Taliesin Institute announced by the Foundation
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Mark Hertzberg
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Taliesin Institute announced by the Foundation
Mark Hertzberg
Re: Taliesin Institute announced by the Foundation
Huh. A glitch in the Foundation's own Website ?
There's this: https://yourvalley.net/stories/the-fran ... ute,283808
As I see it, defining what it is that makes Wright and his work different remains an uncompleted task. The more that his name is evoked as an exemplar of something better, something beyond the norm---ergo, something to be desired, today more than ever (?)---the more people will be asking, "What makes Wright unique ?"
"We know it when we see it" works for Wrightians, I think---those "in the know" and familiar with the work. But that can hardly suffice as the basis for a curriculum or the impetus for a new institution. For me there will always be a dichotomy between what Wright's work looks like and what is said about it in terms of a vague and squishy set of "principles." While Realtors and others are happy to point to appearances (correctly or amiss) and ideologues are pleased by the Principles, does either end of this spectrum really do the man and the work full justice ? Can anyone deny that the list of Wrightian principles commonly offered differs little from the requirements any responsible architectural designer accepts as his duty, today as yesterday ?
It is an inconvenient truth that architecture has caught up with Mr Wright, a century later: his sensitivity to environment, to the land and to nature, his recognition of the importance of an economical and psychologically relevant form of human shelter, is common parlance in the profession today. What has he left to teach us ?
"Several things," is no doubt the answer on the tongues of my readers. Can you name them ? Were they the basis for the practice of the successor firm ? Are they what was taught at the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture ? Just what are they---and will they also be the focus of the new Institute ?
S
There's this: https://yourvalley.net/stories/the-fran ... ute,283808
As I see it, defining what it is that makes Wright and his work different remains an uncompleted task. The more that his name is evoked as an exemplar of something better, something beyond the norm---ergo, something to be desired, today more than ever (?)---the more people will be asking, "What makes Wright unique ?"
"We know it when we see it" works for Wrightians, I think---those "in the know" and familiar with the work. But that can hardly suffice as the basis for a curriculum or the impetus for a new institution. For me there will always be a dichotomy between what Wright's work looks like and what is said about it in terms of a vague and squishy set of "principles." While Realtors and others are happy to point to appearances (correctly or amiss) and ideologues are pleased by the Principles, does either end of this spectrum really do the man and the work full justice ? Can anyone deny that the list of Wrightian principles commonly offered differs little from the requirements any responsible architectural designer accepts as his duty, today as yesterday ?
It is an inconvenient truth that architecture has caught up with Mr Wright, a century later: his sensitivity to environment, to the land and to nature, his recognition of the importance of an economical and psychologically relevant form of human shelter, is common parlance in the profession today. What has he left to teach us ?
"Several things," is no doubt the answer on the tongues of my readers. Can you name them ? Were they the basis for the practice of the successor firm ? Are they what was taught at the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture ? Just what are they---and will they also be the focus of the new Institute ?
S
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Roderick Grant
- Posts: 11815
- Joined: Wed Mar 29, 2006 7:48 am
Re: Taliesin Institute announced by the Foundation
For years, I tried to get the Foundation to look into the possibility of turning both Taliesins into foundations like the Yaddo Artist Colony and the MacDowell Colony, where artist of all sorts can gather and learn, not only from expert practitioners, but from one another, a retreat from the chaos of the outside world to the repose of a community of architects, painters, poets, musicians and the like. They scoffed. But this move looks like a step in that direction. To survive, they will have to broaden their subject matter; there are not enough people searching for the meaning of organic architecture to keep the Foundation on its feet.