Myths on the Death of Modern Architecture: Pruitt-Igoe again

Just as history in Fukuyama's death of history, modern architecture is coming back form the other world. The thing is that in both cases there were false burials. In both the media contributed greatly in building a new utopia: post-history and post-modernity were sophisticated ways of being inside history and modernity. Modern utopia, which has always been the enemy of modern refexive creativity, as it turns into collective what is strictly individual, is behind the political burial of modern architecture. As an example, watch the video on Robert Hudge's obituary of Modern Architecture and read the abstract of the research of Katherine Bristol on the subject:

“(…) In place of the myth, this paper offers a brief history of Pruitt-Igoe that demonstrates how its construction and management were shaped by profoundly embedded economic and political conditions in postwar St. Louis. It then outlines how each successive retelling of the Pruitt-Igoe story in both the national and architectural press has added new distortions and misinterpretations of the original events. The paper concludes by offering an interpretation of the Pruitt-Igoe myth as mystification. By placing the responsibility for the failure of public housing on designers, the myth shifts attention from the institutional or structural sources of public housing problems.”

“The Pruitt-Igoe Myth”, Katharine G. Bristol. Journal of Architectural Education (1984-), Vol. 44, No. 3 (May, 1991), pp. 163-171

Pure Modernity at the Museum

At the Reina Sofia Museum there is the wonderful exhibition A.C. La revista del GATEPAC (1931-1937). By the title one never would guess the vastness, rigor and quality of such an exhibition. In my opinion it could have been called "The various origins of modernity" or something like this: there are architectural plans, models, photography, painting, sculpture, cinema all originals. And have a look at the names: Le Corbusier, Sert, Gropius, Mies (the full scale originals of the Tugendhant), Man Ray, Neutra (the most amazing original perspectives in pencil of the Lowell House and some urban projects), Arp, lots of the best Miro, Picasso, Aalto, Terragni, exceptional sculptures by Julio Gonzalez, films by Buñuel...

It is almost impossible to see it properly in one day. It should be better advertized the excellence of this fountain of knowledge.

Le Corbusier, a young 71 years old

It is worth listening, first hand, what the greatest architect of last century wanted to tell us when he was 71 years old. The images that illustrate the video are not at the level of the speech, I am afraid. Nevertheless, it is interesting to find out the balance he does of his own huge work at the end of his life. Creating ideas, those intellectual constructions that resist time and questioning, is a hard job specially for a "visual man" like Le Corbusier. The sound recording is from an interview at the BBC in 1959. Here is the link

21st Century life in Georgian Spaces

Model of the city at the Building of Bath Museum
The Circus, 1754-69, John Wood Senr. and Jnr.

Inside a John Pinch georgian house, 6,60 mts wide aprox.

A special combination of regulations, cultural trends and business strategies are responsible for the impressive urban artifacts in Georgian Bath from 1667 onwards. The curious thing is that inside these buildings live people that still can enjoy some of the eighteenth and nineteenth century most admirable pleasures, such as long and civilized conversations, while most of them are up to date in the latest issues of the arts, technology and politics. This fact demonstrates that it is possible to have the best of every time, that we can vindicate the right not to choose. Modernity and tradition are compatible if we select the essential aspects of both.