“Things are difficult. You get older and find yourself saying goodbye to people. Life doesn’t make a lot of sense. But it’s more meaningful if the will to be useful and to help your neighbour predominates. Human beings have to be realistic. We live, die and see others die – at the very least there should exist a spirit of solidarity.”
-Niemeyer in 2010.
I’ve been finding it difficult to write about Oscar Niemeyer’s passing yesterday at the astounding age of 104. How can one summarize the full extent of Niemeyer’s impact when I’m not sure we are even aware of it now?
With a life that spanned over a century, and a practice that continued up until his final days as he continued to sketch from his hospital bed, the true scope of his influence on architectural discourse, practice, and design as a whole will continue to unfold for generations. His designs were not just a collection of singularities to be admired individually, but rather a cognitive whole that reformatted the accepted European view of modernism; regionalized it, exemplified its ideals and even exposed its fallacies. His building’s importance far surpass their beauty, not only shifting traditional archetypes of civic and public buildings, but actually changing the way government, religion, and habitation function both individually and as a societal whole. He showed an inimitable resolve through the course of his life, working through political repression, the cold war, numerous economic downturns, and harsh public backlash, all the while maintaining a consistent vision of how architecture can function in the world.
Yesterday we certainly lost one of the most important figures in architectural history (and also human history), but his legacy has, and will continue to leave an unmatchable mark on the urban experience.
towada art center
Impossible to select just one image of Ryue Nishizawa’s Towada Art center, completed in 2008. Via.
Just wondering if the floor design in the last picture was done by jim lambie. does anyone know ?
from subtilitas
can’t help reblogging gigon & guyer.
Gigon & Guyer - The recently completed Prime Tower, Zurich’s new tallest building. G+G also have a new monograph from Lars Muller.
just EPIC !
Sou Fujimoto’s competition winning entry for the 21st Century Oasis tower in Taiwan has some stunning moments (click for big). Via.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Hey everyone ! Since recently I had a surge of new followers, I decided it was time to recommend some of my favorite architecture tumblrs out there, with a word or two on their content and why I like them. They are fairly tumblr-famous, but if you don’t know any of these, please do check them out. Most blogs here present original content (as in, either produced by the blogger or posted by the blogger. Not infinite reblogs). In no particular order :
BETONBABE. A mostly black and white architecture image blog, curated by viviane hülsmeier, a student from berlin currently at princeton. Also, she responds when strangers (me) write her email.
THE PAPER CITY. Henry Stephens is an architecture student from New Zealand, with incredible hand drawing and collage skills.
MIKA SAVELA. somehow, like me, Mika didn’t create a clever tumblr identity (unless ‘savela’ means something in finnish and is not his last name). Either way, very nice architecture thoughts on modernism and its golden age (the sixties!), straight from the north. Vintage magazines !
ARCHIVE OF AFFINITIES. Beautiful architectural images, exquisitely edited/curated. Plans, sections, drawings in general, some models as well. Very elegant.
IIDESU/ENTROPY. “Nothing but eye-candy”, says the slogan. Minimalist approach on photography and architecture. Its the tumblr I would have loved to do, if I could just stop talking. writing. you know. But I am quite happy to follow it.
ROLLERDISCO. For all your blimp porn needs.
BOUWKUNST. Bouwkunst is the art of building, in dutch. Timeless modern architecture. Lots of well executed concrete images. He loves, as I do, Juliaan Lampens.
SUBTILITAS. Everyone already follows Subtilitas, ‘brooklyn-based architectural designer’. Strong and coherent format: one image of an oeuvre, perfectly credited, with links to larger images and more information on the work. Very professional. Also, I kind of based my tumblr theme on his.
ETHEL BARAONA. Even though I’m not particularly fond of her tumblr’s design (the little squares won’t let me look at the pretty pictures !), she posts some seriously interesting stuff. Also, she is responsible for the excellent DPR BARCELONA blog, which is more than just pictures/films/books.
PYTR75. A belgian architect, who also has a blog, and posts almost non-stop art/architecture/photography.
RESPECTA. Why hasn’t this been updated in so long ? It used to be just perfect.
WHITE LIGHTNING BLACK RAIN and KORUT. Less architectural, more eye-candy. Korut does reblog a lot, but since I guess he follows completely different people from me, most of the times his reblogs are the first time I see those images.
and finally CHAZ HUTTON, the person who got me into tumblr in the first place, and the closest thing I have to a “tumblr-friend” (or should I say “tumblr-mate” ? He is australian, after all).
There you are. I’ll do a blog roll someday soon.
The only built relic of Peter Zumthor’s Topography of Terror document center in Berlin. Started in 1992 and demolished in 2004, the center would have been another phenomenal addition to Zumthor’s impressive body of work. Via.
