Scribd Logo
Upload

Welcome to Scribd!

  • Collage City by Colin Rowe

    Uploaded by

    Jacquelyn Belle Johnson
    91 views70 pages
    Colin Rowe and Fred Koetter's manifesto disclaiming the notion of Modernist urban utopias and their applied use on American urban landscapes.

    Copyright

    © © All Rights Reserved

    Available Formats

    PDF or read online from Scribd

    Did you find this document useful?

    Is this content inappropriate?

    Report this Document
    Colin Rowe and Fred Koetter's manifesto disclaiming the notion of Modernist urban utopias and their applied use on American urban landscapes.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    91 views70 pages

    Collage City by Colin Rowe

    Uploaded by

    Jacquelyn Belle Johnson
    Colin Rowe and Fred Koetter's manifesto disclaiming the notion of Modernist urban utopias and their applied use on American urban landscapes.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Flag for inappropriate content
    of 70
    Introduction ‘Man has a prejudice against himself; anything which is a product of his mind seems to ‘him to be unreal or comparatively insignificant. We are satisfied only when we fancy ‘ourselves surrounded by objects and laws independent of our nature. Guonce SANTAYANA [But what is nature? Why is custom not natural? I greatly fear that this nature is itself ‘only a first custom as custom is a second nature. BLaIse PASCAL Wh these two sttements-one a commentary upon ihibion and the ‘other a question as tothe eternal source ofall authonity-it might be posible to construct a theory of society and even theory of architecture: bus f modesty restrains the atfemp, there ar also pragmatic reasons which make the sme insistence. The city of modern architecture (i may’ also be called the moder ct) hs not yet ben built In spite ol the god wil and goo intentions ois protagonists, has remained either a project oan abortion: and. more fn more there no longer appears tobe any convincing reason to suppose ‘hat matters wll ever be aherwise. For the constellation of attitudes and femotions which are gathered together under the general notion of le Corbusier: Vie Contamporsng 1922 ‘modern architecture and which then overow, in one form oe anther, Into the inseparably related Bld of planning. begin the end-to seem slkogether too contradictory, too confused and too febly unsophistated to allow for any but the most minor productive results. By one interpretation, moder architecture ia hard-headed and hard- ‘nosed undertaking. Ther isa problem speci problem, and theres an ‘obligation, an obligation to selence to ole iin allt particulary: and ‘=, while without bias and embarassment we proceed to serutni the facts then, as we accept them. we simultaneously allow thee hard ‘mpi facts to dictate the solution But if such Is one important and academically enshvind thesis, then, alongside, there sto be recogsiaed 8 no les respectable one; the propston that moder architecture the instrament of planthropy, became lager hope’ and the ‘eater 00d. In other words, and right a the beginning. one is confronted with the simultaneous profession of two standards of value whose compatty rot evident. On the one hand there isan expresion of allegiance te the crterla of what-though diguised ax sciences afer all imply macage- ment; on the other, a devotion tothe ideals of what was a few year ago ‘fen spoken of asthe counterculture, peopl, community and al he rest; and that ths curious dualism causes ite surprise can ony be ‘tributed t a determination not o obser the obvious ‘Bt. presumabyy the unate confit which preens ise! s that between a retarded conception of slenoe and a reluctant recogni of oes, this being sais is apparent that modern architect, 0 ‘reat phase. was the great idea tha it undoubtedly was preciely because 'ompounded and paraded to extravagance the two myths which isi Le Corbuter: Pan Vasa, 1925, ‘ew Yok, publ boas in Loner Nenbata ‘most publicly advertises, orf the combination af fentasis about science with its objectvity-and fantasies about freedom-vwith its humanity ‘compised one of the most appealing and pathetic of late nineteenth century doctrines, then the decsve twentieth century embodiment of {hese theme in the form of bulding could no fall to stimulate: an, the ‘more kexited the imagination, the more the conception of scent, rogressive and historically relevent architecture could only serve as ¢ focus stl farther concentration of fantasy. The new archtectare was nitionaly determinable: the new architecture was historically ‘predesined; the new architecture represented the overcoming of history he new