Modernism in the City/Gehry in Brooklyn
Charles Taylor’s review in the journal Dissent of From a Cause to a Style: Modernist Architecture’s Encounter with the American City, by Nathan Glazer, is worth a read. Glazer looks at how the ideals of modernism have been usurped by the making of starchitects, whose personal vision for a building outweighs the consideration of the…
Charles Taylor’s review in the journal Dissent of From a Cause to a Style: Modernist Architecture’s Encounter with the American City, by Nathan Glazer, is worth a read. Glazer looks at how the ideals of modernism have been usurped by the making of starchitects, whose personal vision for a building outweighs the consideration of the building’s context or a social agenda. “When architects are regarded chiefly as artists, discussion of their work is reduced to a question of their personal vision,” Taylor writes. “Questions of whether a building serves those who use it or the larger community, of whether it honors or ignores the style and scale of its surroundings, of whether it adds to or damages the life of its neighborhood, are treated as quaintly prosaic and utilitarian, akin to reducing any consideration of a work of art to its social relevance.”
That’s his zoomed out theorizing, which translates this way when talking about Atlantic Yards. “Introducing his design for Atlantic Yards, Gehry spoke about trying to understand ‘the body language of Brooklyn.’ But the only language Gehry has ever been interested in is the language of Frank Gehry. To say he is defiantly noncontextual is to imply that context enters into his thought at all.”
Gehry may have been ousted from the Theater for a New Audience building, but his vision for Atlantic Yards, which, no matter your opinion of it, seems pretty noncontextual considering the neighborhoods around it, remains.
A Wrench in the Machine for Living: Frank Gehry Comes to Brooklyn [Dissent]
Photo from the Atlantic Yards Web site.
Oh c’mon, the thing is just FUGLY
I deplore large high rise projects, always have. I don’t like them as architecture, and I don’t like them as human warehouses. If I have ever defended them, it was a defense of their existence as a form of necessary housing for people whose choices are those buildings or nothing. I’ve defended the right of low income people to a roof over their heads as a basic right of living in the richest country in the world.
My personal preferences for public houses would be buildings no higher than 6 stories, but I don’t like a lot of the barracks that get built either.
When I was in college, I was tempted to become an architect after taking an inspiring class on the challeges of public housing – how to create buildings that both meet the practical needs of public budget concerns, space, and density, while balancing them against the human needs of personal space, room for kids, community, and the instillation of pride of place. I ended up going in a different direction, partly because I can’t draw that well, but that class instilled a love of the profession that is with me still. If there had been a degree for historic preservation at the time, like Columbia has now, I think I would have gotten that architectural degree.
All that to say that even in this class, there was no firm consensus on how to solve these problems, only a firm belief, that I share, that packing people into towers is not the ideal answer to the challenges of public housing.
Many many buildings and residences from the 50’s and 60’s absolutely are cherished, admired and protected and YES, Mimi they are standing just fine. You have know idea what you are talking about.
Montrose;
Sorry, my question wasn’t clearly written. I was refering to some of your posts in the past in which you have defended the projects. In my memory you defended both the concept of the projects, and their physcial form.
Comments?
“he is an effective protagonist, and suffers for going up against some of the orthodoxy that reigns in Brownstoner country.”
You’ve set the bar pretty low there benson. You seem to have missed some of his more interesting posts from the past.
You lost me there, Benson, where did I ever mention the projects in this thread? If you are referring to my Starrett City remark (which are not projects, I hope you know), you misread the intent of my remark.
I was saying that I hope that something banal, like the architecture of Starrett City, was not built on the site. That AY was worthy of a quality design, and that there has to be something workable yet attractive. I don’t want bland econo-towers anymore than I want the glass and steel representation of a crumpled piece of paper.
Hope that clears it up for you. I do try for consistancy at all times. You gotta give me that one.
Hey Montrose;
It seems to me that you are being inconsistent in your message to Polemecist.
Here you are decrying the idea of the “towers in the park” concept of high-rise housing (inspired by Le Corbusier (sp?)), yet at the same time you defend the same type of housing for the projects. Seems to me that this is the same type of housing -only the financial arrangements are different. What gives?
BTW: I agree about hi-rise housing, but I can’t follow your logic on this.
Finally, I feel a need to stand up for Polemecist, as he seems to be the villian of the day. While I don’t necessarily agree with him on this one, he is an effective protagonist, and suffers for going up against some of the orthodoxy that reigns in Brownstoner country. Keep your chin up, Polemecist!
Ouch! MM. I just envisioned a little old lady dragging some skinny hipsterish kid in black jeans and spiked gelled hair down the street. what fun!
It isn’t surprising that someone like polemicist would misconstrue Jane Jacobs intent.
Yes, i disagree, I don’t think new architecture should necessarily be forced to emulate the neighborhood. there’s room for preservation and innovation. And I couldn’t agree more with you about the meaning of “workability”, but perhaps there is no real answer for that and its the process that will eventually define what does and doesn’t work? Speaking in the sense that Ratner made no real efforts to reach out to the community, other than to manipulate them for his own purposes. But had the community not felt so pushed out, or believed the project was able to bypass the proper reviews at their expense, workability might have taken on a different meaning?
Polemicist, I hardly think Jane Jacobs’ use of the word density, as applied to suburban sprawl, has any relevance to over massing of people in an uban environment. She consistantly encouraged the urban village, walkable, livable, urban settings that encouraged a healthy street life, and the interaction of people. Where is that life in a semi-gated high rise enclave that isolates itself from the two neighborhoods it divides, one that has appropriated streets and bridges and parks unto itself?
I think Jane Jacobs would have gone up one side of you and down the other for your theories of urban density, to the destriment of a quality of life. Your vision, which seems to be perfectly illustrated by the photo in today’s links, would have horrified her. Plus, she would have grabbed your ear and twisted it if she heard some of your ideas about the worth of the Baby Boom generation.