THE Lss Angeles F RUM FOR

ARCHITECTURE AND URBAN DESIGN 835 NORTH I!:INGS ROA D W EST HO LL YWOOD CA 900 69

NEWSLETTER September 1992 IN THIS ISSUE: Experimental Architecture in Los Angeles

introductIOn by Frank Gehry

essays by Aaron Betskv. John Chase. Leon Whi tesOfl

IRlllOIl. Los Angeles Forum lor ArCfl'lecwre and Urban DesIgn: New Yor k, Los Angeles. 1992) Reviewed and Reconsidered

UPCOMING EVENTS: ALTERNATIVE DISDRDERS A series of discussions regarding new community initiatives for inner-city LA Dates TSA

WHOSE BEACH PARTY IS THIS ANYWAY?JOHN CHASE ARCHITECTURE AND ITS AUDIENCE

In the Los Angeles of the 19905. a limited view of the architect's role, and a limited vIew of Ihe region's architectural and urban context. have dangerously narrowed both the public and critical unde rstanding of architecture's nature as a social art. Southern California is seen as lacking botn in recognizable bUilding types and clearly defined urban form. As a result, mUCh Importance is placed on the indiVidual art ifact, while far less attention is devoted to the relat ionship between the artifact and urban forms surround ing It As Stefanos Polyzoldes has pOinted out. "Increasingly bUildings here are a kind of selfish scream for attention . Everything has to be a th ing in Itself . The attitude about oneness has spawned such an Interest in fashion," While It IS true that Los Angeles IS lightly perce ived to be a place that IS open to new Ideas. personal expreSSion, and expenmentatlon. the current architectural avant-garde seems less Interested In re laung their work 10 th iS tradit ion of innovallon In a meaningful way than In uSing th iS tradit ion as a licence to make the Kind of photogeniC objects thaI get good press ,

ThiS essay IS a call fo r cfl\ica l attention to the broad

~I_b Ing types that. In l os Angeles, sprawl from the mall to

carow sh and I at , r,e-a villua_b l~ candidates fo r evaluation and , r- F co nrZ'n e2...!!.!.! p age 6

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Janek B!e lsk l The Desert PrOJect Section

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What ma kes arChitect ure "experimental]"

LETTER FROM VIENNA TEREN CE RILE Y Curator. Deparrmenr of ArC;Jltecture and Design The Museum of Modern An

While I suspl~ctthatl was asked 10 review ExperrmentaJ Arctll/ecture In Los Angeles and ilS essays by Aaron Belsky. John Chase. and leon Wh,teson in order to provide an "East Coast " POint of view. these commentS are being written dUring a brief stay In Vienna. The change Ifl venue Isn' t altogether Inappropriate: perhaos more than New York. Vienna represents the counterpoint to Schindler and Neutra's city of Ihe fu ture .

In thiS and other trips here I have found that most diSCUSSions aboul Viennese architecture are necessarily el liptical­Ihal ls. the bwader Question of Vienna's cul tural structure cannot be long Ignored. Ref lections on the architecture of los Angeles would seem to have the same Imperative-that IS. Ihe three essays m Expeflmema l Archllec/ure are. fo r the most pa rI. more cul tural analySIS than Str iCt architectural CritiCism

The essays represent. on one hand. the refinement of certam accepled OOSlllons on the cultural f lux of Southern California. I'm th inking o j Betst<;y 's "Adam-as-surfer I man-machine satyr" duality In th iS mstance . Similar ly . Wh,teson's borrowmg of the term "flrst growt h" from the language of forestry. is particularly useful In understandin g l os Angeles ' overlappmg patterns of growth-decay­rejuvenation Other elements of the essays go beyond histOrically developed analyses and prov,de a preSCient contemporaneous view

conrinu ed on page 3

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• ~ _ \ M .Arr. 1 studem. UCLA

.uJUJ t5J."11 ,L A-RelY IT E CT U REI N LOS ANGELES

According to this publicat ion, it appears to be popularity. fas hion, and linkage to Frank Gehry and the Morphosis crowd. This defin ition is useful in that it provides important insigh t into the values of the cur rertt architecture " scene," but it is not a def init ion that should be accepted without critical comment or theo­re tical elaboration. Whi le the book's

essays imply ihat archi tec ture is more than beautiful deta ils and formal manipu lat ion and attempt to address the influences of technol­ogy, con text and vernaculars on archi tecture, the connect ion to the w ork in the publication is strained The lay-out. which surgically iso lates text f rom image. further strains the relationship and keeps the book

fro m acknowledg ing open ly its role as a fu rtherer of young careers and a catalog of archi tectural fashions In the end. Experimental Architec­ture not only perpetu-ates the "scene's" values but also pre­cludes the possibili ty of developing a more considered definition of what might constitu te experimental architecture, con tinued on page 2

PRESIDENT'S STATEMENT CHRISTIA N HUBERT

O ... er the past year, the Forum has changed In a number 01 Significant ways We have actively sought to w iden the spectrum of cultura l representa tion 0 11 our board and In our committees, and we are InCleaslngl..,. engaged In addreSSing the sOCial Issues thaI face Los Angeles today The pnnClpalnem sel on the agenda for Qur April board meeting w as to propose act'\I,ues that would enilble .,the Forum to make mOl e direct and Substantive connections to the city as a whole. As 1\ turned Qut. our meeting took place JUSt alter the announcement of the Rodney King verdiCt. and the course 01 events most emphatically underscored the need for broader commitment W hile much of thiS work IS stili In the organizational stage, there 15 already much to repOrt.

