Inclined Planes and the Oblique Function as a Resistance to Gravity

Abstract

Initially constructed for raising objects from one level to another with less effort, the science of inclined planes as simple machines was discovered in the Renaissance period, with their mechanical advantages of prior importance and secondly, linking spaces at different levels both in landscape architecture, interior spaces and in architecture. Although inclined planes are used in many places, in today’s architectural spaces, studies on the perception of the inclined planes are few in architecture; they have also been discussed in psychology in the context of the “oblique effect” since the 1970s. Transgressing functionality of access from levels in a space, inclined spaces can be regarded as places of habitation as they have a polyvalence spatiality that evokes emotions and different behaviour and movements of the body. The inclined plane provides kinaesthetic perception and motion and provides triggers and dynamism in space. As gravity-defying circulation elements that stimulate the viewer’s mind and their movement through proprioceptive senses, this article focuses on the perception and the sensations of the inclined planes with an emphasis on Claude Parent and Paul Virilio’s oblique function through its evolution in history within a theoretical approach to the relationship between architecture and movement.