| ARCHIVE ESSAYS Minimalism 2 Post Modern Architects Spheres of Influence Mother Memory |
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Two Post Modern American Architects, Robert Stern and Michael Graves INTRODUCTION TO POST MODERNISMA gradual trend is more difficult to label under a single heading than a direct and self-conscious movement. This is why the title Post-Modern was adopted. It implies a body of opinion which has no manifesto or single aim in view. The generation of architects trained to build rectilinear geometrical buildings in the tradition of the First World War modernists have by now developed their own approach. This included careful reference to history, the use of the advantages brought by technology and a readiness to please the general public. It has temporarily been labelled Post-Modernism and reinstates many or the traditional values lost when the theories of the modern movement were tried in practise (1). Under this title numerous different styles exist. To consolidate the situation the American architect and critic, Charles Jencks (A) pieced together al1 the styles into a Genealogical Chart (illustration No.l). This clarifies the general outlook between 1955 and 1980, a stretch of some twenty-five years. The chart shows buildings in West Europe, North America and Australia. The seven sub-headings describe the various attitudes adopted by the architects and even some of these are split again in pursuit of a closer definition, for example, the Historicist/Regionalist/Pluralist. Robert Venturi (B) is placed under this heading. He plans h1s buildings with a great awareness of the symbolic content of the forms which he chooses to use. In 1975 for example, he built The Tucker House in Katonah, New York. The typical image of a house, a simple form consisting or a square box with a diagonally pitched roof is used so emphatically that it adopts a freshness of quality. Inside the house the same shape distinguishes the fireplace. Ralph Erskine, a Newcastle architect is someone Mr. Jencks. classifies as an Adhocist (2). In 1974 he was in charge of the renewal project for the Byker district outside Newcastle. He accepted the challenge of the old social fabric of the area and used it to his advantage. He did not split communities which had grown up over some time but rehoused them intheir familiar groups. Consultation with the inhabitants whilst the project was being constructed was part of his practice. The Byker wall is now a large housing complex sheltering a lot of people but economizing on space in an unusual, unrepetitive way. THE BACKGROUND OF MICHAEL GRAVESMichael Graves, the first architect we will be looking at, was born in Indianapolis in 1934. After studying at Harvard he won a Prix de Rome scholarship to the American Academy in Rome. In 1962 he became Professor of Architecture at Princeton University. In the middle sixties he worked with Peter Eisenman, a fellow member of the New York Five, all staunch followers of Le Corbusier, on a competition for a site on the Upper Westside of Manhattan. In 1979 he held the position of architect-in-residence at the American Academy. His early work bears reference to Le Corbusier, Kurt Schwitters, Van Doesberg and the whole Cubist approach. (3) Latterly he has left traditionally modern' buildings behind and has consciously alluded to the whole of architectural history preceding this. This appears to be in an effort to uphold the Cubist theory that the world is built of fragments which relate to one another simultaneously. Because of this, Michael Graves has become something of an eccentric academic; his eccentricity is nurtured and is not innocent. He resembles both the 18 th Century Visionary and Mannerist architect and the Surrealist and Cubist collagist because of this. When an interest in the very elements that comprise a building becomes the main reason for building it, in other words, when form becomes content, the effect becomes mannered and baroque. Michael Graves parodies modern architecture and the flexibility of contemporary building technique means that almost anything can be built. (4) Post Modern, Neo-Mannerist, Neo-Baroque, whatever grand title is used, this concept is one which was labelled after concrete examples of it had appeared. Action preceded words. MICHAEL GRAVES: HIS IDEAS AND BUILDINGSWith particular reference to the Snyderman House, Fort Wayne, Indiana, U.S.A. In the 1970's there occurred a questioning of the fundamental principles that generate any artistic activity. This was a slow shock wave echoing back to the days of Dada. Architecture did not avoid this. As a scholar in Rome, Michael Graves must have had ample opportunity to meditate upon those, who in the past, had confidently followed traditions. Recognising his own place in Architectural History, he took the European and American Modern tradition to its limit in his buildings constructed during the late 1960's and early 1970's. Such is his dissection of tradition that what is left often looks like the skeletal remains of a previously finished house. (Keely Guest House, 1972).Only the fact that the Snyderman House, (illustration No. 2) of 1972, was built as a home with six people to consider, saved it from becoming a purely architectural folly. By using he alphabet of forms that grew from such buildings as the Schroder House (Gerrit Rietveld 1924) (6) into the common language of the International Style, this house makes an ironic comment not only upon buildings which have become the conventional eye-sores' of the provincial High Street, but also upon the elegant sky-scrapers' of Manhattan. At first glance, the total effect of this building is very confusing and to say the least, ambiguous. The flimsy false facades buckle and curve around, or away from the more rigid geometrical structure. Gradually the essential logic becomes more apparent. It is as though some usually well-ordered mind has been temporarily at play and the resultant chaos leaves a chance to explore unorthodox routes that are usually neglected. The uncomplicated look of the faades is of course wholly intentional; by upsetting the usual scheme of things other qualities have become apparent. (7) Inseparable from the philosophical and theoretical side of architecture
is the empirical side. Elementary though the idea may seem, the
conflicting interests of opposites, man and nature in this context, is
a universal theme and can be symbolised in many ways because of its simplicity.