In June, we held a diSCUSSion as to w hat w e, as architects, can contllbute to the Ire)bulld lng of LA We made up a IISI of the Individuals who attended the meeting and have made that list available to other organizations needing pro bono or reduced fee archuec­turat work. We Will have a fo llow·up event In September, w hich IS being orga nized by John Kalisk i and Roland W iley, a new board member and pas\ preSident of the National Organizat ion of M InOfily Architects. A number of community leaders and actIVists Will participate In the diSCUSSion

The Forum has become a participat ing organization In the DeSign Profess,onals Coali tion. Rasa Bauza is our representative and IS on the Coali t ion steeling comm'ttee , We have proposed to the coalition to deSign (and pOSSibly bUild) some temporary market structures In several burned-out locat lons Once a framew ork lor thiS prolect IS established, we hope to be able to count on the energies of our members to carry the prOJect through.

The Forum IS also a spOnsormg organizat ion of the Taylol Yard Planning and Urban DeSign Committee. KrlS M iller IS one of ItS coordinators and Deborah Murphy IS one of Its project managers fOI the AlA. The commillee has scheduled two planning and design workshops for the 250 acre Southern PaCif iC Railroad land Within the Cypress Park I Glassell Park neighborhood . These workshops are scheduled lor September t 1 ~13 and October 23 ~25. More information is available from Kr is M iller at 213-A87-3394 .

Many of these changes fo llow dlfec\lons promoted by Michele Saee dUling his tenure as Forum PreSident We were sorry to accept hiS resignation from our board. but as the new President I look forward to continuing hiS efforts. M ichele has re located hiS studio to Atwater Village where he has also opened a coffee shop/alternative space. We hope to hold some Forum events there in the future. He IS also working With Shelley 6erger at the House of Ruth, a tranSl\lonal house lor homeless or abused children in Boyle Heights. Michele has been teaching draWing classes at the House of Ruth and has deSigned a chlld-care center lor them which IS In the process 01 being built.

Natalie Shivers has deCided to no longer serve as Newsletter editor and we would like to thank her for all her efforts. which have been greatly appreciated. ThiS IS the 1,lst Issue of the Newsletter to be edited by SylVia laVin, w ho, as part 01 the Forum's general effort to Widen ItS hOfl zons. hopes to broaden the scope of the Newsletter beyond Los Angeles, both In ItS authors and readership. Comments, lettels to the editor. or anyone Wishing to contflbute to the New sletter either by w rit ing. dOing edltoHal work or helpmg With producllOn, are welcome and should contact SylVia al the Forum number 1213-852·71 45) . AD M I N I S T R I V I A :

lesser continued from page 1

Frank Gehry IS presented by the essaYists and h,mself as the " godl ather" 01 " e,.;peflmental" archi tecture Gehry IS an undeniably Important Ilgure In contemporary architecture, yet the nature of hiS Importance and Influence bears e,.;ammallon HIS lame reStS on indiVidualistiC w ork whiCh he claims dellves e)tcluslvely f rom emotional response and aesthetiC instinct An organiZing premise for Expeflmemal Archlfec rure IS that the deSigners In thiS book are ~Gehry-ues, ~ fo llow ers 01 Gehry Were they "true disciples," they would be lollowmg him by follOWing thelf own emOlional responses and aesthetiC Instmcts. Instead. they attempt to reproduce the mlmltable . the InSlincts and mtul t lons 01 another psyche, In this case Gehry's . They have responded to what Gehry does and not what he says, which IS not surpnSlng gIven that he doesn't say much. HIS essay uses both false modesty to disclaim responSibili ty for the Gehry School and false Immodesty to re lish the success of hiS Influence W hile he may hope that hiS archly colloqUial style deflecl s allentlon away from these Issues, It actually serves to underscore unconSidered contradictions m hiS poSition

John Chase's essay reveals that Gehry's wOlk actually belongs 10 a local tradition of vIsionary archl tectule-one-ol-a-kmd gestures- that co-e)tls ts With the tradit ion 01 h,stollcat conte)ttualism These two traditions-one rooted In the past and engaging the public realm, the other anticipating the luture and tendmg to occupy the pllvate realm-form an IroniC alliance In Experrmemal ArCfll tec ture m Los Angeles While the deSigners almost always select the future as thell pellod of chOice, the Idea that one can simply choose a histoflcal period In w hich to bUild IS a l undamentally historicist notion . If young architects are to aVOid fmdmg themselves caught between making w ork they leells conte~tua l but that IS read by others as Gehry has-they WIt! need to develoo a theoretlcallV coherent connecllng the tw o tradit ions

SChweI tzer 8 1M. Th e Monumem

Copies of E,.;peflmental Arch,tecture In Los Angeles, Doug SU lsman's LA Boulevard, and Douglas Macleod's Archlnlo are

available from the Forum .

