Monuments to Futility

[Paul Ringstrom]

https://americanmind.org/salvo/monuments-to-futility/

[jay]

Right wing propaganda mixed with a dime-a-dozen critique on "conformity".

[SDR]

Heh-heh. The stereotype "Modern Architecture = Evil" which played again and again in the movies hasn't gone away, apparently. It's been taken up by some of the same people who claim that Hollywood itself is a threat to civic order ?

On the same page can be found a piece from almost three years ago, "BAP's Bait and Switch," which serves the purpose of showing how some on the other side hold the same sorts of suspicions that we on the left entertain---an example of why we should take the trouble to expose ourselves to those with differing opinions ? Clearly there's doubt and suspicion, justified or not, on all fronts. A sorry state of affairs, indeed . . .

S

[jay]

A pointless exercise to declare hypocrisy, I know....but man I love the irony of criticizing "conformity" and then quickly steering into the talking points of a political ideology.

[Tim]

Which part or parts of the article do you disagree with?

[SDR]

"Petty and Pathetic Dreams" (two paragraphs); "Disordered and Chaotic Lives" (first two paragraphs).

Ludditic rants ? "Nothing to see here; everything is just fine as it is. Drill, baby, drill . . ."

S

[Roderick Grant]

I thought we were getting away from turning WC into a political screed.

The article was written by an undergraduate 20-something, if not still adolescent. The responses here sound defensive and glib, suggesting that maybe adolescent "know-it-all-ism" is not necessarily left behind on one's 20th birthday. I used to think no one under the age of 30 should be listened to; now, in my old age, I am beginning to think no one who expresses an opinion on any subject should be listened to, regardless of age.

Getting back to architecture: What do ya'll think of the 3 examples Blaise Ebener critiqued?

[SDR]

"Monstrosity": https://www.google.com/search?q=Smithso ... 3SgmGZouuM

"Disordered and chaotic":
https://th.bing.com/th/id/R.9cf5c8c70f3 ... ImgRaw&r=0

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_C ... ary_01.jpg

[Tim]

This one is difficult to gauge from the images. I feel like I get what they are going for. How it will live in the real world - time will tell. (My imagination cannot bridge it.)

"Monstrosity": https://www.google.com/search?q=Smithso ... 3SgmGZouuM

#####

These two are awful.

"Disordered and chaotic":
https://th.bing.com/th/id/R.9cf5c8c70f3 ... ImgRaw&r=0

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_C ... ary_01.jpg

#####

The Guggenheim Museum is a good comparison. It feels like the first example. I would need to see it live to judge it. (Again, my imagination cannot bridge it.)

I had actually seen the Guggenheim after looking at images for a decade. I admired the try but it was not successful - in my view.

[SDR]

We all judge buildings by a single or a few photos, of necessity---while knowing full well that the only true test is "on the ground and in your face" (and ears, and nose, and skin . . .)

S

[Stephen Cowdery]

The Rem Koolhaas Seattle Library is the only one I have seen and been in, I found it to be glorious and inspired and yes, even transcendent, inside and out.

I found the referenced article odd in that the author started off with an apparent screed against soul-less cookie-cutter shopping architecture and then attacked three buildings that might not be everyone's cup of tea but are certainly, by any standard, not cookie-cutter nor are they monuments to disorder, uselessness, and ugliness.

[JimM]

A lifetime trying to wrap my mind around the probable truth that taste is subjective still evades me, just as nothing about this budding critic's commentary exhibits expertise or rises above simple opinion.

I've only been to the Seattle Library, and although well executed, I didn't find it particularly interesting enough to set it apart from other examples of the "oblique glass facade" school. Just as a Usonian contextually conveys something different than early Wright residentially, the library got caught being a squat variant of the ubiquitous skyscrapers of the genre.

As far as the SAAH museum... "monstrosity"? His inability to consider the probable intent (and success IMO) of conveying one may find the contents of this brooding structure just as unsettling as the exterior, reveals his immaturity of what contemporary architecture can and should be. An argument against such a focus could be made, but it does legitimately encapsulate the dominant fact of a culture forcefully taken for generations of a significant number of Americans-similar to Liebskind's shard-ridden Berlin Jewish Museum. Along with the accepted classicism of Jefferson, Washington and Lincoln just as appropriate for the national mall as the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. I suspect should the critic transport to antiquity he would abhor the Corinthian capital versus the Doric. Wright ran into the same marble quarry mindset with both Crystal Heights and the AF Academy.

I do like the dynamic simplicity of the Denver museum, also by Liebskind, and should be noted one building of a complex. For my taste the metallic sheathing adds unneeded additional harshness, but again, a successful expression of probable content. One question it might beg could be, "What came first, the building or the red sculpture beside it?"

[Stephen Cowdery]

Here is an interesting article comparing Seattle's library and its City Hall, both projects initiated in 1999:

https://www.architectmagazine.com/desig ... -seattle_o

One of the knocks of the Library was its use of cheap materials in the interior but it was built to meet a price point.
The City Hall was more expensive per foot, which seems odd in that its actual usage (meeting rooms, offices) was far less challenging that the numerous technical challenges of the library's structure.

Both designs are now a quarter of a century old and each was successful, in different ways. It remains to be seen if their utility will last for another 25 years.

[Roderick Grant]

As a non-apologetic apologist for FLW, I must admit that I do not entirely disagree with Tim's opinion of Guggenheim. In the fullness of FLW's work, its status as "almost" the greatest of his accomplishments is exaggerated; there are many other works that are greater, not just Fallingwater and Taliesin. However, Guggenheim is undoubtedly responsible (with a nod to Frank Furness) for transforming museum architecture from neoclassical stone piles to works of art themselves ... for better or worse. This also led to a transformation of all public buildings away from echoes of the past, which in itself has been a "good thing," as Martha would say. Yet specifically, one example at a time, many of those buildings might be evaluated independently as desperate attempts to best the master by doing odd things just because they can, as is too often the case with Koolhaas and his CCTV building in Beijing. Like it or not, FLW still looms large. These 3 examples make the case.

[SDR]

I think that's quite fair. For me it's always been Wright's residential work that shines. I'd say his last great public work was Johnson Wax; he got a strong early start in that vein with Unity Temple and the Larkin building, only the former of which survives today. No public work of the postwar period---built or not---rises to that level, as I see it. But I'm sure you're right that the Guggenheim opened a door. If it led to the Guggenheim Bilbao, so be it . . .?

I visited the museum several times in the early years of its existence, and found it impressive and entertaining. I wonder if it palls upon repeated exposure. Increasingly adventurous use of its space in recent decades perhaps serves to refresh it for New Yorkers and others.

I won't be happy until the Gugg is returned to its native color---the means by which, as much as its form, it distinguished itself from its architectural milieu. New York is the Great Gray City; the sand-colored spiral castle was the jewel in its midst. Today---not so much.

S