architecture was responsive t the spirit ofthe age: the new architecture was socially therepeatic: the new architecture was young and, beng self-enewing. i was never tobe wearied by age: Dut-perhaps above al-thenew architecture meant the endo deception, dsslation, ‘vanity, subterfuge and imposition. Such were some of the subliminal suggestions which stimulated ‘moders architecture and were in turn, stimulated by it: and s we look ‘uk on doctrine so extraordinary and a message 0 bizarre. since We ‘are speaking ofa period now fity years ago, we might alo allow to come ‘to mint Woodrow Wilson's hopes for democracy and diplomacy. We right briely contemplate the American preents “open contracts openly ariad a’. For from Woodrow Wilson's hopes for international Policso the vill radlese is but the meres of sep. The crystal ity and the dream of absolutely unconcealed negotiation (ao playing of poker) both lke, epreseated he total expltonoevilafe the purgtion ower ‘The expresdent of Princeton's dream, the pathetic by-product of @ liberal Presbyterian faith which was both too good fortis word and not 00d enough, which was only tobe honoured inthe breach, created ts ‘own portntous vacuum and devastation, By the exponents of Real plik be and what be represented were simply ignored or, at mot. ‘eocivd a ritual deference which was worse than nothing: and, though the vision ofthe crystal city has enjoyed greater longevity, today it ate hardly seems to have been signifcantly moee prosperous. For this wes ‘act nwhich all authorty was tobe ditlved all convention superse ‘m which change was tobe continous and order, simultaneously. com let: is which the public realm, become supertuous, was to disappear fad where the private realm, without farther reason to excuse itself was to emerge undisguisd by the protection offaade. And now, eventhough ‘he weit othe ea persists ity whic has shrunk to very ite t0 the impoverished benaltes of pull housing which stand around like ‘he undernourished symbols of new world which refused tobe born. Such has been the disintegration of a important frame of erence and, ke the kde of World War Is war to end war, the ety of modern arhitecure, both as psychological constuet and as physical mode. hos ‘en rendered tapicaly ridiculous. But, so much sgenerelly fe and ‘the urben model which achieved fs decisive formulation give or take 3 yt Pr La Dose eo Phe oben St Loui, deme Prat poe howe 1971 6 wmoouerion few years. 1930 ls now everywhere under attack t not very lear that either unorganized sentiment or se-conscious crtcsm has, 50 far, achieved any significant or comprehensive placement. In fact. rather the reverse Seems to have taken place. Por, while the city of Ludwig Hilberseimer and Le Corbusier, the city ealebrated by CIAM and sudverised by the Athens Charter the former city of deliverance i every ay found increasingly inadequate, apparently is very expediency ‘Bvarantes its adulterated and alledevouring growth. So moc so, that t right be believed that what here presents Ise is spectacle of spon- taneous generation, a nevero-bedmagined nightmare and a wholly registerd will ever ie’ "And accordingly, the present situation is knoe and almost insoluble or the two increasingly desperate ‘obligations ofthe architect-an the ‘one hand to 'sclence’ aad an the other to ‘peopl! -continue to pers: and, ' tei old working symbioss of the twenties becomes ever more shaky, these divergent drives acquire @ Uteraness and a vehemence which begin w cancel out the usefulness of either. So modern architect, professing tobe sient, displayed a wholly naive idealism. So let thi situaton be corected and, from now on let us Increasingly consult technology, behaviourist research and the computer. O, alternatively, moder architecture, professing to te humane, displayed a wholly ‘unacceptable and see sclentifc rigour. Therefore, rom How on Ie ess rom intellectuals varity ane let a be conten to replicate things = they ae, te observe world unreconsructed by the arrogance of would-be pllosopers but as the mass of hamanity prefer ito be-useful, real and Aensey familar. Now, which of these two prospective programmes for the fatore-the Aespotism of ‘science’ or the tyranny ofthe ‘majority~is the more com- pletely repalsive is difeult wo say; but that, taken separately or together. they can only extingulsh all native should not require inordinate emphasis. Nor should It be necessary to say that thee alternatives-Let science bull the tour and L2t people ull the town-aro both of them profoundly neuro For, up toa point. science will and shou bul the town and. up toa point, so will and shoul collective opinion; but the