We all presumably agree that it is individual human spirits and not
works (or peoples or homelands, etc.)
that ultimately soar or fail to soar.
Even Ludwig Wittgenstein wrote:
Although the ether was filled with electromagnetic waves,
all was dark
until man opened his seeing eye.
Mountains are not tall and amoebae are not small -- until
man the measurer of all things defines a metric
and applies it to them and thereby
takes their measure.
Works that truly soar are those that enable the spirits of the
persons who inhabit them to soar (antithesis: Beaux Arts and
Postmodern architects' decorated sheds). An architect who tried
to do this was Louis Kahn. Kahn's definition of a
city, for instance, "soars" above all others:
[No matter where he may grow up, a child will
have to do some form of labor to live...]
The city is a place where persons can pursue their
crafts beyond the necessities of subsistence, and
where a small boy, as he looks around from the work
of one master craftsperson to another, may bind something
he WANTS to do his whole life.
http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/jpg/Kahn_Salk.html
But I believe that, for all their limitations, all the
pioneers of "the heroic period of modern architecture"
(ref.: book by that title by Peter and Alison Smithson)
tried to build not just buildings but a better world for
Everyman (woman, child). Today's POMO architects pride
themselves on no longer having such aspirations (ref.:
Arthur Drexler, Preface to _Five Architects_).
\brad mccormick
Harry Pollard wrote:
>
> Arthur,
>
> LIFE had an editorial some years ago when the Seagram building was built in
> New York. Apparently, the architects had gone for beauty rather than a lump
> of concrete.
>
> So, their property tax was increased.
>
> The LIFE editorial said the Henry George must be spinning in his grave.
>
> Like a top, no doubt.
>
> Harry
> -------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Arthur wrote:
>
> >Ray,
> >
> >When someone came up with the idea of building according to price per square
> >foot the notion of soaring works simply faded away. In some ways that was
> >the major complaint vis a vis the twin towers. Large, modular, banal.
> >Large widgets.
> >
> >arthur
>
> ******************************
> Harry Pollard
> Henry George School of LA
> Box 655
> Tujunga CA 91042
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Tel: (818) 352-4141
> Fax: (818) 353-2242
> *******************************
>
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>
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--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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