"I believe Architecture is art, of course. It’s art, but it’s not sculpture because it’s made for making service to something else.
Architecture is art that you do to shelter something else—a house, a family, a museum, a concert hall. There is always that service. Now, there are different ways to do this. One way is just functional, but I don’t think this is enough because architecture is not just the art of making buildings; it is also the art of telling stories, like other art. It is an art of expression. So one way to make architecture is giving strength to the functional aspect. Another one is, without forgetting the functional aspect, to give strength to poetry, to emotion and poetry. This is where the difference is very subtle."
Poetry is something to be picked up and put down, handled with care, because one person's poetry is another person's nightmare. In making art, you gotta put it on offer and let people find their own way in, imposing a poetic experience one of the worst forms of coercion. Maybe architecture works the same way, I don't know enough about it, but geez its so damn big.
It is a fine line isn't it – and I believe totally subjective - what makes a good home to art?
We have probably all seen examples of architecture imposing on art in some of the rudest and most thoughtless ways. But I do believe unless you go the white cube route (which I do not want to endorse) we will all have different examples of what we cite as insensitive.
Luck did lead me to the Beyeler Foundation Museum a few years ago and I can easily say it was the most overwhelming art-in-context experience I have ever had. Overwhelming in that the space only enhanced the art within, for me it did not detract, but made the experience "spiritual" and singular. But the architect had the advantage of a fixed permanent collection for which he designed for – as opposed to kunsthalles where the architect does not know what potentially might come. I do believe that the architecture should never compete with the art. But whose definition of competition do you follow?
"Two decades before the Centre Pompidou began to change the social implications of art, the New York Guggenheim laid the groundwork for a new way of looking at it. By his replacement of the traditional box with a continuos spiral in the Guggenheim, Wright prepared the way for the creation of the "Museum as Environmental Art"..
Victoria Newhouse.
The Beyeler link works fine for me in your text. The second link has a backwards curly quote in the start of the tag (right after a href= ) which seems to be messing it up. Strange.
Never mind. I see you fixed it.
One thing we can say for 'the white cube' is that it means something we all understand. The phrase describes something both physical and historical that we can agree to like or dislike. But when Renzo Piano says " the Kimbel is a very emotional building" or "you have to work on the immateriality of the museum—light, vibration, proportion" I have no idea what he means. I get that these are subjective calls, both for the architect and the users of the space, but does that mean we have to give up on communication and just ascribe special powers to the architect? Even poets sometimes struggle to articulate the mechanisms by which their work has affect. I'm just poking around in this because I am not conversant with architectural discourse one little bit. Thanks for the Victoria Newhouse link. The book looks interesting and the site provided this outrageous(!) quote: "Museums satisfy.... a deep natural want.... as deep and as natural as sex or sleeping".
Philip Johnson
I almost picked that quote to link to - philip johnson is quite a character. He likes to excite, and I believe that might be an understatement.
Special powers is one way to think about it (and more and more architects are reaching superstar standing). Architects, like visual artists, in some cases like to talk about their work with emotional attribution. You walk into a bright window-lined room you feel differently than when you walk into a dark red book-lined room. Architects are the builders, the interpreters. When we walk into a space they hope to manipulate our experience (obviously there are extremes).
Yup I get it. I don't like to feel manipulated, but without a bit of it going on we'd live in a pretty boring world. We art types are full of big talk too (myself included, without a doubt). As a sometimes designer I find that articulating a design vision (even the word vision, for instance is kind of overblown if all you are talking about it paper stock and pantones) is much harder to do without sounding bullshitty than describing motivations behind artwork.
oops that was me above (logged out).
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Architecture is art that you do to shelter something else—a house, a family, a museum, a concert hall. There is always that service. Now, there are different ways to do this. One way is just functional, but I don’t think this is enough because architecture is not just the art of making buildings; it is also the art of telling stories, like other art. It is an art of expression. So one way to make architecture is giving strength to the functional aspect. Another one is, without forgetting the functional aspect, to give strength to poetry, to emotion and poetry. This is where the difference is very subtle."