The Gehry School, haVing already sl led MorphOSIS, Fred Fisher and others, is now In ItS second generation Aaron Bet sky, whose essay stands out m th iS publlcallon, claims that the followers of Gehry have long since Deen 01 two types-the "Gehry-schule. ~ those directly aSSOCiated With the master. and the "man/machine satyr. ~ dominated by MorphOSIS Betsky aVOids assigning the new " e )tpel1menta l~ archi tects to either the theoretical VOid 01 the former category 01 the defenSive formal and Ideological SOphiStiCation of the laller Instead, he attempts 10 connect thell w ork \0 ImpOrtant Oltlcal thought He argues, lollowmg BenJamin, that technology has replaced nature In Los Angeles that. In lact. technology has become natu re ano that the lormal e)tpresslon of these deSigners IS msplred bv the artil iclainv 01 natura l phenomena . By the very aCI of formulating th iS conceptual framework. Belsky reveals hiS deslfe to transform the formalism of Southern Califo rn ia by glvmg II a Slgnil icant theoretl· cal component But when Bet sky refers to the w ork of the new generation as " tentat ive assemolages," he also reveals that there remains a large space between theory and practice.

Schools of architecture are tradit ionally e)tDected \0 bndge th iS gap, bUI w hile most of the architects Included III EX~flmemaJ Architecture ale currently InStructors at SCI-Arc and UC LA, With tne e)tceptlon of Nelj Denali. Iney are primarily concerned with the aesthetics of form and arrangement of program. Because they get publiC e)tposure, notably m places like Expefim emaJ Archrrec­rure in Los Angeles, they are eagerly sought alter by Sludents and administra­tions. But the Impression they make on students is much like the impression made by their work in th is glossy book-the illitial e)tcitement and .)tpectation are soon replaced by diSilluSionment and lingering d,sappomtment that there rea lly wasn't any Ihere, there . The book as a w hole succeeds In furthellng the

"""''''"''','''''' by celebrating thei! e)tperlments, but falls to

r i ley continued 'rom page 1

of the cultural framework of Southern California. Given the recent unrest In los Angeles, Whlteson's Citalion of gang activi ty. race, and economiC Imbalance and Betsky's references to the dark Side of technology frame a picture of Los Angeles that IS more turbulent than Esther McCoy or Reyner Banham may have ever been able to foresee. Despite the East Coast-West Coast COmpe1l110n Implied in the essays, It certainly gives no satls/acllon to recognize los Angeles' recent agonies. If Edward Ruscha's Burnmg Gas Station takes on new meanmgs 11"1 light of the fiOtS. from my pomt of view these meanmgs are more universal than speCif iC to Los Angeles.

Betsky's optimistic assert ion that, despite the dark clouds on the horizon. a culturally relevant architecture can be "found. projected and constructed" is reminiscent. perhaps mtentlonally. of Henry-Russell Hltchcock's triumphant postSCript to The International Sryle: " We have an architecture stili. " Betsky may well be correct but the essaYists ' reliance on analySIS and description is. at times. at the expense of speCif ic criticism. In this regard Whiteson's closing comments wherein he seemingly defends Southern California 's

Lelr Central Office of Arch,tecrure Museum Square Corrected Right Neil M. Denari. Pool Regenerator

"fertlle confusions. engagmg shallowness. bland barbarities and shameless self·love·· are remarkably disengaged, Betsky raises the Issue of a cmical stance by mSlstlng that architecture have a "polltlcal"' )read "moral"'-you can't get around it even m a post-rationalist world) POSition Yet. even here he hedges about makmg "value Judgements" since they have "pockmarked our Cities With well-mtentloned disasters." Never mind for the moment that Betsky and the other essaYists devote much of their eltort to poruaymg Los Angeles as preCisely that-a well- Inten\loned )though well-loved) disaster, More to the pomt. It IS hard to thmk of Los Angeles' great cultural monuments Without thinking of the uniquely Southern California "value Judgements" which they represent the Case Study Houses. Neutra's lovell Health House and RUSh Clly proposals. GIIJ"S courtyard apartments. Wngh(s Doheny Ranch development. etc

Bets~y's heSitations about "value Judge­ments" ultimately gJve way to hIS conVIction that the problems of Los A""ge'es Will not be solved by SImply \lnkeflng With the status quo: "the role of the architect IS to create compell"g VISions of transformation tnat can be erected agamst t ~e purely destructive forces Jnherent In the economic ane ~OC1" Sllucture of the cily" At a time when "vISlon" IS SilO ~ confused With the cybernetiC bungeY-lumpmg 0' v' '"al reality. Betsky's call to arms IS mdeed welcome

