Designing Through the Darkness 在黑暗中寻找光明

 

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Architect loses his sight, but not his vision  这位建筑师虽然丧失了视力，却仍保有设计的眼光

 

The architects met on a damp Saturday to visit a modern New York landmark, the American Folk Art Museum.

（两名）建筑师在一个潮湿的星期六相约走访纽约的一座现代地标：美国民俗艺术博物馆。

 

But the two men hadn’t traveled to Manhattan to look at the structure’s features.

不过，他们两人到曼哈顿并不是要观看这座建筑物的特征。

 

Instead, they slid their curious fingers along the surface of the bronze façade. Inside, their hands explored a smooth, round railing of warm cherry wood. Their canes clicked along the intricate floor, sensing the shift from concrete to planks of fir.

他们（不用眼睛看，）是以充满好奇的手指滑过铜质建筑正面的表面。走进建筑物内部之后，又用双手探索一道圆润温暖的樱桃木扶手。他们的手扙沿着精致的地板不断轻敲，感受着水泥地转为杉木地板的不同质感。

 

“We were exploring how we could sense it with a cane, sense it with our fingers, sense it with our feet,” said architect Christopher Downey. “There is this great palette of textures. … All of a sudden, it starts to engage your brain in a different way.”

「我们在探索自己如何能用手扙、手指和双脚来感受，」建筑师克里斯多福．道尼说：「这里汇集了各式各样的质感。…突然间，这些质感开始以不同的方式刺激着大脑。」

 

Downey and Lisbon’s Carlos Mourão Pereira joke that their meeting was the “first-ever International Blind Architect Conference.”

道尼和里斯本的卡洛斯．慕劳．贝雷拉笑称他们的相会是「史上首届国际盲人建筑师会议」。

 

But the questions that engage the men are deeply serious: What makes a building beautiful if you can’t see it, and how can you create beautiful structures if you’re blind?

不过，这两人所著迷的却是一个非常严肃的问题：那就是在眼睛看不到的情况下，建筑究竟美在哪里？而盲人又如何能创造出美丽的建筑物呢？

 

The day the world turned black  世界陷入黑暗的那一天

 

In 2007, Downey was coaching his son’s Little League team when he began to have trouble following the ball. A few months later, he could no longer play catch.

二００七年，道尼原本在他儿子的小联盟球队担任指导教练，却开始发现自己没办法追踪到球的去向。几个月后，他连抛接球都办不到了。

 

A neighborhood optometrist referred him to a specialist. Then, Downey was told that a brain tumor was pushing on his optic nerves.

于是他住家附近的验光师把他转介给一位专科医师。结果，医生说他的视神经是遭到脑瘤的压迫。

 

Downey was whisked into intensive care for five days of tests and frantic experimental procedures. When he woke up on March 26, the world had gone black.

道尼随即被送进加护病房，接受五天的检验和急骤的实验程序。他在三月二十六日醒来之后，赫然发现世界已陷入了一片黑暗。

 

“That was a tough day, realizing that [blindness] is the new deal,” he said. “It’s hard for me to get through a day like that.”

「那天非常难受，知道自己从此以后必须盲眼度日，」他说：「度过那样的一天，对我来说实在很痛苦。」

 

 

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damp [dæmp] adj. 潮湿的

slide [slaɪd] v. 滑，滑动

façade [fəˋsɑd] n.（建筑物的）正面；前面

railing [ˋrelɪŋ] n. 栏杆，扶手；栅栏，围栏

cane [ken] n. 手杖，拐杖

plank [plæŋk] n. 木板制品（如桌、凳等）

fir [fɝ] n. 冷杉，枞；松科常绿树

texture [ˋtɛkstʃɚ] n.（织物的）组织，结构，质地

engage [ɪnˋgedʒ] v. 吸引（人）; 引起（注意、兴趣）；占用（时间，精力等）interconnect; bring into operation; activate

first-ever [͵fɝstˋɛvɚ] adj. 破天荒第一次（或第一个）的

optometrist [ɑpˋtɑmətrɪst] n. 验光师，视光师

optic nerve【解】视神经  the bundle of nerve fibers that pass signals from the retina at the back of each eye to the brain

deal [dil] n. 交易; 待遇

 

 

 

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Reaching out  向外求援

 

It seemed more important than ever for Downey to talk to someone who had mastered the field of architecture without the most basic tool of all: eyesight.

道尼此刻最重要的事情似乎就是找一个人商谈──这个人即使缺乏视力这项最基本的工具，却精通建筑的领域。

 

“Dear Mr. Carlos Mourão Pereira,” he wrote to this stranger in Portugal, describing him as “amazingly” the only blind architect “that I had been able to locate since I started searching.“

「敬爱的卡洛斯．慕劳．贝雷拉先生，」他写信给葡萄牙的这位陌生人，声称对方是「我开始寻觅以来，唯一能够找到的」盲人建筑师，这真「令人难以置信」。

 

Pereira quickly wrote back, “A blind architect is specially sensitive to tactile, acoustic and smelling details of the architecture …. The important thing is [to] not stop working.”