- bill 4-11-2004 9:16 pm
Poetry is something to be picked up and put down, handled with care, because one person's poetry is another person's nightmare. In making art, you gotta put it on offer and let people find their own way in, imposing a poetic experience one of the worst forms of coercion. Maybe architecture works the same way, I don't know enough about it, but geez its so damn big.
- sally mckay 4-11-2004 9:44 pm [add a comment]
It is a fine line isn't it – and I believe totally subjective - what makes a good home to art?
We have probably all seen examples of architecture imposing on art in some of the rudest and most thoughtless ways. But I do believe unless you go the white cube route (which I do not want to endorse) we will all have different examples of what we cite as insensitive.
Luck did lead me to the Beyeler Foundation Museum a few years ago and I can easily say it was the most overwhelming art-in-context experience I have ever had. Overwhelming in that the space only enhanced the art within, for me it did not detract, but made the experience "spiritual" and singular. But the architect had the advantage of a fixed permanent collection for which he designed for – as opposed to kunsthalles where the architect does not know what potentially might come. I do believe that the architecture should never compete with the art. But whose definition of competition do you follow?
"Two decades before the Centre Pompidou began to change the social implications of art, the New York Guggenheim laid the groundwork for a new way of looking at it. By his replacement of the traditional box with a continuos spiral in the Guggenheim, Wright prepared the way for the creation of the "Museum as Environmental Art".. Victoria Newhouse.
- selma 4-12-2004 7:54 pm [add a comment]
The Beyeler link works fine for me in your text. The second link has a backwards curly quote in the start of the tag (right after a href= ) which seems to be messing it up. Strange.
- tom moody 4-12-2004 8:18 pm [add a comment]
Thank you!
I fixed it - both of them - and deleted my last post.
- selma 4-12-2004 8:19 pm [add a comment]
Never mind. I see you fixed it.
- tom moody 4-12-2004 8:19 pm [add a comment]
One thing we can say for 'the white cube' is that it means something we all understand. The phrase describes something both physical and historical that we can agree to like or dislike. But when Renzo Piano says " the Kimbel is a very emotional building" or "you have to work on the immateriality of the museum—light, vibration, proportion" I have no idea what he means. I get that these are subjective calls, both for the architect and the users of the space, but does that mean we have to give up on communication and just ascribe special powers to the architect? Even poets sometimes struggle to articulate the mechanisms by which their work has affect. I'm just poking around in this because I am not conversant with architectural discourse one little bit. Thanks for the Victoria Newhouse link. The book looks interesting and the site provided this outrageous(!) quote: "Museums satisfy.... a deep natural want.... as deep and as natural as sex or sleeping".
Philip Johnson
- sally mckay 4-12-2004 8:42 pm [add a comment]
I almost picked that quote to link to - philip johnson is quite a character. He likes to excite, and I believe that might be an understatement.
Special powers is one way to think about it (and more and more architects are reaching superstar standing). Architects, like visual artists, in some cases like to talk about their work with emotional attribution. You walk into a bright window-lined room you feel differently than when you walk into a dark red book-lined room. Architects are the builders, the interpreters. When we walk into a space they hope to manipulate our experience (obviously there are extremes).
- selma 4-12-2004 9:06 pm [add a comment]
Yup I get it. I don't like to feel manipulated, but without a bit of it going on we'd live in a pretty boring world. We art types are full of big talk too (myself included, without a doubt). As a sometimes designer I find that articulating a design vision (even the word vision, for instance is kind of overblown if all you are talking about it paper stock and pantones) is much harder to do without sounding bullshitty than describing motivations behind artwork.
- anonymous (guest) 4-12-2004 9:59 pm [add a comment]
oops that was me above (logged out).
- sally mckay 4-12-2004 10:01 pm [add a comment]