Form4 Architecture | John Marx, Installation view at Palazzo Mora, 2016.

By default Architecture implies an intense commitment to being in the world. It has physical extension, it involves sequencing, and it constitutes the autobiographical imprint in material substance of its creator. In brief, it resides in Time, Space, Existence.
The 9[+3] Conversations is a visual-textual artwork dealing with the broader philosophical choices architects make in their longing for meaningful space. 9 are pictorial poems illustrating an architectural design philosophy. [+3] are the existential premises journaling the uniquely personal itinerary of those individuals embracing architecture as a life project: the why (Epiphany), one's place in the order of things (Avocation), and the challenged navigation of one's own choices in life (Existence). The rebus is the rhetorical device both groupings share within the artwork. As an ensemble, they invite viewers to decode, interpret, connect, and reflect. Each poem intersects the Visual (V), the Textual (T), and the Work (W), three areas encompassed in a living philosophy. Poems are paired with either one or two projects, in each case illustrating the relationship of the Work to the underlying philosophy. The poems featured reflect the inner world of design architect John Marx.
We present our concepts through highly concentrated optical allusions. Our Work is impregnated with aspirations, ambitions, and anticipations; that is those intentions mobilizing the individual to externalize in architecture all that lives within the self in an effort to communicate with others the range of emotions nested in the flow of Time. Architecture is a co-author of the book of Time, its setting being Space, framing the collective's Existence. It transcends the immediate pragmatics of building to reach dimensions where the personal and the universal fuse into a socio-cultural and metaphysical continuum. Heretofore literary language has alluded to bigger things, the inscrutable, the ineffable, the ungraspable. Its acknowledgement of the self – either producer or consumer of architecture – is an attempt to bring back the focus on a balanced relationship between the humane and the rational side coexisting in the mind. The 9[+3] Conversations aim at striking that chord resonating in those who feel the vastness of its argument. They shape the Work and in turn are recalibrated by it. Each designer would likely craft diverse conversations.
Clustering these 9 headings/titles [+ 3] life constants into an exhibition conveys the desire to engage the stable technology of paper. These visuals are reflections and solace, roadmaps and statements of belief, pledges and romance. Over three decades of John Marx's design practice, the Work has unveiled a coherent philosophy. These 9 [+3] commitments are both generative and interpretative of it. The 9 conversations are given purposefully enigmatic visual and textual representations. The graphic texture of each composition invites viewers to take a creative, interpretative leap. The 9[+3] Conversations introduces the viewer to a puzzle with suggested connections. The narrative outlines one possible interpretation among many and explains the links in the iconography. Nothing is either conclusive or definitive. The puzzle is open, holding pieces that are amenable to variable arrangements.