Duncan Hosie
December 31, 2013
Art 102: McReynolds/Hu
Short Paper 2
Venturi’s Non-Ideological Ideology
Sometimes the best revolutions are those that are forgotten. At least in the short run. And so it is with Robert Venturi, a revolutionary and remarkable architect. While he may not be as celebrated as Frank Lloyd Wright, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, or Louis Kahn, Venturi leaves behind a forceful intellectual legacy that is perhaps more durable than any building. By condemning the functionalism, simplicity, and orthodoxy of modernism in Contradiction and Complexity in Architecture (1966), he instigated an enduring architectural rebellion. This rebellion continues to run its course today. Notably, Venturi’s ideas sparked and profoundly influenced postmodernism, an international style whose buildings span from the beautiful to the gaudy and vulgar. Ultimately, Venturi’s alternative to modernism succeeded because he prized human experience and the interaction of individuals with architectural forms over a rigid, doctrinaire ideology.
Venturi’s philosophy reacted to the failures of modernism. Modernist architects, motivated by an inflexible commitment to minimalism, efficiency, and functionalism, had created buildings that were banal and bereft of identity. Very little distinguished the tall glass skyscrapers of Toronto from those in Tokyo. In Contradiction and Complexity in Architecture, Venturi offered a radical call for change. Embracing the idiosyncrasies and intricacies of architecture, he advocated for a diverse and pluralist style, one that welcomed techniques and traditions discarded by the modernists. To that end, he included ornamentation, allusion, quotation, irony, wit, mannerism, color, and decoration to h...
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...raves perpetuates the same problems in modernism against which he was ostensibly rebelling.
People are made of complexities and contradictions. Venturi recognized that buildings should be complex and complicated, too. He theorized and built buildings inspired by this principle, and succeeded because of his emphasis on individual experience and the interaction between humanity and architectural forms. In pursuit of this goal, his pluralist and revolutionary style of architecture embraced difference and ambiguity and rejected the rigid rules of modernism. While undoubtedly influenced by Venturi’s ideas, later postmodern architects failed to live up to his principles by forming their own inflexible rules and not concentrating on the human experience with buildings.
This paper represents my own work in accordance with University regulations.
|x| Duncan Hosie
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