In hiS essay. Chase pursues themes that are more explJclt ly architectural. In hiS opening remarks he reminds the reader that Ihe " avant-garde " of Southern California has always been supported by a mmOrlty of clients: li ke Europe of the 1930s. the most mtereslmg of the bUilt prOjects in Expenmental Architecture are private houses or other small scale commiSSions. These prOlects do. indeed, bear out the essaYists ' enthUSIasms for the architectural climate of Southern California . For example, both the formal mnovatlon and the lyrical quality of Vic tOria Casasco's newer work seems far removed from that of the offices With which she was formerly assocI­ated. Similar ly, the work of the Central Office for Architecture, with their sol id California credentials, convincingly supports the book's premise on a variety of scales and Issues the " second growth" house, the automotive environment and a persuasive Vision (regretta­bly one of the few) of los Angeles as a metropolis. SlteWorks, Unfortunately, there are fewer illustrations of th iS urban project than of most houses in the book, despite the fact that it was chosen as the cover illustra­tion. Similarly, the format slights Guthrie + Buresh's

SportCenter and Wagner + Webb's Santa Monica Stone Garden, both of whIch appear to deserve more scrutiny Michael Burch's McMahon ReSidence Add,tion IS another Intelligent commentary on the Idea of "tear-down" con­struC\lon, If the result could be as articulate as the model It IS a Pity that It IS only presented as a prOlected work

In contrast to the exuberance which charactenles much of the work In Experimental Architec­ture, the Office of Charles and Elizabeth Lee's UCLA Chlldcare Center "screams" res traint ThiS piece of high modernism presentS a level of technocratic polish that IS not frequently assOCiated With Southern Califorma, the mfluence of thelf stmt In the office of Norman Foster IS apparent I. M. Pel's Creative Art ists Agency In Beverly Hills has a Similar altitude, though the ephemeral qualities of the Chlldca re Center seem more approprrate than Per's monumentally opaque structure

If the lees' Chlldcare Center JS restrained, It IS also not the" cheap construct,on" frequently alluded to by the essays In fact, the ,ncluslon of Casasco's Alnar ReSidence, Ron McCoy's Grossman ReSidence, and M ichele Saee's and Hubert I ZelnlO'S varrous prOlects, which all display a more precise at titude towards the architectonic POSSibilities of finely wrought details, raises some questions Is "cheap const ruction" a value ,n Itself? Are the architects who work in sheet-lock and plywood arguing, a la Groplus, that f inely crafted construc-

3

tlon IS an anachronism? Certainly O'Herlihy + Warner's house In Malibu IS related, in lIS Simple planning and its emphaSIS on space rather than material commodity, to the work of J. J, P. Oud. Yet even he confessed that he would have liked to have received more substantial commiSSions even as hiS beautIful ly deSigned SOCial hOUSing prOjects In Rotterdam brought him an mterna­tlonal reputat ion. Without diminishing Ihe accomplish­ments of Ihose working With Ihe most meager of budgets, I suspect that many of the architects working with cheap matenals wouldn't mind the chance to do otherwise.

jl , for the moment. the projects illustrated were seen as a commentary on the essays, there are several denials of Betsky's assert ion that the work in Experimental Architecture IS "resolutely modern." RAW Architecture's Platinum Tnangle Collagen Medical Group Offices may have a program (if it is what I think It is) thaI is unique to the late twentieth century, though! th ink the designers are more influenced by the postmodern pop imagery of Charles Moore than any source that might be called Hmodern." Similarly, Barham Shlfdel and Andrew

REGENERATOR

Zago's projects should not be subsumed under the same rubriC that descnbes Nell Denarl's. The latter does mdeed express a "faith in the abili ty 10 construct an alterna\lve phySical environment." butlhe Importance of AKS Runo's work IS ItS challenge to the technocrallc obleC\lvl!y at the heart of Denarr's work. Chase also descllbes AKS Runo's OlympIC West prOlect in POSitiViSt lerms, Clling lIS attempt to "create a more clearly defined sense of place" It seems to me to be the oPPosite. If any of the deSigners In Expenmental Arc/mecture have made a seriOUS attempt to grapple With the Implications of post· structuralist philosophy, It IS Shlrdel and Zago. It may well be that as prOjects such as thiS transfer from the hothouse of philosophical debate to realization they may be seen, by the general public at least, as more "modern" than anything else. Nevertheless, AKS Runo's work deserves the ideological debate that It aspires to provoke

Certain omISSIons, such as the work of Fred Fisher and Angelil + Graham, are not wholly explicable given the overall breadth of the book. Even so, Expen­mental Architecture IS a sellous and comprehenSive attempt to portray a new generation of Los Angeles architects. Given the history of the arch itectural avant­garde It IS II"Ilerestlng to speculate whether In, say, ten years time It Will be pOSSIble to put the same archnects In a SIngle volume. The success of the book may, ulll­mately, be achIeved when It becomes outdated

AVANT-GARDE (AESTHETICA) CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES HISTORY 20TH CE NTU RY' EX PERIMENTAL AR CHITECTURE IN LOS ANGELES . CODIFIED

JOE DAY

GEHRY FACTOR MULTIMEDIA CAIT CRIBBING LOCAL COLORS (influence of the EQUIVALENT A. Reliance on B_ Grasp (signatures, motifs, master, 1 to 10) (the Pitch) Theory thereof fetishes)

(1-10) (1-10) THE PLAYERS (so to speak):

AKS Runo 5 "The Blob" vs "T2" 9 (12, on a 4 (2, on a Oh so many facets to good day) bad day) Geh-reify Eisenman

Janek Bielski Mad Max 8 10 Apocalypse by tours "Brazil" auler-pllot

Blake + Au 8 "Something Wild" 3 5 "Me bamboo. You steel"

Micheal Burch 2 Architectural Record 2 2 Corporate bulk, cover shots, 1985-8 pastel panache

Victoria Casasca 5 Capra's "Utopia" 5 7 So many ways to hide from the sun

Central Office of 3 Sant'Elia after 7 9 Industrialismo. Architecture "Repo Man" unmodified

Neil M. Denari 2 "Pan-Asiatic Cyberporn 9 7 Pantone views Bikers meet Post-Fordis! from the laser turret T echno-cult Doom!"

