|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
From the Friends letter to the LPAB of 3/18/01
The LAPB eventually agreed that the ornament was essential and informed the CCP in a letter on August 8, 2001 that it was obligated to restore the ornament at least to the state it was in when the building became their property in 1998.
The CCP agreed to restore the ornament, and has now stated that the work will cost $6000. Gary Nathan on behalf of The Spectrum has already donated $1000, and the Friends are going to donate $1000. As you have probably read in the paper, the CCP is still behind in their fundraising and needs help specifically on raising funds to restore this ornament. All donations would be greatly appreciated and should be made out to the Community Center Project.
It is clear from the comments of Ms. Cee and letters subsequently written to the editor about this matter that even now in 2001 applied ornament is still belittled (wittingly or not) by those under the influence of the dubious puritanical prejudices of the International Style. I have never been able to understand how a carving or a bit of paneling can be moral or immoral. To me people are moral or immoral, not things. If we talk about expenditure of resources, then you can have a discussion about morality (but this is not a discussion about aesthetics). One argument used against ornament by the Modernists was that it was a waste of money. This was hypocritical in the face of the fact that the first Modern buildings and the high art Modern buildings now being built are typically extremely expensive. In the case of the Community Center Project, they could only justify the wasted expense of the useless slanted wall by saying that otherwise the building would be too boring. Modernists feel the absence of ornament so strongly they tend to turn the whole building into an expensive bauble.
To leave you lovers of ornamental and symbolically complex architecture with something to ponder I leave you with a comment of Theodor Adorno regarding Adolf Loos, one of the founders of Modern architecture:
|
|
|
|
Loos traces ornament back to erotic symbols. In turn, his rigid rejection of ornamentation is coupled with his disgust with erotic symbolism. He finds uncurbed nature both regressive and embarrassing. The tone of his condemnations of ornament echoes and often openly expressed rage against moral delinquency: "But the man of our time who, out of inner compulsion, smears walls with erotic symbols is a criminal and degenerate.
T. Adorno - Functionalism Today |
|
|
|
|
Copyright, 2002. |
|
|
