ManIFesto

I’m a bit baffled by this lot. They’ve got some big names endorsing their manifesto* (Will Alsop, Denise Scott Brown) which at first glance appears to be The Fountainhead re-written by Jeremy Clarkson.

The Manifesto Towards a New Humanism (or NewTowNHuman) is an odd piece of writing and worth unpicking a little. To summarise, it accuses contemporary architecture of meek compliance with our over beaurocratised society. It states that there are too many design targets and constraints and that originality, creativity and the old promethean fire cannot thrive in such circumstances. It criticises our contemporary inability to celebrate man’s (sic – see Denise Scott Brown’s backhanded compliment) achievements and have faith in progress. It also has a bit of a bee in its bonnet about both the language of sustainability (fair enough) and the fact of climate change (not so fair enough). Generally, it stresses that architects have lost their creativity in a welter of rules and regulations and a mealy-mouthed concern to consult with all and sundry (it’s quite easy to write this sort of stuff – I just kinda slipped into it by accident back then).

So, it seems to combine standard neo-liberal criticism of the 'nanny-state' with some good old fashioned faith in unfettered creativity. A few things bother me about this which are:

The assertions of the individual’s right to overcome mediocrity and the pernicious over-influence of the state seems obligatory anti-New Lab rhetoric these days. This is the default position of most neo-liberals, a belief that the ‘nanny state’ (and is there not something mysoginistic in the endless repetition of that phrase, a fear of smothering women or something?) is stopping our fun.

This kind of thinking occurs in a vacuum without any sense that there may be competing ideas as to what constitutes legitimate freedoms. The Boris Johnsons of this world will always feel that they occupy some common sense middle ground under threat from idealogues. It is a classic sleight of hand of conservatives to pretend that they have no ideology, or that they are not merely protecting their own vested interests. The fact that the rhetoric of freedom usually comes accompanied by attacks on the freedoms of others (kids on buses playing MP3's, drinking on the tube) never seems to occur them as being inconsistent.

The disregard of environmental issues seems bizarre, given that one quarter of the UK's carbon emissions come from housing.** Are the authors denying the reality of climate change or are they merely saying it has nothing to do with architecture? “Whatever happened to maximising one’s impact on the planet?” they ask at one point. Well, I don’t think that minimisation of our impact on the planet is exactly the problem right now is it?

Are they suggesting removal of all statutory controls on building or just some? Is there a period in time where they feel there was the right balance between legislation and freedom of creativity? When exactly did architects design without any restriction or control? The myth of a halcyon past is the hallmark of all conservative ideology.

They state; “We believe that a more critical, arrogant and future orientated cadre of architects and designers can challenge the….localising consensus”. Jesus, that sounds terrifying. And there’s more than a hint of one of Alan Sugar’s Apprentice candidates in that triumphant use of arrogance as a positive quality.

“It is humans – not disembodied abstractions – that have the capacity to create a meaningful world”. Their manifesto is full of endless abstractions. And some pretty craggy old shibboleths too, not least the declamatory manifesto itself with its hyperbolic exaggerations and it’s a-historical this-is-the-time-the-time-for-action rhetoric.

There is probably a lot of things wrong with architecture right now but lack of self-confidence doesn't seem to be one of them. It’s ironic they have written this at a time when there is such an outpouring of bombast from the profession. The last thing anyone needs in my view are more outpourings of the architect’s unfettered creative fire! That way this kind of vacuity lies!

*I have to say it seems a grand word for what is, in effect, a protracted moan.

** Figures from the Code for Sustainable Homes document.

The Fountainhead - Howard Roark Speech (Ayn Rand)

The work of architecture in the age of reproduction.

The degree to which reconstructions of buildings is seen as either sentimental kitsch or authentic rebuilding depends largely on the perceived value of the original structure.

Last week I heard Jamie Foubert make an interesting presentation (at this event) regarding resurrected buildings. I was reminded of it in connection with the current, rather odd, campaign to reconstruct the Festival of Britain Skylon.

Resurrections of buildings can take a number of different forms. Sometimes they are the realisation of something that was never actually completed to start with, like Charles Rennie Macintosh’s House for an Art Lover, built some 90 years after he designed it.

Sometimes they are actually the original article but displaced from its original context, such as the reconstruction of London Bridge in Lake Havasu City, Arizona.

Sometimes they are precise reconstructions of a building that was demolished such as Mies van der Rohe’s German Pavilion in Barcelona.

All these re-buildings raise interesting questions about authenticity. Are they all, to some extent, fakes? In art authenticity historically lies within the mark made by the author. Can a building, which is never the product of a single author and can take years, even decades, to construct ever be simply a fake?

For Modernism reconstruction is always a problematic act. Architecture, it assumes, should be an immutable product of its time. It derives its authenticity through its very newness. In his talk Foubert attempted to re-categorise his examples into authentic and in-authentic examples of reconstruction based on familiar modernist tropes: honesty of construction, appropriateness to function, proximity to original site etc.

So, the architects of the Barcelona Pavilion reconstruction would no doubt claim authenticity of detail and location to justify their recreation although, technically, Arizona’s London Bridge could make an equally legitimate claim. In this instance, dislocation in space is assumed to be more inauthentic than dislocation in time.

This dislocation in time has another effect, which is to enshrine the buildings perceived meaning within that of a particular era. The Skylon, for instance, is still synonymous with the Festival of Britain and the post war Labour government that sponsored it. Reconstructing the Skylon, it is suggested here, is inappropriate because its absence is a more eloquent testament to the reasons it was removed. It's political meaning would be effaced through reconstruction.

Reconstructions are also interesting then because it is in their absence, rather than their presence, that buildings seem to gain a purity of meaning. Jonathon Hill has argued that the Barcelona Pavilion achieved its iconic status precisely because it was dismantled. This is not simply because it became more poignant but because it could only be experienced through the rarified medium of photographs and architectural history. It was never sullied through (mis)use. To connect back to the bastardised Walter Benjamin title of this post, it retained its aura. Buildings that disappear are like rock stars that die young: they leave a beautiful corpse. They never grow fat or old or lose their edge.

Free from contamination by the present, the Skylon still represents the possibilities of British Modernism and post war socialism. Whether you want to recreate it - re-released and digitally re-mastered – or celebrate its absence, Skylon’s meaning seems clearer than if it were still here today.