Tuesday, January 26, 2010
'You want ugly buildings? I'll show you ugly buildings'
Adam goes on a great rant about about modern architecture and ugly buildings:
Adam goes on a great rant about about modern architecture and ugly buildings:
People resent structures like City Hall not because they are different but because they represent a deliberate attempt to stamp a giant boot on the face of the people who paid for it forever (John Collins was, I'm sure, a perfectly grand fellow, but that Orwellian homage to him on the side of City Hall fits the building perfectly). The JFK Building is decried not because it is new (or was when it was built) but because it's insipid and bland - just like those skyscrapers for which an entire vibrant neighborhood was torn down a few blocks away. Damn right people resent having the "old" taken away from them when that represents their homes.For the record: I happen to like the “new” City Hall and many other modern buildings. But Adam’s right that architecture has gone through a long, tired period of either trying to shock the bourgeois or trying not to come across as bourgeois – and the results too often are ugly “modern materials” monstrosities like the Interncontinenal Hotel, etc.
