Why architects design such awful buildings. I think something similar goes on in the fashion industry. And if we don’t get how wonderful their creations are, there’s something wrong with us.
Lileks, call your office. I think that Tom Wolfe had something to say about this as well.
Photo looks like Level 5 from one of those ubiquitous dystopian first-person-shooters. Come to think of it, the guys at ID could really break out of their rut by taking a page from Thomas Kinkaid…
So they can’t design appealing buildings because there’s something mentally wrong with them? Bull-tookus. Bad buildings are of a piece with bad modern “fine” art and bad modern “classical” music. What they have in common is the elite arbiters who grant the prizes and the government funding (and therefore dictate the design culture) are purposely isolated from an accessible esthetic because it automatically justifies the existence of the elite itself.
And, of course, the western nomenclatura goes along with the gag because it validates their elitist self image.
Yes, it’s the Singularity of crap, just like their politics: the only way to climb the ladder is to be more insane than the previous guy, and so on…
A couple weeks ago, I read an article about the proposed Eisenhower Monument. The artists who are designing the monument are very pleased with their design but the Eisenhower family considers it an abomination. The artists fail to realize that the monument isn’t about them.
Architects are trained in art and engineering. I think their training in art isn’t serving them well for designing buildings. Like you said, much of modern art is indistinguishable from crap. The buildings an architect design should meet the buyer’s needs and desires, not make a “statement” of artistic merit. It isn’t about the architect but the customer and the broader community.
Uh-oh. Now I’m imagining the Barack Obama Presidential Library resembling something dog owners have to pick up and put in a bag if it happens in a public park.
Now that would be a perfect confluence of form and function, don’t you think?
A dog-turd shaped Obama Presidential Library would be fitting with his administration. In recent years, the Navy has been naming new ships after presidents. The USS Jimmy Carter is an attack sub and the USS Ronald Reagan, USS Gerald Ford and USS George H. W. Bush are aircraft carriers. There is a lot of discussion that the USS Clinton should be a garbage scow. What should the USS Obama be? How about a dredging ship because he sucks so bad?
A building was assumed to meet the physiological and social needs of the people of that neighborhood first and foremost, and only then it would express its artistic qualities.
I think they’ve got this backwards. Regardless, I think the simple truth is that fewer people can produce art than the number that become architects.
Theirs also the fad factor.
We seem to look for mental problems when the truth is much simpler.
I’m surprised Christopher Alexander wasn’t mentioned in the article. Incidentally Alexander’s work has had a great deal of influence on software development, and as I understand it on David Masten’s approach to RLV development.
Rotten people → Rotten culture → Rotten art.
The only way to heal art is to heal the culture. The only way to heal the culture is to heal the souls of the human beings from which culture grows.
Enter God, in Whom most here do not believe. And so the problem will continue.