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  • A Critic Writes

    Încărcat de

    Luciana Roça
    14 vizualizări8 pagini
    essay by Reyner Banham A Black Box The secret profession of Architecture

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    essay by Reyner Banham A Black Box The secret profession of Architecture

    Drepturi de autor:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Descărcați ca PDF sau citiți online pe Scribd
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    14 vizualizări8 pagini

    A Critic Writes

    Încărcat de

    Luciana Roça
    essay by Reyner Banham A Black Box The secret profession of Architecture

    Drepturi de autor:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Descărcați ca PDF sau citiți online pe Scribd
    Indicator pentru conținut neadecvat
    din 8
    ae I ie ae NaS 1 NS : NN Se ee | te NA eee ee @ WS y) paeaneenteontoanabierrnee | NS eee NS Ce ee ce es ae ae SN ee ae ee ee et ee e Renna ooe ene Bese F INN ; Gre | Nie ee er) j SE N aS Ronco a ae : oXs ‘Four culture, scrutinising the national gid, bolo tes (remember them?) Stone ores 9 Pea eas eee ree ier mseSnvrD int Ean Neer Se i pt H ESSAYS by REYNER BANHAM i H CT en en eee et ears 3 a) i Een Cas > Sareea eke one \z i Mary Banham, Paul Barker, Pa coerce: | Il i Pesaran erence meer Ten mnt Ss EE * Oe a eet ee eee al hi ee eel reer eens al ‘ Loaner et nen nel cemaem eee aan H eI Pai epercee erences open aeannnednnen ee | m ee eee eee i k 3 Sc See ees a 1 oa i Las : | a i peepee | / Tame asa 3 I | 1A i | PL the ee g kh Cee ae 9 "780520"219441 CSCC Lieay i } ‘ A Critic Writes ESSAYS by REYNER BANHAM seecreo ey MaryBanham Paul Barker Suthertand Lyall Cedric Price Foreword by Petor Hal eyo Banham tn 19805, Pot by Bud cab UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS Beraly Los Angeles London Contents Thisteoks a priat-on demand volume It anofaured using toe in place rink Type and images maybe les sry has he same material seen in radtonally ined Unvesty of California Pres ditions Published with the assistance of gran fom the Gra for kavanced Stes nthe Foreword by Petar Hall xi Fears ing 3009 The 19505 1 Vetoes Dette. 3 arf ges net rteon Dn 2. TeNewBratm 7 3. Omen and chime: The Des Contrbton ot AH Loos. 16 al 5. Machine M 6 Sncatney_son eran 2. Mena it 8. Printescfe MechanzecAn 39 mone ae The 19605 47 9, 1960-Stctaling 49 11, Design byCrolce 67 ” ee 23, Gig Doug, Small Plece 82 eer sin is pubic mee te ima 24, QlaNumberone 84 pred ne enon 25, Kentand capaoity 7 ‘The 19705 148 ‘The 19805 235 4 45, 48 The Dymarcrat 91 ‘Te Siyleforthe Joo 96 sow Leamt to Lie wth the Norwich Union 100 People's Palaces 105 The Great Gizmo 109, Aviary, London ZologicalGarens, 119 Unibet Any Speed 122 Rsdscape wih RustingNalls 124 History Faculty, Cambrige 128, “Te Widerness Years of Frank Lyd Weight 137 PonerofTrent andre 351 ‘Te Grispatthe Crossroads 157 ‘he historn onthe Per 161 ‘The MasterBullers 168, Rank Values 175 Power Pink 184 Iron Bridge Embaimed 188 Bicolgues ala Lanteme 198 Valey ofthe Dame 208, Grass above, Glass Around 208 ‘summa Galactica 212 Pevsner Progress 216 Tokingiwih You 223, Hotel Dejequoi? 227 Valentino: Simply Fed Away 231 The Haunted Highway 237 Dead onthe Faut 242 O,Bright Star... 248 String Escapes tre Hoots 254 Modem Monuments 262 Bulinginside Ost 265, Inthe Neighvomeod o Art 27 onthe Wings of Wonder 276 lack Box biography 304 tal Monuments 264 of rcitecture 3) A Black Box The Secret Profession of Architecture ‘oor was an architect an Wren was net. This judgment may seem foolhardy, buts not deiveratety perverse. Ihas been forced on ma by soma mnths of Wlting the Uoj's bung chant which gave me a chance to revit St Paul's and sundry Cy churches hac not seen since stasert days, And It struck me that even whan Wren was being as clever as he was in widening the central bain each arcade st St Manse fon, oF as Inventive ashe wasn the upper pars of St Stephen Walbrook, he still was not doing whateveritwas that Hankemoor had done te make gest echiteture out of ashumerum a concept as the interior of St Mary Wooinoth, The distinction |am making i not between cferent temperaments orlevels of oe ative genius, but between fundamental mages of designing, Nor are the consequences othe srettectural mode necessariy beaut, Some prety vey tut happens inthe lantem of the mausoleum of the Dulwich At Galley for Instance, yet the reaut eaves usin no doubt that Sie Jobo Soane was an absolute architec. \Watever this mode, attitude or presence may be, ene can recognise t—in the bot {om of Pil Johnson's AT&T busing, for example, but in most oer works of programmatic postmen. Its absence tam Chaies wn house lo London inspite ofa ts eucion about architecture, seems to conf what the recent work of Robert Sto but na, think, of Robert Vent) has been strony suegesting. That ance on erudtion alone leaves postmoderism a ‘the same relation to architecture as fale impersonation to femininity. isnot ach tecture, but bung in rag. | propose to teat the shen rai mode ot recognised ts ouput though unknown in ts contents isnot abe mistaken or ‘ood design’, since architectures often