Abstract
This thesis is a critical inquiry into the nature of expositions using a structuralist semiotic approach in the analysis. The analysis aids in modifying theoretical assumptions in academia and tenders a methodical, complete and coherent study of expositions as a whole, not just instances of it. By locating exposition architecture within a structuralist semiotic framework, the central idea is to show that a semiotic analysis of expositions addresses issues that might otherwise go unnoticed. This is done first by identifying general features of expositions, then by appealing to concepts developed in semiotic analyses that are useful in understanding expositions, and third by applying such an analysis to four specific exposition pavilions. The study ends with a discussion of how a semiotic analysis of expositions raises legitimate questions about exposition architecture in general and whether there really can be a field of study called architectural semiotics. The study reveals that exposition pavilions, while behaving as 'signs,' tell us things that other theories of architecture fail to. Expositions attempt to show what happens when a sign is isolated from a system of signs. The fundamental purpose here is not to present expositions as they actually are, but to evoke different levels of meaning, making their elements readable and understandable in several different ways. Refined and advanced by others, this approach will certainly open new avenues for the study of architecture as a system that embodies significance.
Krishnan, Sudarshan (2001). The exposition pavilion: a play of structure and sign. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from
https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /ETD -TAMU -2001 -THESIS -K77.