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The Morals of Modernest Minimalism
On Design
The Morals of Modernest Minimalism
A Provocation
by Tom Spector
If the simple fact of being Modern is no longer enough to bestow moral superiority on a building, then cannot Modernism be practiced more modestly today as a matter of personal and artistic preference, as one style among many? Certainly, a flip through the pages of Architectural Digests annual Architecture Issue would suggest that it can: Coverage in May 2005 includes a severely minimalist glass house in Chicago, followed by a capacious Sardinian hillside home in Greek vernacular style, a Cape Cod compound on Lake Tahoe, and a Ricardo Legorettas museum-like house before the finale of a cozy but predictably spacious shingle-style Long Island vacation home. All this is presented as a matter of taste and choice, of alternate and equally beguiling visions of the good life. Indeed, if you were wealthy enough, you might own one of each, and so much the better. The haute bourgeois audience sought by Architectural Digest seems willing to accept even the most reductive versions of Modernism as, indeed, just another style, and architects seem willing to accept and even applaud these attempts by forces outside the profession to broaden Modernisms appeal. Culture critic Virginia Postrel thinks this move from morality to style is a done deal: Modern design was once a value-laden signal a sign of ideology. Now its just a style, one of many possible forms of personal aesthetic expression.....
continue reading: Harvard Design Magazine
The Morals of Modernest Minimalism
A Provocation
by Tom Spector
If the simple fact of being Modern is no longer enough to bestow moral superiority on a building, then cannot Modernism be practiced more modestly today as a matter of personal and artistic preference, as one style among many? Certainly, a flip through the pages of Architectural Digests annual Architecture Issue would suggest that it can: Coverage in May 2005 includes a severely minimalist glass house in Chicago, followed by a capacious Sardinian hillside home in Greek vernacular style, a Cape Cod compound on Lake Tahoe, and a Ricardo Legorettas museum-like house before the finale of a cozy but predictably spacious shingle-style Long Island vacation home. All this is presented as a matter of taste and choice, of alternate and equally beguiling visions of the good life. Indeed, if you were wealthy enough, you might own one of each, and so much the better. The haute bourgeois audience sought by Architectural Digest seems willing to accept even the most reductive versions of Modernism as, indeed, just another style, and architects seem willing to accept and even applaud these attempts by forces outside the profession to broaden Modernisms appeal. Culture critic Virginia Postrel thinks this move from morality to style is a done deal: Modern design was once a value-laden signal a sign of ideology. Now its just a style, one of many possible forms of personal aesthetic expression.....
continue reading: Harvard Design Magazine
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