Guthrie + Buresh 6 "Pale Blue Thunder," 2 7 Pavilionization the daylight sequel

Hubert/Zelnio 0 70's Fellini 6 9 Art iculate suriaces, but does all Light come from above ?

Johnson Favaro 2 "The ShininS (Bodies): 7 7 Corb's "Bone" columns The Health pa Sequel" traded for Gehry's

"Log Bunch" columns

David Kellen 7 "To Live and Die: 5 5 Cornering bJ Eat in L.A." Green and reen

Koning Eizenberg 8 "Scenes from the Class 5 7 Next time, let's see Strutgle in Santa Monica the diaper pattern in and urrounding Hilltowns" crushed velvet

Lubowicki Lanier 9 " Honey, I Blew Up the 7 5 Guess who got all the Kids" coolest toys from

Frank's mode! shop?

Offices of Charles , (maybe early Gehry) Films of Charles 3 8 Pacific Rim and Elizabeth Lee and Ray Eames Modular

Ron McCoy 3 Ron Howard? Does historicism still count? Touche, poche!

Norman M illar 0 The Domestic Sector of 2 4 More bays than the Lang 's " MetrOPOlis" Bay Area

O'Herlihy + Warner 3 If Henry M iller and 8 M inimaLA Kate Hepburn were going to shack up in the hills."

Gary Paige 2 "Vincent and Theo " Gamblers Award for combining So much feeling, in black and white Escher, Corb, Turrell in one so li tt le t ime

drawing

RAW Architecture 3 (very early Gehry) " Bri~ht Lights, 4 8 Courageous late Big ediment" champions of PoMo

M ichele Saee 3 " Honey, I Shrunk the 4 7 H Aa!to? Man, he ain't Kids" no real sensualist. H •

Schweitzer BIM 9 Spagetti Western a 7 4 Bam Bam's la Almodovar Bungalow, Inc.

Wagner + Webb 4 AI! the places that 7 8 Sharper than 007 got lucky Sharper Image

1 Lib<l'Y of Congrns hsung ' 2 for EJp"riment.' A,eni,e,Iure in Los Ang, 'es, ,ntroduct,on by Fr.nk Gehry:

nuys by A.ron Bel sky, Jonn Cnue. Leon Whilnon (Rizzoli. Los Ang,'es Forum lor Arch itec\Ure . nd Urb.n

O ... ,gn: New York, Los Angeln, 1992).

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NOMADIC THOUGHTS': LA

LEFTOVERS

AARDEN HANK

RUSH HOUR

, T~e Nom ad Project IS t~ " prov,soon l l toU " o f a body of work about a rC~ It.Clur .. If' mOlion It IS prompted by. u biqUitouS cond lt,on-Ine mOll,l ,ty of mOd Et, n hIe. especIa lly

Amenca ... hie. In pan. It denOtes a <:01111<:1100 of shdes of overlooked So les luns'ght ly

SIlUllaken from C.'S. p llnes. trl"'S. Ne n ne r , .. lid nO ' Sll ttOnlly. the l)roieci ,$ a

f.twcallon of obse,vl llons occas,oned by mOveml(1I and ded,cated to '<eelllng

orcrlltectu,a l thOu\lM ,n mOHon . II 's In aCCOunt 01 Hansmcn.1 ,e rri Tory Imob lle g fouf'ld ).

'O ~H'Ig Invest lgatoon

Downtown LA In the distance. Building and highway, remotely pro~lmate . What to do With leftovers-with outdated VISions of endurmg urban form)

Cfllen3 used to evaluale Cilies. urban values, are predicated on the spallal Structure of traditional urban form: cities bUi lt of prO)(lmltles. Old cities were concentrations . DenSlflcatlon occurred through time In confined and bounded situations: movements across great distances were rare: settlements were located on stable ground . The spatial structure of the new city IS different. New cit ies e)(pand according to other logiCS. They grow In space, IgnOring time Yet distances are effectively cancelled out by fle)( lble capita l and advanced technologies that reduce the need for manifest physical adjacencies. As the new city eschews old urban vis ions, we are left With leftovers.

In fa lling to admit the persistence of physical form and the duration of lived time, recent urban theories that strive to account for the spatial effects of technology and offer new ways to conceptualize the city pose a double challenge . On the one hand, while information now travels at the speed of light and sound, physical infrastructure still remains relat ively static. Thus, despite the speed of change prompted by techno-space, we must st ill account for the perseverance of urban form, the slow duration of the growth and decay of buil t environments. We must account for the leftovers. On the other hand, we must admit the observation that space/t ime compression radical ly alters our experi­ence of the city, rendering our system of old city values inapplicable as mea­sures of new urban forms. We must begin to COnfront the new city's capacity for infinite expansion . To loosen the grip of urban ideals predicated on proximities and stable ground, an alternative urban vision is needed : imagine urban ground as mobile ground, as territory in flux, as pOSlt ionings in the face of constant repositionings.

