Compelling Form

Book excerpt: Compelling Form: Architecture as Visual Persuasion is an assessment of the visual persuasiveness of buildings. It demonstrates that architecture is as capable of social influence as speeches or advertisements are and that an awareness of this influence provides an insight into buildings’ cultural roles. The book considers a diverse array of structures ranging from museums, to performance halls, to universities, to cathedrals, to governmental buildings, to palaces, and to skyscrapers. Compelling Form is an important extension of theories of persuasion and visual communication to architecture and engineering. The book bases its assessments on the elements of visual literacy and then on the elements of architectural design to demonstrate that buildings, monuments, and even such means of commerce as bridges affect the viewer in such a way as to have social impact.