Architecture of the Absurd: How "Genius" Disfigured a Practical Art

Architecture of the Absurd: How ‘Genius’ Disfigured a Practical Art

John Silber, W.W. Norton & Co, 2007, £16.99

Not a moment too soon, this provocation takes to task the trend in architecture that prioritises ‘spectacle’ over the design of buildings to meet the functional, aesthetic and economic needs of the client.

The book is concise, well argued and nicely illustrated. It responds to the author’s own hypothesis formulated back in the 1950s that architecture, with its obvious programmatic needs, could never follow the trends of the day evident in the arts, where artists, musicians and playwrights engaged in the absurdity of invention over purposeful innovation. Sadly, Silber finds himself to have been wrong, and those he finds guilty include some of the world’s best known architects. Daniel Libeskind and Frank Gehry in particular are targeted for ‘theoryspeak’ justifications of their dysfunctional buildings often delivered late, and over budget.

Given the extent to which masterplanners are driving (or at least complicit in) the kind of bland urban branding exercises that in turn provide fertile territory for these ‘iconic’ interventions, Silber’s critique will hopefully be absorbed by all urban designers – not least of all those acting on behalf of public sector clients in charge of large budgets to regenerate ‘cultural quarters’. For urban designers intent on placing an iconic ‘starchitect’ building at the centre of their regeneration masterplan, the tale that Silber relates of Gehry’s Los Angeles Concert Hall is apposite. Such was its insensitivity to its neighbours, the Concert Hall’s shimmering curves directed enough sunlight into neighbouring homes to raise the temperature by fifteen degrees.

None of the above is intended to argue against ambitious, or even, what might be considered from a future vantage point, ‘iconic’ architecture. But the worthwhile distinction that Silber sets up is between today’s pervasive absurdist trends and bombastic superficialities, and a genuine sense of craft, innovation and well-founded experimentation that contemporary architecture so desperately needs to discover. At a time when intelligent debate is at an all time low, he never explores how we might transcend the former and encourage the latter. Yet, this book itself is a good start. In the current climate, a work that unambiguously advances the case for rigour, beauty, utility and economy should be widely welcomed.