Travelling west. outSide RIVerSide, destination LA Heading east. commuters In arrested motion. Why IS It called rush hour)

Rush hour IS ti me spent traverSing the new Clty~traverSlng mobile ground. Travel, marked by pOints left behind, is a crossing of continual space, motion reassert ing distance through time. But rush hour, f,ghllng distances, does not belong to !lavel time. The space of commutation IS, Instead, contlnU' ous Commuting differs from travel in that it entails an exchange without remainder. In math, the property of commutation states nothing IS left over or behind. During rush hour, the CB. radio, ce llula r phone, and fax insure that the commuter's exchange of place for place occurs In an unbroken space where in­between is never detached from here or there. In new Cities, the commuter expends effort in motion between different places that are remotely proximate in one expansive space . Commutat ions span an urban territory that spins outward across space. This is because unlike old cities, where one place could accommodate diverse co-present space, new Cities are made of multip le spaces that cannot occupy the same place .

In rush hour, measurable distances are crossed by phySical bodies in persistent time: an enduring account of mobile ground. Neither here nor there. this ground IS a locus of tranSition and challenge, of movement and change: an overloaded gap. It IS a space of progression, of slippage, and constant re-valuatlon rather than an ob ject or place defined by arriva l, settle­ment. or commodifi cat ion. Rush hour is the reminder that even Cit ies In motion remain cities in time. The riddle of the arrested speed of rush hour IS solved by recognizing that simultaneous movements cancel each other out When moving bodies cross mobile ground, distance can no longer be measured according to stable points . Travers ing the new city, motion and stasis become, paradoxically, one and the same. Rush hour: time when motion stabilizes space .

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chase cont inued from p age 1 understanding as are high aft artifacts of limited produc­tion. A work. 01 architecture may begin as a pnvate statement 01 taste. but all works of architecture inevitably become to some degree public artifacts that Bre part of everyone's dally hfe.

A perusal of the pages of Expeflmenlal Architecture In Los Angeles does not reveal that thiS city has a distinct context. hiStOry, and typology of vernacular architecture that IS both all I\S own as well as part and parcel of Amencan urbanism as iii whole. Local avant­garde architects tend to behave as IhOtigh these phenom­ena that unify urbanism In Southern California Simply do not eXIst. As a result, reinforcing degrees 01 agreement between bUildings or districts has generally been a low priority with much recent arChitecture, JUSt as the Idea of taking cues from a neighborhood or regional repertOire of bUilding types IS seen here as a limitation on creallVlty, David Gebhard has pointed out that even the malor architectural innovat ions of pioneer modernists, such as Frank lloyd Wright, Irving Gill and Rudolf Schindler, had little urbanlstlC Impact. and Leon Whlteson notes that Los Angeles cont inues 10 be a place where small firms, howe\ler InnO\lall\le they may be In the context of their small COmmiSSiOnS, stili have nO real effect on the city as a whole , Glyen the mutual incompatibility of the agendas of high art architecture as they Inform many indiVidual bUildings and the agendas of popular taste as they Inform the common landscape, II IS diff icul t 10 undersland how thiS could be otherwise.

Experimental Archi tecture does li tt le to help overcome this incompatibil ity but does a lot to help one segment of architectural producers-"boutiQue" formalist olfices-domlnale the professional and public perception of architecture. ThiS kind of domination is fTl()(e acute In Los Angeles than perhaps anywhere else in the U.S. While Southern California may still be relatively isolated from East Coast publications, it has Increasingly become mandatory for the established media 10 track activity here and to focus their eyer more myopic eye on the most glamorous and the least SOCially relevant categories of bUilding production. Each new wave of commodified alchltects IS offered up as more daring, IconoclaShC, and orrglnal than the last. "Los Angeles, where trends come from" proclaimed a 1989 Issue of Metro Home magazine devoted to architecture and deSign In the city.

As the speed of commodification Increases, so does the speed of the star·maklng process. The Metro Home Issue, which typifies recent coverage of architec­ture In Los Angeles. featured a group of avant-garde archl\ects With pnmarlly sculptural or Ylsual concerns. But the wav these architects were presented seemed modelled alter the media packaging of Inlerlor decorators, fashion deSigners, and most of all, mOYie stars. It would

Top: Hubert/Zelnio, Wal/a/Sussman Apartment BOf!om: Victoria Casasco, Aznar Resrdence

seem perfect ly logical to view Experrmental Architecture as part of thiS phenomenon that seeks to invent celebrr· ties rather than provoke cllllcal diSCUSSIOn

Motlvallng the beach-comblng to uncover the next meola star hes the assumption that formal invention is the most Important aspect of architecture. In other words, the more a bUilding differs from the pubhc's understanding of what building IS, the more "information," and therefore the biggest poSSible media event, It generates. The more an avant-garde firm. such as Coop Hlmmelblau, treats thelf work as pure formal abstraction, the more prestige they have - not With the public but With their peers, The more the media treats "avant-garde " architects as they do artists, the more avant-garde architects are encouraged to treat their buildings as though they are walk·in sculpture. In the artific ial land of the press, "movie star" architects often ignore the experiential character of their work, let alone the SOCial and real world forces that are part of architecture. Without the burden of having to communicate w ith the publ ic. these architects can exploit their fictitious freedom to gratify indiyidual whim and pursue a course of sel!­aggrandizement.