ever ending nsstnce on the incompetance of the architec, which Increasingly becomes more true and whichis a continuous insistence on the evi of self-conscious activity, should at leat be recognized forthe psychological manoeuvre thet i s-a5 a gllidden attempt to shit the locus of responsi. But if the architects social gland the meens he has employed to fects sublimation isa whole story which has resulted in the complet Asaray ofthe profession. more importants that we are here once more 1 the presence of Santayana’ the human mind has a prejudice agains itself" and, alongside this deepscated prejudice we confront the corresponding determination to pretend that human artifacts can be irropverion ser than what they ar, And, of cours, piven the andety to induce such luton che appropiate mechanism wil ever be lacking. For there i, ater al always ‘nature's and some concept of nature will elways be invented-decovered ithe operative word-in order te appease the panes cof conscience ‘With so much sald an inidatory argument almost complete. Fr, ‘on the whole the twentieth century architect has been entirely unwling to conser the onl of Pascal’ question; and the ea that nate and custom may be interconnected i, ofcourse, ently subversive of his peton. Nature pure, custom corrupt andthe obligation to transcend atom i at to be evaded. "Now, in ts day, this was an important concept and, as a convition that only the new sully authentic. one may sil fet cogency. How lever, whatever may be the authentity of the Dew, lngsige novelty of farfacs one might just possibly recogniae novelty of Meas; and the tented century architc's working teas have, fora very long tne remained conspicuously without overhaul. There pests an eighteenth century belein the veracity of science (Bacon, Newten?) and an equally iheenth century bebe in the veracity of the eallectve will (Roussea, Burke?) an, if both of these can be conceived to be furnished. with persuasive Hegelian, Darwinian, Marsien overtone, then there the situation rests almost asi rested nearly one hundree years ago. Which 's very largely a noton ofthe architect as a sort of human ouija-board or planchete, as a sensitive antenna who receives and tranemtes the logical messages of destiny. tis the mark oan educated man to look for precision n each clase of things just far asthe nature ofthe subject adits." tls hard to Asagre; but in the endeavour t protde architectre and urbanism witha precision that, of their nature, they can scarcely poses, the suldance of eighteenth century ‘nature’ has been allo well consulted and meanwhile (with the architec absorbed with visions of supe. ‘science’ or ‘unconscious’ selfzegulation, with makebebeve un precedente for abvence of efectvenes) in a Kind of resurgence of Soil Darwinism-natural selection and the survival of the Sttest-the rape of the great cies of the word proceeds "There reraine the old aad enticing advice that. rape fe inevitable, then get with and enjoy; but, this central cree of Futrim-let us celebrate fore majeure unacoeptable wo the moral ensciousnes, then ‘were obliged to think again Which what the present ext iallabout™ A proposal for constructive disllusion, ts simultanewsly an sppeal or ‘order and alsorder, fo the simple and the complex forthe joint existence ‘of permanent reference and random happening, of tke private and the public of innovation and tradition, of both the retoepective and the prophetic gesture. Tous the occasional virtues of the moder city seem {0 ‘be patent andthe problem remains how, while allowing forthe need ofa "moder decamation to render these vets responsivs to circumstance, Collision City and the Politics of ‘Bricolage’ + fT have succeeded ... my last wish is that a higher and indestructible bond ofthe beautiful and the true may have been tied which will keep us forever firmly united, Grone Wits Friepaici: Hest there exists a great chasm between those, on one side, who relate everything to @ single central vision, one system less or more coherent or articulate, in terms of which they understand, think and feel-a single, universal, organizing principle in terms of which all that they are and say has significance-and, on the other side, those who pursue many ends, often unrelated and even contradictory, connected, if at all, only in some de facto way, for some psychological or physiological cause, related by no moral or ‘aesthetic principle: these last lead lives, perform acts, and entertain ideas that are centrifugal rather than centripetal, their thought 's scattered or diffused, moving on ‘many levels, seizing upon the essence of a vast varlety of experiences and objects, for what they