Response to Postmoderism and Venturi's theory

Say bye to modernism, now we have moved to postmodernism, which is the period where thing become more interested, no more straight line, but it start to become more organic shape. We used to familiar with the word, “form follow by function,” but during this period there still a function but with ornament in it. Some of the buildings show the idea or the concept, like what is this building for? For example, duck house, the function of the duck house is to sell duck eggs. I think the building shape, act as a sign, telling us that this building related to a ‘duck’.

In conclusion, I still like the modern style but sometime it’s too straight forward. Building can be more, I like the idea of Venturi for making the decoration or the ornament as a function too. And as architect student, I think it allow you to be more creative. Nothing is wrong in postmodernism, building can have a unique shape, compare to modernist, where everything need to be in geometry form.

Response to Expressionism Architecture

This is completely different from modernism. No more straight line, no more minimalism, and ornament come in to place.  Expressionism building have a very unqiue style, it doesn’t look boring anymore. The form and shapes is expressing the emotional feeling of the architect to the people, illustrate they feel through the building form. So in this period you will see that the buildings start to have curve line, for example Geotheanum 1 and 2, designed by Rudolf Steiner. He has express his architecture by using curved line to create the movement. This building is made up of concrete which create the smooth texture.

Another interesting building called Einstein Tower, design by Eric Mendelsohn. I think this building look a bit weird but still have a very interesting element. This is another building that has very difficulties in the construction. The exterior was all concrete, and it is not easy at all to make the concrete to become smooth and have no crack on it. Compared these two type of architect, the modernism is a lot easier to construct.

TWA building in NY, is also one of the important building in expressionism period. I saw this building before during my Structure lecture by aj Komthat. The form of this building was inspired by the bird’s wing. The concept of TWA is that, Eero wants to express the feeling of the bird flying back to its nest.

In conclusion, I think expressionism is more interest in idea and the construction. I don’t think that modernism need hard work in construction because most of it is just a geometry form, nothing fancy compare to expressionism, that have a curved concrete wall, or organic shape. I think I prefer more of expressionism. I like the idea of express the feeling by using the architecture to communicate to the people.

Le Corbusier and Play Time by Jacques Tati

Response to Le Corbusier, one of the most famous modern architecture, his work is very simple im shape and form but very functional. All of his work is very logical and straight forward. He think everything should be simple, so Jacques Tati did a film called Playtime, which to me is to making fun of Le Corbusier theory of minimalism. The film is about making the city very simple in architect form and to see how people react to it.

The film is in colored but the idea of putting everything simple, the film look like black and white. The city is very simple and very organized. The office is just like a big box that has many small boxes inside to separate each room, which look very weird to me. And the funniest part of the film is that Hulot ( the main character) get lost very easily because the building is too simple that they can’t tell the different. And there is another part that he was lost because he saw the man that he need to meet on another side of the building, so he walk to the man, but actually it was just the reflection of the glass wall. The whole building is covered by the glass wall, so there is reflection everywhere.

After watch this film, I don’t think I want to stay in this kind of city, where we do everything the same. To have same car, same work, same office, wearing same kind of clothes. Life probably be very boring. I kind of prefer the city that I’m living right now. People should have their own way of lifestyle. We can take any kind of transportation like car, bus, or BTS. We should have freedom to choose whatever we like not everyone is all the same. It is more interesting to have different kind of size, height, stlye of building than having all building look all the same.

Response to Mies van der Roche and ornament

Mies van der Roche was a very famous architecture during the modernism period. Most of his building will show the structure and the material he use. His work was known as, “less is more.” He developed a design approach based on structural and minimalist. Even though Mies’s concept is, less is more he still use ornament is his building. If you still remember the book that Loos wrote, Ornament and Crime, the idea of modernism. Loos believe that ornament is just a waste of money, resource, labour, and space in a building. He believes that modern shouldn’t have any kind of decoration in it and think that it’s a crime. However, Mies van der Roche was also architecture during the modernism but his buildings also have an ornament on it. For example, the Seagram, it is very simple shape building that shows all the materials and structure of the building, but still there is a crime! Mies van der Roche wanted to show the structure of the building by putting the extra I beam outside the building, which it didn’t support any building structure but it just for decoration and of course these beam is a tons of money. I don’t think this should be called as “less is more”. The beam didn’t act as a structure but it also carry a tons of loads, I don’t think this is make any sense at all.

To be honest, I think Mies van der Roche should change his quote from “less is more” to “not less but more”. It is so funny when I heard about this first time. The idea of adding the extra beam that isn’t for structure but just for decoration is from the person who believes in “less is more.”