Younger architects today seem to be disconnected from even the most recent architectural history of Los Angeles. In decades I'IOt very long paSt there was a local tradition of modernist architecture that often carried With It a moral imperative based on ambl' tious definitions of how much social change could actually be implemented by architects . Irving Gill was concerned wi th providing decent worker housing and in simplifying the amount of work that houseWives had to do. Charles Eames explored the Idea of uSing ready-made elements

6

like a kit of parts, and even Wallace Neff experimented With Simple concrete houses. ThiS modernist Imperative was exemplified by the Case Study Houses program which was operated by the now legendary Arts and Archsrecrure magazine between 1946 and 1966. John Entenza, the pubhsher of the magazine, commiSSioned architects such as Pierre Koenig and Craig Ellwood to deSign houses which were built as real hfe demonstra· tlons of how modernist deSign could Integrate technology, such as the steel frame, Into bUildings that accommodated contemporary hfe styles.

Wtllie In many cases thiS modernist morahty was often an excuse to make deSign deCISions that were actually based on formal preferences, It did prOYlde a framework for tying bUildings back to their means of production and to the ways people use them. This seems to be the only aspect of the modernist tradition that has SUrviVed, for the operatlye avant-garde Imperative In much current Southern Cahfornia avant-garde alchltecture is largely formal. Even when the avant-garde IS concerned w ith issues of urban order, this urban order IS often treated as large scale sculpture or the formal resolution of latent site geometry, divorced from the complexity of actual site issues. This kind of divorce has been aided and abelled by the degree to which the art world has rein­forced the solipSistic role played by many contemporary architects. It IS not the devotion to or Interest In formal or theoretical Issues borrowed from the an world that is the problem. The problem is that the architect's freedom is often paid for by the loss of a larger consciousness of architecture's SOCial role, some of the consequences of which are already clear. Avant-garde architecture has not been able to comment on or respond to the radical demographIC transformation of Los Angeles Into a substant1ally Immigrant mult1cultural community, nor has It addressed many of the pressing SOCial problems that the city faces

As the archness and brillieness of postmodern Irony and the anti-social abstraction for abstract ion's sake of decon wear thin. we need to explore approaches that rein force likeness and communalities Within the environment rather than fragment It further. I! we are ever to have a segment of building production whose deSign Intent can be clearly understood and appreCiated by both the pubhc and those Inculcated In

architectural cul ture, archi tectural cognoscenti Will have 10 stop dismiSSing popular cul tural values and find some common ground With the public Steoping beyond the cult of the archltect-as-artlst/personality, acknowledging and chronIcling the COntext and the Yernacular that does eXist In Southern Calrlornla IS a first step In that direction If

Yernacular architecture can be Judged and found lacking by the standards of lor mal purity assOCiated With high·art architecture, then, perhaps by virtue of that lack and by constituting a call for archi tecture to communicate wi th a larger constituency, vernacular architecture also functions as a critique of high art archllecture, In thiS sense. it might be said that vernacular architecture performs the cfl\lcal function absent from the contemporary archllec· tural press

Books such as Experimental Architecture are not bad because there is anything wrong with the indiYidual designs they present. Rather, what is wrong is the way such books tend to present one category of bUilding production as though it were the sum total or the apogee of aU architectural production. ThiS narrowness of focus and omiSSion of other possibilities denies us all the possibility of asking primary and critical questions. How do those IndiYlduals already inculcated in architectural culture coexist with the world around them that largely ignores the values and rules of high art arChitecture? What IS the re latlOl'lship of moSt people to the actual built environment? How do the buildings that we see from the freeway. the developer housing, and the blank-faced speculative office bUildings and shopping malls get built and deSigned? How do they effect the Quality 01 our lives? Architec ts and the media alike must become more preoccupied With Ihese Issues, even though they are precisely the issues that never get InYlted 10 architecture's beach party.

Ed,IO"S Note A velS,oo 01 1~1S essay was 10 ~ave been ,ocluded

,0 Expel/melll.' A/chl l l/clU,e m Los AnQele. A,noll declined 10

publish II

AARON BETSKY

I have always felt slightly guilty about admir ing James Stirling. The pleasure I tool: in his architecture always seemed somewhat peNerse. How could I explain to a rational person the delight I look in a floor plan, like that of his entry in the Dusseldorf Museum competition. deliberately drawn 50 that Its collage of histOrical citallons and slipped geometries would 'rusua,e any understanding 01 how one woold actually move through the space? How could I admire the glonous reading room 01 the History Faculty Library at Cambndge when It left scholars to fry on the altar of archltecturel And what 01 the si te plan of the Olivetti Training Center. In which the Arcnlgram fragments 01 molded plast iC skinS were presented as an airplane crashing In the Derby countryside? I loved It all. even SUCh recent absurdities as the four different facades of the Clore Galleries at the Tate. whose Tudor references seemed as out of place as their planes of differently colOfed brrck seemed like pandering. I loved them because James Stirling taught me to delight In architec­ture.

