"The so-called 'avant garde' architecture of our epoch lays claim to being 'functional', but it is so only in part and in a wholly exterior and superficial way, since it ignores functions that are not material or practical; it excludes two elements essential to human art, namely symbolism, which is as strict as truth, and a joy at once contemplative and creative, which is as gratuitous as grace. A purely utilitarian 'functionalism' is perfectly inhuman in both its premises and its results, for man is not exclusively a greedy and cunning creature: he is not meant to be comfortable inside the mechanism of a clock."
-Frithjof Schuon
For any Minnesotans who would like to experience the feeling of being 'inside the mechanism of a clock', I recommend that you spend a few minutes inside the recently built library in downtown Minneapolis.
For any Minnesotans who would like to experience the feeling of being 'inside the mechanism of a clock', I recommend that you spend a few minutes inside the recently built library in downtown Minneapolis.
2 comments:
That really makes me want to GO there. Can you believe I haven't been inside yet? Stuck in suburbia...
Sub-urbia is actually super-urbia in respect of pretentious architecture. City people build ugly and think they're superior for it (i.e. The New Guthrie). We suburban folk build ugly too, but we don't pretend it's pretty.
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