are in themselves, without consciously or unconsciously seeking to ft them {nto or exclude them from any one unchanging ... at times fanatical, unitary inner vision. ISAIAH BERLIN Scope of Total Architecture: such was the tle which Welter Gropus alized t9 «highly miscellaneous election of, mostly, insubstantial ‘souys Itwes public in 1985; and, apparent, at that date, insistence on ‘otal erchitectaré-an obvious version of the Wagheran Gea Funstere with all ts promises of cultura integration didnot appear citherunjustied or bizare. Presumably, in 1955, a"Yoal architecture anal controling system whichis yet not a system because itis geowth ‘anew growth coming right from throes up'a combination, probaly. of both Heyola freedom and Hegetan ‘necesty, in aay case a me modal tthe Museo ‘87 COLLISION cITY AND THE POLITICS OF sRICOLAGE ‘emanition from fundamentals, was sill considered not meray a plausible [but lio a desirable possiblity: and, no doubt, it here, when such notions become expressed in the gentle vole of ‘concerned Mberalsm, that we may be encouraged to dscem something of the stil shining afergnw of unitary and holistic utopan ft ‘We have earir attempted to specify two versens of the stoplan idea: aopia 88 an. imple, object of contemplation and wiopia as an cexplctinstrument of socal change; and Its a this age, that we must, re-afi hove much the conceptions of ‘total architecture’ and ‘total dksign are present, of nocesity, in all utopian projections. Utopia has rever offered options. The cltzens of Thomas Mere's Utopia ‘could ‘not falta be happy because they could not choose bu be goo and the ‘ea of dwelling in goodness’ without capacity for moral choice, has been Fone to atend mos fantasies, whether metaphorical or tera of the deal society. For the architect, of course, the ethical content of the good society has, maybe, always oen something which bling was to make evident. Indeed it bas, probably lays ben his primary eference: for. whatever other controling fantasies have emerged-antquly. wadition, tech- rologs-these have invariably been concelved of as aiding and abetting fan in sme way benign or decorous social order. "Thus not to retreat backward all the way to Plto an. instead, to find a much more recent guatacentospenghoard, Maret’ Storainda Vera, ew contain all he premonition ofa situation assumed to beanie ug. eotble to rule There i a hiatchy of elgou ees. the pn "eal he arstcraic place, the mercantile extabilshment the pricag residence: and tis in tems ofsuch a gradetion-an ordering sttur ang function-that the well-condacted ety became conceivable : Buti tll eained an idea and there was to be no qustion of xy | era nd iets aan Fr the meal yr ap | intractable naceus of habit and interest which cou, In no wy Ce ect bend: an soa, te ol ofthe oe fame | one of subversie interjection (Palazzo Massimo. Campidotli, et) op ‘of polemical demonstrations outside the city-the | loses what the ety ought tobe | ‘The gatden as criticism of the clty-a eicsm which the city ley abundantly acknowledged has not, as yet received suficientatenton, but, outside Fence, for instance, tis theme ie profusely representa its most extreme afirmation can only be at Versailles, that veneer century cic of medieval Pais which Haussmann and Napoleon I “ater so elaboratly tok to heart. Carty the gardens of Verses, an aristocratic Disiey Wo ‘hough they may have been, must in the end, be construed enue ‘attempt to put over quatiocent ideas: and ts when presented with ts den which “Tok Mae's il, lew ode ‘5 COLLISION CITY AND THE POLITICS OF “BRICOLAGE scene-stl, occasionally, magniicent-that we are oblige to recone ‘how completely the lineaments of «Flaee style utopia sould be rep, cated wit tees. But, If Versalles might be intrpreted 38 a utopia of ‘eatin, we may stil be amazed thatthe platonie, metapkoricl utopia ‘enerally regarded in Italy as such-could here be take to such Iter Now, for present purposes, the obvious construct to mount along side Versa i the Villa Adriana at TWol. For, i the one is certlay an exhibition of total architecture and total design the otker attempts Asimulte all reference to any consoling Wea: and, if here there bso power under two impersanations, then one mighteven fel en. strained io digress and to ask which isthe more ust model-for us, ‘Theres unambiguous, unabashed Versailles. The moral Is declared ‘to the world and the advertisement, like so many things French, can scarcely be refused. This s total control and the glaring tamination ot ‘i Ts the tamph of generality, the prevalence of the overwhelning ‘dea and the refusal ofthe exception. And then, compred with ths ‘single-minded