Rather elegant," intoned the white-haired figure at the podium. He was speaking of Adolf Hitler's Reich Chancellery, designed in 1938 by Albert Speer. Up next on the screen was the Nuremberg Party Rally Grounds where brown-shirted Nazis paraded en masse. "I think it is really great architecture," said the lecturer. "You take off the swastikas, and you can admire it without feeling guilty." — Wall Street Journal
As you might expect, "Audience members shifted awkwardly in their seats, and a few walked out to protest the remarks by Léon Krier, opening a conference on Berlin at the Yale School of Architecture in February." Anyone manage to actually be there for this, or have any follow-up?
58 Comments
Krier is great. Nobody trolls modern architectural pharisees better than ol' Leon. He is truly one of the greatest architects and planners alive today.
Krier's brother Robert wrote URBAN SPACE, still on my bookshelf, In that book you can see the influences on the Krier's of French Neo-classicism, Camilo Sitte aesthetic theories and Zucker's survey of urban space in Town and Square. The striped down severity of brother Leon's work, I think comes from Ledoux. If you look at the revolutionary art and architecture in France it was heavy with propaganda (think David) and the absolutism of the state (think Boulee).
There have been a few books tracing the Soviet revolutionary art and architercture and, interestingly, also Nazi art and architecture to French Revolutionary aesthetics. Both are in German which I dont read too well.
this appropriated bit of excellent footage retains its excellence despite having been appropriated. go collapse some new buildings.
yeah, and this needs to be somewhere too ...
and why not? this too.
@Spike love me some Will Oldham! I see a Darkness is a personal fav
Dear Nam, I'm not averse to how you love me.
I always thought this gave off more of a Nazi vibe than some of the Third Reich buildings themselves. Anyway Corbusier was an actual member of the Nazi party and Adolf Loos was a convicted pedophile. And so it goes...
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