On architectural drawing today. Notes, observations, questions

Abstract

The disciplines of Drawing, as defined in the sec tor’s manifesto, in their broadest sense, are con cerned with understanding formal structure, and with analysing, conveying, appreciating and disse minating existing values, both tangible and intan gible; from this derive its main fields: the scienti fic-technological and the social-humanistic [1]. For some years now – almost coinciding with the ‘digital revolution’ – we have witnessed an ever-increasing volume of scientific output that is more closely aligned with one aspect of the first sphere – the technological sphere – rather than with the second sphere or the scientific aspect of the first. Naturally, there are exceptions, but it is deeply concerning that these constitute a sub stantial number; for example, to mention just the content of some of them, what emerges is more a description of tools and procedures than a ge nuine analysis of the subject under investigation and its necessary documentation.
It may seem paradoxical, but it happens, for instance, that in a study of an architectural ar tefact – such as a survey – the representations relating to the plan, elevation and section, upon which architecture has built its foundations, are absent, whilst screenshots of digital processes are presented as if they were convincing, the reby distancing both the reader and the author themselves from an understanding of the archi tectural ‘thing’. It also happens, in certain cases – whilst acknowledging the ethical value of interdiscipli narity – that studies from the disciplinary field of ‘Topography’ are presented as studies of ‘Dra wing’, thereby signalling a loss of the very mea ning of the discipline itself; furthermore, terms such as ‘resilience’, ‘panglossianism’ and ‘post pandemic’, by contrast, are thrust into the fray with the aim of ambiguously emphasising—in a flight of fancy—a possible value of drawing.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.20365/disegnarecon.36.2026.aw2