I have a review of a new book - Down Detour Road by Eric Cesal - in this month's RIBA Journal - you can read it here. Cesal's book is a good one and asks some very relevant questions about the role of the profession of architecture post the financial crisis. Some of the same issues - namely how architects ascribe value to what they do and bring their skills and knowledge to bear on a whole range of activities - are also touched on in Amanda Baillieu's blog at BD this week, which kindly links to a post I wrote some time ago about risk.
Needless to say, I disagree with the conclusions of Amanda's post, if not with all of the ideas within it, mainly because I regard the government's Localism Bill, like their Big Society idea, as a benign sounding sop to cover up massive public spending cuts and free market ideology. But ideas of localism divorced from David Cameron and co., and the role of architects in socially engaged design, is interesting and perhaps worth exploring in more detail here.
Some of my scepticism about localism is touched on in this excellent article by Alex Andrews at the New Left Project, which is otherwise concerned with more pressing political concerns.
5 comments:
Is it really true that "Most architects work long hours for low (or, indeed, no) fees to pursue the dream of joining this elite"?
In my experience, most architects work for a fee. Some do make the choice to go after so-called stardom, but it is a small but vocal minority.
Perhaps I am reacting to the US landscape, where very little real work comes from competitions.
Have you seen any studies (or estimates) of the numbers of architects in these different realms of the profession?
Thanks for pointing me to this book, which looks right up my street (no pun intended) - one for the Christmas list.
Incidentally, I've been reading a lot of Bourdieu recently, and Helene Lipstadt's application of his theoretical framework to the architectural competition. It's very illuminating. Let me know if you want the references (or the pdfs).
Your response post "un-blurring the boundaries" came up in google reader, although it doesn't seem to exist here.
I agree with the relative folly of the competition enterprise. I would also add that there seem to be SO MANY ideas competitions that it would take decades to exhaust the so-called ideas that have been discovered.
I would add another dynamic to the conversation. While starchitects tend to focus on the "big ideas" of a building, there is almost ALWAYS another firm or firms involved who actually see to the actual detailing/coordination/construction of the buildings.
I, for one, see most of the beauty of the craft of architecture in resolving the "big idea" with the real world of dollars (or pounds), dimensions, and politics. In a lot of ways, big ideas are cheap. Any of a number of them *could* work. It is in their articulation and execution that they truly succeed or fail.
While the big ideas part of architecture is constantly given away for free, no architect can afford to take a project through (in US jargon) design development, construction documentation, and construction administration without a fee. There is a whole economy of architects who make a living doing this work for the stars, not to speak of the majority of buildings that are built without a star every getting involved.
The higher fees that doctors, lawyers, and financiers can charge have a lot to do with the blatant antagonistic nature of those fields. A lawyer's aim is victory over another party. A doctor seeks to defeat disease. A financier aims to get the better of a counterparty.
For architects, the area where their role as an agent is most pronounced (and measurable) is during construction. At this point, the architect should help the client get a value from the builder. However, this high-stakes part of the profession is deemed by most architects low, not culturally relevant, and boring.
This would be akin to a lawyer praising the overriding philosophy of his argument and ignoring the fact that his client lost. Or (my favorite analogy) a prostitute who ignores the client's need for satisfaction while devising a new way to think about the problem of copulation.
The architects whose priorities are most in line with their clients practical (not philosophical) needs will always be the best rewarded for their efforts.
Your response post "un-blurring the boundaries" came up in google reader, although it doesn't seem to exist here.
I agree with the relative folly of the competition enterprise. I would also add that there seem to be SO MANY ideas competitions that it would take decades to exhaust the so-called ideas that have been discovered.
I would add another dynamic to the conversation. While starchitects tend to focus on the "big ideas" of a building, there is almost ALWAYS another firm or firms involved who actually see to the actual detailing/coordination/construction of the buildings.
davis,
thanks for your comments and sorry for slightly confusing missing post - sorted now.
I think your second paragraph is interesting - I like the idea of a finite number of ideas, or at least a stock that we haven't looked at yet yet!
More importantly most of the things you say are right but it IS interesting the way that architects are generally paid for tangible work (i.e. drawings) whilst artists are paid for the idea. I noticed this most when I've worked in the public art sphere where artists are commissioned and all the fee is for the idea with a generally accepted sense that they might need technical assistance in realising it.
A big problem for architects is that they are marginalised from the realisation aspect and pushed into the role of the artist albeit without the pay-off! Possibly the worst of both worlds this, which is to generate ideas for nothing and then get paid to do some basic drawings before being replaced by an executive architect or a contractor....
Steve, would love the references. I guess Bourdieu's ideas of cultural capital are pertinent here. I am just reading him on the issue of taste too so please do send on the bits you are looking at.
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