From Charles Moore I learned about light and texture and landscape. from Rietveld I learned about the utopian beliels 01 modernism. and Irom the classics I learned about ciarrty and order. but from Big Jim I learned about the delights 01 that partICular discourse 01 bUilding that we call architecture. The pleasure of an Intrrcate plan. the revelatory. but yet measurable beauty of the ~full frontal up view. ~ the almost naive delight In great moments of architectural history stolen and hung like dirty pictures on a wall, the outrageousness of those lime­green metal COIOfS, and the Indulgence In gadgeteerrng all made me feel as II architecture was a complicated language written In real terms As I learned ItS grammar, Its phrases, ItS great texts and Its dialects. new worlds opened up to me Jim Stirling was my gUide and translator. leading me through the purgatory of form and function to a heaven that was no more than an Imaginative recombinat ion of the real world all around me

In a sense. Stirl ing was the perfect Postmodern architect. because he knew the ru les 01 collage bener than anyone else In the bUSiness HIS 1976 Image of Rome, composed of plans of all of hiS bUildings pasted together Into an Idealized verSion of that great ossuary of architecture, was the perfect picture of hiS methodology. Stirling's theSIS prOject was the mOSt seamless combination of Le Corbusler, GroplUS and Mles van der Rohe ever to not come out of the Bauhaus He did not Invent Bruta lism, but perfected It When the mod young men of the Architectural AsSOCiation started sending out their Archlgrams, he responded With experr­ments In prefabrication and fleXibi lity In the Olivetti and St Andrews College prOlects, extending them Into the megastructural VISIOns that culminated In the unbullt

palette In the Leicester Engineering Labofatories. the History Faculty Building and Cueen's College at Oxford, seem almost like an anomaly. Their expanses of clear glass promised to rescue modernist transparency from corporate banality. while their red tiles InStitutionalized a social-democratic version of Construct ivism Alter several decades of ThatchenSI neglect. they appear to us today as the last hurrah of a romantiC, IdealistiC and heroiC modern architecture . They are the e:w::uberant counterparts to Kahn 's Inst itutional rUins: an architecture that spoke of ma~lng a new world, not a new world order

Most of Stirling's work IS darker, more ironiC and filled with self-doubt. but also more fun and recherche than these last hurrahs of an architecture of amelioration, II not salvallon. Thumbing ItS nose al rules of good CIVIC conduct while secretly ennchlng the city with picturesque pathways and fragments of a UnifYing monumenl8lity. Stirling's German museum buildings rehabilitated hiS career while allowing him to continue to have fun with the tools of his trade . His Wissenschaftszentrum In Berlin connected his buildings In all the wrong places (and was

I 1 based on a monastery plan by Kahn). used bizarre pink and

blue colors and cut Its own monumentality off with the sills left oflthe heavy window surrounds. Yel il somehow managed to convey a more authenuc and confident vlscn of that city than all of ROSSI, Hejduk or Klelhues' ponder-

JAMES STIRLING: FULL FRONTAL UP VIEW Siemens Headquarters. In the 1Q70s, he returned to the burned-out schools and came back with Schinkel. Tudor, and Ledoux, only to fragment them further as we unlearned the coherence of such grand texts.

Yet Stirling'S architectural thefts were always approprrations and transformations. rather than the petty larceny and face-lilting to which the scamsters of the Jenckslan and Johnsonlan persuasion resorted. There was a sense that hiS architecture liberated the prelormed matenals from their context, projecting out of their very disjunctive supeflmposition a slipped world where everything would nOI only be different, but decomposed to the point tha t you could imagine yourself marching as confidently through the cracks of Inherited authOrity as YOO would through the offices and ga1lerres 01 the Sackler Ga1lery. through the public path snaking its way through the Stuttgart Museum or down the curving ga1leria of the Olivetti HeadQuarters project,

In retrospect, the glory days of Stirling'S career. whef'l he developed his own signature style and

7

ous attempts at authentiCity. If some of the recent buildings to come out of hiS office seemed somewhat facile and Incomplete, hiS last design, a factory in Southern Germany. offered us a bUilt verSion of the Roma Interrota prOlect. a three-dImenSional summation of hiS whole career

Neither Stirling nor hiS buildings was evel comfortable, beautiful. or accommodating. HIS very presence and att ire gave lie to the whole notion of a service profeSSion. That IS why I felt QUilty lor liking hiS deSigns: it was not work thaI seemingly served the maSSeS. It was an act of self-consciousness carried out In space. In the end. though, that game or deSign process seems to stand up against the bankruptcy of good form With great conviction, It IS what I would call archltecture_

Since the 195Os, the Rebel James has become Big Jim and then Sir Jim, and now he IS the Lale Sir James Stirling. I gladly memorialize, memOflze and monumentalize his massive presence. Long live the Full Frontal Up View!