code. A methodology for generating such a code has not been found, so it is created comprehensively, using all possible methods, but the decisive “word” is left to intuition, whose activation is called inspiration. The study of the megaform has a private, purely personal intuitive nature. Every day, every minute, in every situation, a myriad of forms float before our eyes. One analyzes, seeks and snatches “megaforms”, or at least their fragmentary presence, from this flow without a trace, because only they give such a sense of primeval awe, which penetrates, bypassing consciousness, the deep bowels of the human being. It is worth noting that only the megaform is capable of: attracting attention, making an impact, lingering in memory. Other forms are not fixed by consciousness at all, they are invisible.
A megaform is an almost mythological creature. It is difficult to describe, and even more difficult to domesticate. It should not be easily accessible, it should not be too much, but shortage also robs the picture of life greatly. It is as valuable as gold, but what is the point of gold if there is too much of it. It will lose its value and become tiresome and irritating.
One shouldn’t hope to see Megaform in all the works of authors who proclaim this idea. It may not be there or it is present in fragments. The important thing is to understand that such a task is formulated and set, and each new work is a new expedition aimed at finding the Megaform.
I am not counting on everyone’s understanding of this task at all. People are all different, and everyone chooses his own, just as people intentionally or ignorantly refuse many of the benefits and “colors” of this world. But when the “megaform” is there, it cannot be overlooked.
The megaform does not depend on scale; if it is reduced, it should not change and lose its meaning. A megaform is a “big” form that would be pleasant to hold in one’s hand. This is because the tactile sense, bypasses the filter of consciousness. In architecture, the mega-form is solved at the layout level. All further work is the work of preserving it.
Invisible forms.
The entire material world has a form, but it is increasingly rare for people to notice it, to pay attention to it. Not to mention how rarely do they admire, enjoy, and remember it.
There are several reasons for this.
Of course, much depends on the viewer, who is unable to perceive form due to an atrophy of sensitivity to it. The world becomes virtual, dematerialized. Due to the enormous flow of various information, special effects, video, light, all kinds of dynamics and sounds, the value of the quality of form is lost, goes into the background. So people stop noticing it like the sky above their heads and many other things.
But the main obstacles are the consciousness templates in the production segment. They prevent everyone from creating “megaforms”. Only the selected few are capable of it, only those who are consciously engaged in this process. A talented sculptor does it best. And then the form becomes not accidental, but deeply conscious. And it simply cannot be overlooked.
Such forms, as a rule, are found in the luxury segment, as far as industry is concerned. Here there is a serious attitude to form and to detail. Here the manufacturer is ready to invest in form. And at the output we see, for example, a luxury car, and we open our mouth and feel an influx of emotions.
The conclusion is that if you pay attention to the form of an object, marked it exactly from this point of view, it means that there is “megaform” in it.
Digital Culture and Form.
Nowadays digital technology has reached such a level of development and popularity that all new forms are modeled in three-dimensional programs. On the one hand it is good. It greatly simplifies the process of creating the form, makes it possible to immediately visualize the product with different parameters, different colors, materials, textures. Then the three-dimensional model goes straight into production, bypassing the human factor. But there is one problem that is imperceptible at first glance – there is a degradation of the form. It ceases to be self-valuable, loses its aesthetic priority, and becomes alien and frigid.
Digital forms are devoid of life, energy, charisma. Being materialized, they continue to be virtual in perception. They are not just emotions, but there are objective reasons behind them.
The first reason is human. Forms are modeled by specialists immersed in the virtual world. For them, the form is a formal envelope. They lose touch with it. Work with the form becomes formal. And in general these are specialists of a different profile, without proper training and education in the field of esoterics and the culture of form creation, its philosophy and psychology. They have no tactile experience and observation.
The second reason is technical. I know from personal experience that you can’t see the shape as such in a 3D program. It is not clear there. Its scale, its density is not clear. You can’t see its nuances. You can’t touch it, hold it in your hands, feel it tactilely. But the sense of touch is the main expert and connoisseur of form. That is why the modeling of forms shifts to the creation of edges, faces, and joints. They are more visible on the screen and easier to work with. All plasticity is reduced to uniform mathematical roundings and optimizations. Even with all the eccentricity, you get a dead and “invisible” shape. A dummy to be painted over. This is as sad as if, for example, smells disappeared or food lost its taste or if all light became electric.
So my main thesis is that the form must be created by hand. It should be obvious at the stage of creation. 3D technology is only an aid, an auxiliary tool, not the main working environment. This is what, at the current level of design technology, can give a chance to create a real “megaform” and not a digital fake. There is no point in judging anyone for being unintelligible-it’s everyone’s own business. But it is a worrying general trend due to the economic specifics of our time. Mass production is always associated with optimization and reduction of the aesthetic qualities of the product. The world is thus filled with low-quality objects, which gradually becomes addictive, and as a consequence the aesthetic demands of the consumer are reduced and the concept of quality form disappears from our lives. The same can be said, but to a lesser extent, about many other manifestations of life: flavor additives make food taste primitive, electronic music is incomparably poorer than acoustic music, indexed colors and RGB colors have dozens of times fewer hues than in nature. Man gradually gets used to living in an artificial world, his sensitivity is dulled, he, in fact, degrades. In practice, this reduces and discolors the quality of real life. All modern computer achievements are several orders of magnitude lower, and will not be able to truly meet the requirements of our own, built-in “bio-computer” for a long time yet.