Nature' is defined by Michael Graves as that which shows irregularity
and movement, and man-made' means that which is of idealised, often
geometrical form, usually stationary. The building reflects this
conflict by having attributes of both curves and straights, which are
situated side by side, and an extraordinary tension has grown around
the periphery of the building, where the maximum use has been made of
layered screening and shallow recessions. Leaving he territorial
limits of the house ambiguous and as unresolved as possible, this zone
expresses continuous struggle. The south and east facade/walls are composed of several coloured planes that interact with a very large open, white framework or grid. It is hard to ignore that historical allusions to the early Modernists, (iii,iv) Mondrian and the De Stijl artists reduced the picture making components to the simplest of elements: straight lines and planes of flat colour. Because no figurative references were made in their work the ideas that the paintings communicated were those that referred to the pure language of painting itself. The spiritual element residing in every work of art was supposedly distilled and isolated by these artists and others who rank amongst the exponents of the radical theories propounded at the turn of the century (8). Michael Graves has managed to absorb the idealism without any of the destructive naivity of their early statements. Mondrian writes of "the metropolis as the embodiment of abstract life, where nature has been straigthened out." He welcomed the increasing engulfment of the countryside by he city, rectifying nature's capriciousness."(C) The house is painted in pale red, blue grey, green grey and dark grey, colours that blend with the natural context in autumn but not during the summer. the proportion of each individual element in the facade is considered in its relation to the whole. All these fragments, pieces such as balconies and bow windows, railings, pillars and doors, have an internal logic of their own, working simultaneously in a strange harmony, and one's attention oscillates between them. It is this integration of separate elements collaged and juxtaposed into a whole that is so interesting, and indeed the interest would increase if the differences were more numerous. Reminiscent of the Mondrian "Tableau I", 1921 (illustration No.6), or perhaps a contruction by Kurt Schwitters, (illustration No.7), the changes of proportions are effected not only through changes of colour and brightness which increase or decrease the 'weights' of these planes. In the Snyderman House, paler tones recede even if they are literally in the foreground, as on the exterior staircase, for example. The way that the house has been painted isolates the individual elements and confuses the eye. The external pink and bulbous walls of the study and hall/boid try to level out with the protruding angular bays, also painted ink. The white grid structure intervenes, prising them apart. The large flat area that dominates the left-hand side of the south facade remain there on sufferance, defying its structurally prominent position with a pale blue complexion. Yet the rigid white frame holds it up, acting as a neutral buffer zone. "In their complex relationships these elements
are in varying degrees both structural and ornamental, frequently redundant
and sometimes vestigial". Robert Venturi (D) The two extensions, a garage anda summerhouse, have not been built. (fig.9.ix) From the plan, however, their character can be understood as freestanding, independent structres connected to the main house by corridors in the air. This idea Mr. Graves began in his Hanselmann House (1967) also in Fort Wayne (fig. X) where a "pipe rail frame and the front plane of a studio house (which also has not been built) defines the outer edge of the house's precinct. It acts as a gate, receiving the stiar between the ground and the entrance level." In the traditional houses of Japan the entrance is always very discreet. One does not step straight from the street into the living-room, becasue there is a space, nearly always a small space, between the street and the door. It may be only six feet square but it is enough to create a sense of detachment that is really more psychological than physical. In general conception, the Snyderman's House is a rough cube divided into four quarters (illustration No.9). Along the intersections of the two main axis, at right angles, are the points of entry, one on every side. The plan is relatively tranquil in composition, but a diagonal mars this peace. This feature is a canopy on the roof terrace reflected directly opposite in the parallel stairwell. It is interesting to note the dispute over the symbolism of the diagonal that existed, between Mondrian and Van Doesberg. "In 1925, Mondrian's theory of the vertical/horizontal
was challenged by his friend and fellow artist, Theo Van Doesberg,
who, in an attempt to increase the dynamism of his art, introduced
the concept of the counter-composition, in which the elements are placed
on a 45 degree angle. Van Doesberg felt that the horizontal/vertical
elements referred to, male/female, landscape-tree/earth and to classical
architecture; this he reasoned that the oblique, because it was free
of such 'mundane' or referential associations was a spiritual element.
Mondrian criticised Van Doesberg by saying, "Through such an emphasis,
the feeling of physical equilibrium which is necessary for the enjoyment
of a work of art is lost. The relationship with architecture and its
vertical and horizontal dominants is broken." (10) It is easy to sympathise with both points of view and Michael Graves has included the diagonal element in all but one of his elevations. (illustration No.11) Its ommissionfrom the south elevation brings a welcome contrast without a radical change in the flavour of the design as a whole. It is interesting to see just how the adition of this element disturbs the rectilinear reose that Mondrian spoke of. Against the movement of clouds in the restless sky and the seasonal variations in the vegetation the static quality of the man-made must be very noticeable to the inhabitiants of the house, but however bent or skew its lines, a mobile element, like a kinetic sculpture would serve to integrate natural qualities more completely. We find when looking objectively at the building that it can be read as a highly indulgent piece of work, affected and unnatural for all its attempts at adhereing to the laws of nature, in the syntax of the Modern Movement. Why is this so? What makes this building so mannered? The large white space frame throws a strong shadow onto the curving screen wall behind and this mimics the cut-out rectangle, but it is a contributing factor of little consequence, other than to make a point about architecture as sculputre on a larg scale, or functioning as a large sundial. Is the cantilivering staircase outside (not inside) the building meant to be a play upon the familiar old fire-escape? It is more likely to be a nautical reference.
To be continued. |
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