贝雷拉立即回信：「盲人建筑师对于建筑物的触感、音声和气味等细节特别敏感。…重要的是，不要停止工作。」

 

A light in the dark  黑暗中的明灯

 

In the summer of 2009, Downey sat at the Western Blind Rehabilitation Center two seats from Millicent Williams, who supervises the men and women who teach blind veterans how to perform basic tasks again.

二００九年夏天，道尼坐在西方盲人复健中心里，而米莉森．威廉丝和他相隔两个座位。威廉丝手下督导的人员专门教导失明已久的人重拾生活基本技能。

 

Downey slid a heavy piece of paper down the table toward Williams – the floor plan, embossed in thick raised lines, of a sprawling new building for the center.

道尼在桌面上把一张沉重的纸张推向威廉丝──这是复建中心一座大型新建筑的平面图，由粗厚、凸起的线条压印而成。

 

Like her students, Williams is blind. Although her input in designing the facility has been key, she has struggled to understand its intricacies.

威廉丝和自己的学生一样，也是盲人。她在这座建筑的设计过程中所提供的构想虽然是重要关键，但她即使费尽心思也很难了解其中的精微之处。

 

But as Williams touched the 3-D diagram, she was able toenvision the seating areas and doorways.

不过，当威廉丝触摸了这份3-D立体设计图之后，就能在脑海中想象出座位区和门口的模样了。

 

“Oh, this is what we’ve been talking about,” she said. “Now this makes sense.”

「哦，这就是我们谈过的啊，」她说：「这样设计很合理耶。」

 

No one at either of the architecture firms designing the facility had worked on buildings for the blind. So when they met Downey, they were intrigued enough to hire him as a consultant.

负责设计这座建筑的两家建筑事务所都没有人设计过供盲人使用的建筑物，因此他们和道尼见面之后，就对他很感兴趣并雇用他担任顾问。

 

Downey collaborated on a room-numbering system to help blind students navigate the building. The facility will use different textured flooring so students can tell where they are by the tap of a cane.

道尼参与设计了一套房间编号系统，这套系统能协助盲人学生在室内通行无碍。这座建筑将采用不同质地的地板，好让学生能借着用手杖轻敲就知道自己所在的位置。

 

Vision for the future  展望未来

 

Over the last months, the building’s design has been transformed in subtle ways. So has Downey.

过去几个月来，这座建筑的设计有过不少细腻的改变，而道尼本人也是一样。

 

“I don’t have any control over what happened, but I do have a lot of control over where we go from here,” he said. “But with this project, all of a sudden it became clear where my real value is.”

「我完全无法控制所发生的事情，但我却能掌控此后的人生走向，」他说：「参与这项计划之后，我突然清楚了解到自己真正的价值了。」

 

−by Maria L. La Ganga

 

 

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reach out 伸手, 向…伸出援助之手 move forward or upward in order to touch; also in a metaphorical sense; attempt to communicate

Portugal [ˋportʃʊg!] n. 葡萄牙

locate [loˋket] v. 找出

acoustic [əˋkustɪk] adj. 听觉的

supervise [ˋsupɚvaɪz] v. 监督；管理；指导

sprawling [ˋsprɔlɪŋ] adj. 不规则地伸展的

intricacy [ˋɪntrəkəsɪ] n.（常复数）错综复杂的事物

diagram [ˋdaɪə͵græm] n. 图表；图解

intrigued [ɪnˋtrigd] adj. 好奇的；被迷住了的

textured [ˋtɛkstʃɚd] adj. 具备某种质感的 describes something that has a surface that is not smooth but has a raised pattern on it

 

 

 

 

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intricate [ˋɪntrəkɪt] adj. 复杂精细的 having many small or complicated parts and details

palette [ˋpælɪt] n.  调色板；调色盘；画板 a range of qualities or colors, especially those typically used by an artist

whisk [hwɪsk] v. 迅速移动；突然带走 to take someone somewhere else quickly

frantic [ˋfræntɪk] adj. 匆忙混乱的; 紧张忙乱的 done in a very great hurry and often in a state of excitement or confusion

tactile [ˋtæktɪl] adj.（有）触觉的 related to the sense of touch

emboss [ɪmˋbɔs] v. 饰以浮雕花纹, 加以浮饰 to decorate an object, using special tools that make a raised mark on its surface 

collaborate [kəˋlæbə͵ret] v. 合作，共同研究，协调 to work with someone else for a special purpose

 

 

read more from: American Folk Art Museum

 

Christopher Downey of Piedmont, Calif., who lost his sight to a brain tumor, navigates his office in San Francisco. He was an architect before going blind, and he remains one today. He's now working on the sprawling Polytrauma & Blind Rehabilitation Center, scheduled to open in three or four years in Palo Alto. (Robert Durell / For The Times)