performance of Loxis XIV, we have the curiosity of adrian-of Hadfan who is, apparently, 90 dsorganined and casi, who proposes the reverse of any ‘totality, who seems to need only an ‘ccumultion of asparate Ideal fragments and whose erica of Iimpecal Rome (confgurationally much like his own hous) rther an ‘endorsement than any potest ‘Bat, if Versailles isthe complete unitary model and the Villa Adria ans i, ln fer Eel Canina 4 COLLISiOW cry ANH rim PonITICS OF “BRICOLAGE! the apparently uncoordinated amalgam of discrete enthusiasms and, if the shattering Kealty f Versailles isto be compared with the relat Istcally produced ‘hits of Teall, then what opportune interpretations can be placed upon ths comparison? The obvious ones no doubt: that Versalles ste ultimate paredigm of atocracy that assumes a com= let poltical power, undeviating init objectives and long surtained: tht, fundamentally, Hadrian was no les autocratic than Louis XIV bat that perhaps he was not under the seme compulsion to make 0 consiteat & splay of is autoeracy... Bat. there no doubt that al dis might be sald and Wits afte all ot very luminating, ws a thi stage that we {el liga to call to our asistance Isaiah Berlin. "The fox knows many things but the hedgehog knows ane big thing. “Ts. in tare ofour concern, ste statement, otherwise uninteresting ‘which, in The Hedgehog and the Fos, Isiah Berlin chose to gloss and to elaborate? Taken fgurtively but nt pressed to fat, what one Is sup ws 1 cortaser: Vita Satna Garces, 1927. plan rahe Carts: ty fr tee maion oateant 1922, Quart of plan ead F 2 posed to have ere are the types of two psychological orientations and temperaments, the one. the hedgehog. concerned with the primacy o¢ the single ide and the other, the fox, preoceupid with multiply of stimulus; and the great ones of the earth divide fury equally Pats, Dante, Dostoevsky, Prout, are, needles to say, hedgehogs: Aol Shakespeare. Pushkin, Joyce ae foxes. This the rough dlcrimination bot, ss the representatives of Iterature and plalosophy mho ate Bet’ erdcal concern the game may be payed in other areas al Picaso fox, Mondrian, a hedgehog the gues begin to leap inte place land, as we tum to architecture, the answers are elmost enidy pr. ictabie,Pallado is hedgehog, Gio Romano a fox: Hawksmooe Soane, Philp Webb are probably hedgehogs, Wren, Nash, Norman Saw almost certainly fores; and, closer tothe present day, whe Wrights unequivocally « hedgehog, Lutyens is just as obviously fos But. to elaborate the results of temporary thinking In such eat ores, tis as we approach the area of modern architecture that we bei. to recogni the impossibility ofariving at any so symmetrical a balance For, i Gropus. Mies, Hannes Meyer, Buckminster Puller are “early frminenthedgetiogs then where are the foxes whom we can ent int ‘the same league? The preferences obviously one way. The single central sion’ preva: One notices a predominance of hedgchogs; bu. if ne tight sometimes feel that fox propensities are less than mord and therefore, not to be disclosed, of couse there will remain the jo of asslgnng to Le Corbusier his own particular slot, ‘whether he sonst ora pluralist. whether his vision is of ene or of many, whether be of ‘single substance ar compounded of heterogeneous elements ‘hese are the questions which Berlin asks with relerence to Tost questions which (he says) may not ke wholly relevant: and then VY tentatively, he produces his hypothesis 98 COLLISION CITY AND THE POLITIES OF ‘aRICOLAGE’ ha Toltay was bs ature a fo, bt Beloved in sng a hoch that ital nd acsemers tone ting an is Be are aoesty a iepeon of own achewement, anther an tht ‘Steen He hate fet an we who ik pena ol ober wer deig &sbould be Saag ke so much other Ierary ertcsm shited into a context of architectural fous the formula seems to Bt; and, should not be pushed to far, it can il ofr partial explanation There is Le Corbusier fhe architect with what Wiliam Jordy has called ‘his witty and collsve Inteigence'* This i the person who sets up elaborately pretended Platonic ructures ony to idle them with an equally elaborate pretence ‘of emplrical deal the Le Corbusier of maltpe aides, cerebral references {and complicated ctr: and then theres Le Corbusier the urtanist,the deadpan protagonist of completely diferent strategles who, on a large and public scale, hes the minimum of use fr all the dialectical tricks and Spatial involuons which, invarably, be considered the appropdate document of a more private station. The puble world Is simple, the private worlds elaborate: and, the pevate world aflet concern for ‘contingency, the would be puble personality long maintained an almost ‘too herte dda Br any tanto the speci ‘Bat if the stuaton of complex houses ty seems strange (when cone might have thought thatthe reverse wae applicable) and to explain the discrepancy beween Le Corbusier's architecture and his urbanism fone might propose that he was. yet again. anther cas ofa fox assuming hedgehog disguise forthe purpotes of public appearance, thi so build a digression into a digression, So we have noticed a relative absence of, foxes atthe present day: and. though ths second digression may later, itis hoped be put to use. the whole fox-hedgebog diversion was initiated {or cstensiby other purposes-to establish Hadrian and Louls XIV as, -more oles ree acing representatives of these two psychological types, “win were autocratclly equiped to indulge ther inherent propensities sand then to ask which of thei two peoduets might be fl to offer the ‘more useful example for today-the accumulation of set-peces in ‘olson oF the toil co-ordinated display ‘Which is in no way to doubt the pathological aspects of bth Tleolt and Versailles bu which simply to assert dhe usefulness as exaggera- ‘ions of anyeverydey norm. For. thes are laboratory specimens-suely ‘no more, fi as two instances ofthe normal written very large that they ght sil adress heels tows to propound two questions: the ope ‘of taste, che other o polis. ‘ast sof course, no longer-and was, perhaps, nevera serious or substantial matter: But, this Beng sald tis almost certain thatthe Ux Inhibited aesthetic preference of the present (given fro condtions of ‘almost equal suo and enlessnes) ls forthe structural discontinuities and ‘the moliplcty of syncopated excitements which THol presents. And. ‘inthe same way, whatsver may be the contemporary and conslentious concer for “the sale central vison’. shoal be apparent that the ‘4 coutistow cit AND THE PoLiTiCs OF “BRICOLAGE ‘manifold junctions of Hadrian's wil, the sustained ference that was but by several people at diferent tes, ts seeming combiation ofthe sclnld and the inevitable, might recommend it the attention ‘of polical soctetes in which poical power fequenty-and mercial changes hands. For Hadrian's ila asthe simulated product of diferent régimes, all ‘adds up’: and i adds up in so convincing and use « fashion than one can oaly belive ts promotion, However, this isto antleipate the argument, Hadrian here became Inserted ae a qualifcation and a ericism of Lous XIV: and our in surprise only concerned the fact hat, at Versailles even i the days ofthe platoni, metaphorical utopia. genuinely determined hedgehog could ‘ome up wit so iterl a representation. Indeed one can only adie the will Louis XIV was working against heavy olds: and. as s00n as the classical utopia became superseded there was patently volved pret liberation for people of his own particular personality type. Hada, ‘with hs reminiscences of famous buildings and places, provided nhs ‘miniture ‘Rome a nostalgic and ecumenical ustration of the hybrid ‘mix which the Empire presented. He was one of Frangze Chveys ‘cultural’; but, for Louis XV, the ‘progres’ (assisted by Cot, tis the ationalable preset and the fature which exhibit themes 15 the exacting idea: and ts wien the rationaizations of Callers be come handed down via Turgot to Salat Simon and Comte tht one begins to see something of Versailles’ prophetic enormity. or certainly. there was here anticipatad all the myth ofthe rationally ordered and scent’ sacety: and, i we might find here-in mare wipe than one-a cause ofthe revolution of 178, then we have only to imagine 4 later, posteevalutionary version of Louis XIV becoming supreney responsive to the message of Hegel. or inthe history af despots 1st the history of utopia, almost the same arguments sem apply: at ‘as we are deleted inthe area ofthe mechanically rational, so we move to the logic of organism. Bat the combination of a mechanical model of ratonalty with an organic one could only be left to the later nineteenth century and t> ‘modern architecture; and is again, when we find these two hedgehog ‘requirements conflated with the threat of damnation that we retro 12 {Ue avium a it was recetved between the fw Word was ‘The Htany of the myth i by now familar: a condtion of violent and ‘rapid change, unprecedented in the history of mankind, has peed slate of isorentatin, of suring, of exploitation so profound, a moral and politcal ers of such dimension that catastrophe x surely imines. pechaps inevitable; and, theefore, in order to ensure the orderly Po ‘resion of human alas, inorder to guarantee universal mental an physicel health. in order to avert the economic spoitions of worl society, In onder to avoid