conspicuously present—in the wok ot ve -—Inbuldings that are prety cub designs trom other points of View. T seperate architecture fom good design inthis way may unsettle thaze wn do not question the mynologies by which architecture has operated for some si cent: es now, but doesnot imply tet the wo ae incompatible: smal tht. ether without the ote The situation has been much muddleaty the tendency ofthe modern movernen of Willam Moris, to gatver up all cont bugs ino the rubcc of ‘architecture, This was @ warm endly an egatar'an thing to do, but it must now ‘00m as historically crude and as pemiciouly confusing as Nikolaus Pevsner’sprozo- sition thet Linco Cathedral's architecture and acyl shed isnot. The astinton was made on te basis tat Lincoln Cathedral ha aesthetic pretensions and bike shes dont, This was not only apiece o academic snobbery that can only offend commas {70st ke myse but also involves a supposition about sheds that sso sweeping 38 ‘tobe almost ast, How can he know that any particular bicycle shed, or even the whole typology of “bcyte shed In genecal, wes conceive without aesthetic inten ‘om’? wnat one csn know by practised observation, however end whet Pevsner may ‘even have meant), is that cathedrals including uy ones) ae general aesigned ‘med areitctorum, and biyee sheds (even handsome ones) are more commonly one in one of the numerous other modes of designing buicngsavalable ‘Such the cutural prestige of the purely architectural made, however, within the Dvotected ares of “west civilisation”, that most of us get brainwashed into beleving thotitis synonymous with "good design’ ox even “the design of bulldings”. The moo em movement hes done itstitle good In promoting this muddle, because i thereby Lndermines one ofits own most useful polemical devices, Fo, in spe of his ins 'steporoach, there as been a long traction —from before Ado Loos to after Cadre Price—of using comparisons wih certfably non architectural objects, tom peasant ‘rafts to aavenced electronics, to reves how ad regular architectural designing nad become. Quite alot of tse paragons ware indeed bullae, and good ones a he, boutonce they, in theirtur, had become incorporated into the areca canon, they lost heir crest poner anette boy of erhtecture confused rather than reform, Let us then revere what should never have ines togetneria tis oppor: istic mariagecotconvenlence Throw out athe Zulu Wreals,grain-elevators, hogar lunar excursion modules, erucknouses, Farman biplanes and so forth, nd look again at "this thing clied architecture" ints own right, a one of & numberof thinkable ‘modes of design which, for some reason, has come to acuny & positon of cultura pilege in eaion to the constuction industry What ten would cstinguish the praduts ofthis black bx from tose of other ‘inkable modes? Functional or evirenmentalpartnmance? Beauty of form of deft ness of space? Truth to materials or srvtual aflency? These areal qualities fo: niente arehitectal profession habitual congratulates tse, but a Buckminste- Fuller dome or an Eskimo igloo can usually beat architecture on ll si counts, and so an alot of other bulcngs, sips lines, nfitabies an animal rs, So why do we not adit that what cstingushos architecture is nat hats cone—since, on their od days, lhe word ani wife can spparenty it better—but how tis done. We can cstngush that how” in two crucial ways nthe actual behaviour of ac tects as they pefonn their alltod tasks as bulding Selene. The fstis that arc most uniquely among modem deslan potessionala—proposeto assume re sponsibityfor lof hose sik aspects of good bulding set out above, end tobe legaly ansmerabe to the cent for rer proper delivery. Oter professions (euch as electra and mechanical engineering notoiousy avid such overall responsibilities, prefer ‘remain at one remove rom the wrath of cents a “consutentss hired guns whe, Ike minor wa erminas, “were ony canyng out orders Or, to be less offensive to ‘erences, a body of men who ae to pre to say, forinstance, "You design your cor "That's @ stupid shape fora concert al tis will werk a lat beter. However, nis wiligness to assume responsibilty sony what makes architec noble profession. trot what makes them architec, as Lethaty seems to have pet ceived in his arguments agsinstprofessionalsstion atthe begining ofthe century. What makes them architec, and recognisable as such, is usualy easiest to demon strate anecdotally, begnning wit that of repeated story of the achtectwho, when ‘asked fora pene that could be used to tienen the tourniquet on the limb of per ‘son leesing to Geath in the stet, cael enquired "Wil 28 The point of such stores is that ey unconsciously veal not ony the fundamental value-ystem on which architects operete, but the narrwmoss of thet system, and the Lnspoken-—ar unspeakable-—assumpons on whieh rests, The more revealing of ‘thes stories tend to oignate trom that rela attuceformingsuaton, the desion ceitin the architectural sohool sudo Inateling example rom my own experience, | ones found myst defending sire by point a student design fora penthouse apartment that he been flied by my acs

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