2007.06.26 16:09
Anti-Starchitecture Chic
I don't think there's any doubt the Breuer name played a role within your initial post here. I believe you when you say Breuer's attachment did not play a role for you personally, but it did play a role beyond that.
And don't get me wrong, I'm not passing any judgement. I'm just asking if anti-starchitecture chic really exists?
2007.06.26 15:53
Anti-Starchitecture Chic
I agree that there are many "anonymous" buildings worth keeping, and even impressive/accomplished when looked at more closely. Yet, without the name most people (including most architects?) don't even give a damn.
2007.06.26 14:58
For the pleasure of sharing ideas, through the poetry of the printed word
Well, that doesn't negate the fact that you did indeed ask a question.
I think my favorite poem is...
so the question, so the answer
...honest.
2007.06.26 14:52
Anti-Starchitecture Chic
Would the Grosse Point library have garnered so much attention if Breuer was not the architect? The building itself appears rather anonymous, like many, many other buildings by 'anonymous architects'. Is there really such a thing as anti-starchitecture chic?
2007.06.26 14:29
For the pleasure of sharing ideas, through the poetry of the printed word
A plain old lie is for sure less honest than memory. Memories are mental reenactments, and, for sure, a reenactment can never be the original. Those are givens.
Yes, one can certainly tell an unwitting falsehood, and that's usually due to not knowing all pertinent information, or some such circumstance. Whereas to actually tell a lie means that indeed the liar does know the honest truth, but chooses not to express it. In which case the memory is indeed truthful, although the expression of the memory isn't truthful.
2007.06.26 13:33
For the pleasure of sharing ideas, through the poetry of the printed word
Perhaps at first it's instinctual, and then, as one learns to trust one's instincts, it becomes a skill. That's at least the reader's part. The writer gives off clues within their style. Citing "failing memory" is often such a clue.
You're not suggesting that people at archinect aren't always being completely honest are you?!? Such a prick would surely burst the (hot air?) balloon.
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2007.06.26 11:55
For the pleasure of sharing ideas, through the poetry of the printed word
I love being inspired, thus the new working title of my next book project is The Faux Failing Memory.
The interesting thing about the written word is that you can almost always tell when the author isn't being completely honest. At least I can.
2007.06.26 10:00
For the pleasure of sharing ideas, through the poetry of the printed word
Look, "When in Rome..."
Subject: Re: A trivial day
Date: Fri, 19 Nov 1999
At around 9:59 am this morning, I was sitting next to my brother in the waiting room of a doctor's office, waiting for one of Otto's regular doctor visits. Since the days in 1994 when I used to take our Dad to therapy after he lost his first leg, I always take a clipboard and pad of paper with me whenever I have to go a doctor's office (which is a lot!). Anyway, I always write notes, and I always date them. So today I started by writing 11.19.99, and I said to Otto, "look, today's one one one nine nine nine." It didn't seem to impress him.
I've been writing all day, actually. I have to finish up a paper I'll be presenting in Brussels, Belgium next week (Thanksgiving Day, which, in case you don't know, comes after Ax Wednesday). The paper is on Piranesi's Campo Marzio, and today I've been writing the section entitled "love and war." Here's my favorite paragraph:
Atop the bluffs along the south bank of the Petronia Amnis, Piranesi situates a series garden villas among a scattering of other building types. The planning of the villas individually is orderly, if not also symmetrical, yet, in relation to one another, the grouping of the villas appears completely disorganized. Once the names of the various buildings is understood, however, a distinctive pattern develops. The first and largest villa is the Horti Lucullani, the Gardens of L. Licinius Lucullus, which, in 46 AD "belonged to Valerius Asiaticus, but were coveted by Messalina, who compelled the owner to commit suicide." Messalena was the nymphomaniac wife of the emperor Claudius. Next to the Horti Lucullani is the plain and simple Horti Narcissi; Narcissus was the name of the freedman of Claudius by whose orders Messalena was put to death. Next to the Horti Narcissi is the triangular Horti Anteri. There was no real garden of Anteri in ancient Rome, but there was such a thing as an anteros, which is an avenger of slighted love, or, in this case, love triangles. Then there is a bath complex in honor of Venus, the love goddess herself, and then a nympheum named for Tiberius, an emperor known for his fondness of pornography. And, at the edge of the Ichnographia, there is the Viridarium Lucii Cornificii, a pleasure garden with two building extensions clearly phallic in plan. Finally, among these structures of love and lust are two Turres expugnandae, military defense towers whose plans no doubt represent substantial erections.
ps
I watched Woody Allen's Hannah and Her Sisters for the first time last night. I had no idea one of the minor characters was going to be an architect with a schizophrenic wife.
pss
There's now sans aspirations, posthumously yours, dead and buried, and, of course, me. But who knows for how long.
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2007.06.25 16:55
Anti-Starchitecture Chic
25 June 1925 - birth of Robert Venturi
25 June 1992 - death of James Stirling
2007.06.25 10:36
For the pleasure of sharing ideas, through the poetry of the printed word
My predominate stlye is 'letter writing' style. Honest, easy and personal.
What I'd like to do more of is 'fictitious historical dialogue'.
As of yesterday, reading Duboy (again) along with ongoing Montesquieu and spotty Foucault--bricolage plus letters plus Las Meninas etc. Mix that with 'fictitious historical dialogue' and you have my next book project.
It's a book about all kinds of style. The working title is über œuvred e suicidal. Piranesi hires a Quaker lawyer to fix historical inaccuracies while the Quaker lawyer hires Piranesi to design an historically accurate house. Neither knew of the other's true propensity--playful double-meaning meets good-natured honesty--yet they discover themselves to be a formidable team. You'll think you're laughing and you'll laugh about thinking.
2007.06.24 19:41
Everyday Urbanism - Design and/or Default
And I'm sure it's that time of year again.
non-event cities wo bist du?
2007.06.24 19:21
Everyday Urbanism - Design and/or Default
Like Koolhaas said, Luxury is "Rough",
but I really don't miss the everyday at all.
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2007.06.24 18:55
Everyday Urbanism - Design and/or Default
One of my favorite everyday urban places was actually mostly the inside of my car?
genius loci?
love among the ruins
what's next, every inch a gentleman?
ancient Lenni Lenape trail leading to the summer solstice celebration site
$1.13 a gallon for regular?!?
hangin' with Julia Roberts, kinda
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