impending doom. the enterprises of mand must be brought into a closer alignment withthe, equally ineviae forces of bla destiny ‘uch was the cult of ess inthe inter-war period Before i sto lt society must nid itself of outmoded sentiment, thought technique: and. a aki ia ose Tiersen: eet or Central ‘1927 iin order to prepare fr its impending deliverance, it must be ready to make hua rsa the architec, as key gure in this transformation, must be prepared to assume the historical lead. Foe the ule world of human habitation and venture is the very cradle ofthe new oréer and, in order ‘ropery to rock ithe architect must be wing to come forward, purged of prejudice, as font-ne combatant inthe battle for humanity. Perheps, while claiming to be scientific. the architect had never previously operated within quite fantastic a poycho‘plitia’ mie Dut this is to parents, twas for such reasons-Pascallan reasons ofthe heart-that the city became hypothested asa contlon of com. plete holistic end novel continu, the result of scenic ndings and @ completely glad. ‘human’ collaboration. Such became the activist utopian total design. Perhaps an imposible iio (he future to approx mate tothe condtion of Wagnerian muse?) and certainly an improbable ‘thought: bat the alternative, the disappearance of humanity. was ‘obviously far worse, And itis against such a psycho-culturel backdrop thatthe message of modem architecture was marketed and sold For those who, daring the past iy or sixty yeas (and many of ther | must be dead), have been anxiously awaiting the establishment ofthis new city, tmist have become Increasingly clear tht the promise-such 25 it is-cannot be kept. Orso one might have thooght; bat, although ‘the total design message has had asomewhatspttedeareerandhas on ited scepticism, it has remained, and possibly to this day, as the Payehologielsubststum of urban theory end its practical application. ‘Such a combination of sclentsm and moral enthosiam was, of course. Jong ago enicad by Keel Popper-pethaps most potenti in his Lagi of Scientific Discovery and bis Poverty of Histrkism:? and in our own ‘nterpretation ofthe actvs utopia eu indebtedness to Poppe's position ‘Should be evident. But if Popper. way back. was concered with what he maybe felt to be a stuation of potentially dangerous rhetoric in splte | | | Cand, Jose and Wood: Foe Dales ee 196, an Chstopher rand: agra of « tilage 1964 this easly avalabe reservations, the total design message Was aot to ‘be repressed. Indeed it was so lite tobe repressed that, inthe lst ey years, a newly inspted and wholly Ierl version ofthe message we enabled to appear a renditions othe stems approach anda variety of ‘other methodologies! finds [Now in these areas, where the scenes’ of early modern architecture ‘is presumed to be painfully detent. it goes without saying thatthe methods involved are laborious and sen extended, One hes ony to ‘contemplate the scrupulousness ofthe operation ina text sch as Ny ‘on the Synthess of Form to ge the pure. Obvious a ‘clean proces dealing with ‘clean’ information, atomized. cleaned an thea clesed ‘again. everything is ostensibly wholesome and hyplenici but, resulting ‘tom the inhibiting characterises of commitment, especialy physica ‘commitment, the product seeme neve to be quite so prominent ay the process. And something comperable might be sald about the related production of stems, webs, grids and honeycombs which inthe loer sixes, became so conspicuous an indesty. Both are attempts to ave ‘any imputation of prejudice; and if in the frst case, empirical facts we resumed 1 be value-tree and fnally ascertainable in the second the co-ordinates ofa gud are awarded an egal impartiality. or, tik the Fines ‘of longitude and latitude t seems to be hoped that these wil, in some way, eliminate any biaseven responibiit-in a specication of the ‘nfling deta ‘Bat, if the ideally netral observer i surely a eit tion, if among the mulipcty of phenomena with which we are surrounded we ‘observe what we wish to observe, four Judgements are inherent selective because the quantity of factual information isfnaly indigestible any Iteral usage of ‘acuta grid laboers under epproximate problems ‘The en isto be either allencompassieg-a practical impos, or {sto be delimited-and hence not etal: and. therefore, what resus ftom both ‘methodology’ and ‘systems (atv tothe contexts of fics and space) can only be the reverse of whit was intended-in the one cs, rocess elevated tothe level of ion ani in the other, the cover ste ment ofa tendentious iden, Which is not to deny the usfulnes of well concerted information nor the heuristic utity which fantasies of highly organized reality ony ‘fen supply: but which i to notice tit, by now, the iteral extension of total design into total management and total printout, as, as enuch “among its proponents as its ries, beg, fr some tine, to appear es cher dubious and fries enterprise. dis perhaps as result that there have emerged a series of counter-poductons a barrage of mp feciy defined reactions, not ony to the monolithic oflensiveness of would-be systemics but also to its related lack of responsiveness to rain association, immediate circumstance, vitality, Loosely arranged and somehow attached to this reaction are notions 97 COLLISION CLEY AND Ine POLITICS UF “HRICOLAGE of Ad Hocisa, Decentralised Socialism (on the mod of the Swiss anton?) thePop version of townscape and. rather mor: removed from the architect, versions of advocacy planning, with a whole body of alate and allegedly populist statepler-all of them identifiable by a ‘common thread along which they seem tobe sung tgethe, That is (and relative to the various ‘methodologies’ which they would supplant ‘or mos) the. all of them. in one way or another, del deci with, 1 far moe intensive attachment to the elusive predilections ofthe people ‘And (again relative tothe situation which they have come to dnd in adequate) these atitudes. by and large, would subsite occasion for pace, acon for artifact, maby for fxd meaning and sl generated hole for ingestion, But to maintain this simplification. While mach has been done ‘through these atts to break down an unmanageable monolith, a8 resul, there has aso been introduced an equally untenable lemma. For there s surely some queston as to the ultimate vablty of any ‘wholly popular imperative Cve ‘em what thay want whether soctoogs cally endorsed or otherwise, has never been a, completely, tenable poltcal dogma: and, to the degree in which they leave thie fsoe an considered, hase often genuinely modest and disarming revisionist propositions ae likely tobe found implicated with either or both oft very unpleasan doctrines: Whatever is right-an evidently nauseous idee-und Vor pul wor dia suppostion upon which cae might have thought that twentieth century history had already cist a sullent penumbra of doubt "The architetural proponents of populism are all for cemocracy and all for feedom: bat they are characteristic unwilig to speculate sto the necessary conflicts of democracy with lw, of the necestary collisions of teedom wit jase, They adres themselves to what they believe to be (and to a large extent are) conereteevi-economlc evils syle evs, cultural and ethnic abuse; bat they are 10 much (and ‘often so propely) concerned with species at to be typically unable to place ibertargn deta! in what, fr the want ofa better world, must be ‘ts complementary contest of legal and lease abstraction. In other words, the populist (Uke some ofthe devotes of townscape) are apt to vitate an ently plausible argument by thelr unwilingos to consider the matter of teal reference: and, because they are Mily to be pre- ‘occupied with the problem of present minorities. the predcament of the future under griveged is Mable to evede their attention Sufased with senerosty, they surrender to an abstract entity called the people's an, while talking of ploralism (another abstract entity whch is usualy hhonoured in the absence of any speci tolerance), they are uawiling ‘recogni how manifold ‘the peopl’ happens tobe, and consequent ‘whatever's wil. how much in need of protection frm each other is ‘components happen to stand. To date, Vor popu takes care of 10 9 COLLISION cIFY AND THE POLITICS OF BRICOLAGE’ ‘minorities: and, asfor Whatever is right (and isn’t just untatored choice. splendid), one can sometime el this o be no more than a socoogea heat sink, an entirely monstrous conservative pot intended to drew of any possible cbulltion of revoluionary steam. ‘And so, while we have no wish to promote recurent dustic, versions of the scence feion-townscape confontation, we Ad ‘ourselves confronts yet again with the extremes of two postions ‘There isan abstract would-bescenic eal and. conret, would e Populist empires. One discovers one attitude of mind which, whatever IK might profes, can scareniy del wth epecior; ad one loners another which, whatever it might ned, is radically disinclined to cope ‘with generalities. ut though one must be disposed to wonder why these diisions of humanity shouldbe so, i also hard not to rege ‘hat the populist revisionists, who are foxes attacking « hedgehog octrne, precisely because they are attacking this doctrine tend to ‘become hedgehogs themselves. For it ian unfortunate fect that. a pro.

    You might also like