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Architecture of the Absurd: How "Genius" Disfigured a Practical Art
Have you ever wondered why the Guggenheim is always covered in scaffolding? Why the slashes on the exterior of Libeskind's Jewish Museum, supposed to represent Jewish life in prewar Berlin, reappear, for no reason, on his Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto? Or why Gehry's design for an MIT lab for sensitive research has glass walls? Not to mention why, for $44.2 per square foot, it doesn't keep out the rain? You're not alone.
In Architecture of the Absurd, John Silber dares to peek behind the curtain of "genius" architects and expose their willful disdain for their clients, their budgets, and the people who live or work inside their creations.
In his twenty-five years as President of Boston University, Dr. Silber oversaw a building program totaling more than 13 million square feet. Here he constructs an unflinching case, beautifully illustrated, against the worst trends in contemporary architecture. He challenges architects to derive creative satisfaction from meeting the practical needs of clients and the public. He urges the directors of our universities, symphony orchestras, museums, and corporations to stop financing inefficient, overpriced architecture, and calls on clients and the public to tell the emperors of our skylines that their pretensions cannot hide the naked absurdity of their designs.
In Architecture of the Absurd, John Silber dares to peek behind the curtain of "genius" architects and expose their willful disdain for their clients, their budgets, and the people who live or work inside their creations.
In his twenty-five years as President of Boston University, Dr. Silber oversaw a building program totaling more than 13 million square feet. Here he constructs an unflinching case, beautifully illustrated, against the worst trends in contemporary architecture. He challenges architects to derive creative satisfaction from meeting the practical needs of clients and the public. He urges the directors of our universities, symphony orchestras, museums, and corporations to stop financing inefficient, overpriced architecture, and calls on clients and the public to tell the emperors of our skylines that their pretensions cannot hide the naked absurdity of their designs.
97 pages, Hardcover
First published November 12, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews
December 14, 2024
Okay, by 2007 John Silber was mad. Silber, the son of an architect, was known as a scholar and as an academic administrator at Boston University and the University of Texas. He was mad at the state of architecture in the world. The term "starchitect" was not in use yet, but John Silber, in his book, "Architecture of the Absurd: How 'Genius' Disfigured a Practical Art", went gunning for those very fellows. John Silber was kickin' ass, takin� names, and showing pictures of the very buildings he deplored.
When did architecture seem to go "absurd"? Silber writes about giving a speech in the early 1950's saying that architecture would never approach the absurdity of, say, art or theater. Architecture has to stay grounded; how else would people use buildings that weren't practically designed? As the years passed, and Daniel Libeskind's Jewish Museum in Berlin was opened, the critics seemed to ignore the odd shape of the building and what I saw myself as an interior that didn't make sense with it's exhibitions. In his book, Silber singles out the Berlin museum and points out what the critics didn't. A bit of "emperor" and "no clothes" come to mind reading his book. There are a couple of other buildings I've seen in Berlin built in the years past Silber's book (he died in 2012), which he would probably also condemn.
But John Silber didn't stop at naming Daniel Libeskind. He also talks (rants?) about Frank Gehry and the various monstrosities he's built along the years. Particularly citing the Strata Center at MIT, Silber's pictures of the building makes it appear as an architectural turkey that it is. I certainly wouldn't want to work inside THAT building, yet that is exactly why the building was built! Silber doesn't use the term "form follows function" but he'd probably agree that none of the buildings he has shown in his book were built with that maxim in mind.
Is Silber's book a long-winded rant against "starchitects"? No, but it is a short-winded one. I think he was probably just real, real mad at what he was seeing produced and hailed as "genius", that he sat down and wrote a short book. The book is worth reading if your thoughts about architecture are similar to his.
When did architecture seem to go "absurd"? Silber writes about giving a speech in the early 1950's saying that architecture would never approach the absurdity of, say, art or theater. Architecture has to stay grounded; how else would people use buildings that weren't practically designed? As the years passed, and Daniel Libeskind's Jewish Museum in Berlin was opened, the critics seemed to ignore the odd shape of the building and what I saw myself as an interior that didn't make sense with it's exhibitions. In his book, Silber singles out the Berlin museum and points out what the critics didn't. A bit of "emperor" and "no clothes" come to mind reading his book. There are a couple of other buildings I've seen in Berlin built in the years past Silber's book (he died in 2012), which he would probably also condemn.
But John Silber didn't stop at naming Daniel Libeskind. He also talks (rants?) about Frank Gehry and the various monstrosities he's built along the years. Particularly citing the Strata Center at MIT, Silber's pictures of the building makes it appear as an architectural turkey that it is. I certainly wouldn't want to work inside THAT building, yet that is exactly why the building was built! Silber doesn't use the term "form follows function" but he'd probably agree that none of the buildings he has shown in his book were built with that maxim in mind.
Is Silber's book a long-winded rant against "starchitects"? No, but it is a short-winded one. I think he was probably just real, real mad at what he was seeing produced and hailed as "genius", that he sat down and wrote a short book. The book is worth reading if your thoughts about architecture are similar to his.
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November 2, 2018Crotchety, self-important, inconsistent and itself at time absurd, but kinda fun in a mean way.
February 1, 2020
I hate bad buildings and architects who attempt to justify irrational spatial gymnastics with pseudo-intellectual bullshit as much as the next guy, but seriously? Is this really the best that the president of Boston University can do?
Unfortunately, John Silber took a decent premise for a book and completely shot himself in the foot. As other’s have noted, this book is similar to Tom Wolfe’s From Bauhaus to Our House of a previous generation. Wolfe ranted and raved about the aesthetic, functional, and urbanistic failings of modern architecture in the United States. While anti-academic and full of misrepresentations, Wolfe at least produced a witty and comical classic that provoked others to write more-serious rebuttals. Silber does none of this. Instead, of starting a much needed dialogue within the architecture community, he chose to propagate diversions and half-truths to the general public in order to sell bad coffee table books and create yet another excuse for people to shun certain architectural styles rather than the underlying problems, (which are inherently astylistic), that destroy many projects.
Oh…and yes, Frank Gehry is overrated and he did gave us the sham of MIT in the Stata Center, but do not forget, he also gave us the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao � perhaps the best architectural masterpiece of the past twenty years. I guess this particular "absurd" design did not fit into Silber’s argument.
Unfortunately, John Silber took a decent premise for a book and completely shot himself in the foot. As other’s have noted, this book is similar to Tom Wolfe’s From Bauhaus to Our House of a previous generation. Wolfe ranted and raved about the aesthetic, functional, and urbanistic failings of modern architecture in the United States. While anti-academic and full of misrepresentations, Wolfe at least produced a witty and comical classic that provoked others to write more-serious rebuttals. Silber does none of this. Instead, of starting a much needed dialogue within the architecture community, he chose to propagate diversions and half-truths to the general public in order to sell bad coffee table books and create yet another excuse for people to shun certain architectural styles rather than the underlying problems, (which are inherently astylistic), that destroy many projects.
Oh…and yes, Frank Gehry is overrated and he did gave us the sham of MIT in the Stata Center, but do not forget, he also gave us the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao � perhaps the best architectural masterpiece of the past twenty years. I guess this particular "absurd" design did not fit into Silber’s argument.
April 3, 2009
The guy who writes this book is pretty pretentious and has a rather stuffy idea of what is "absurd". Although he proves his point about buildings that are nonfunctional or faulty (and once or twice is actually funny when he's trying to be), he comes across as a self righteous blowhard and the best things about this book are probably the pictures.
November 19, 2008
In the same vein as Tom Wolf's From Bauhaus to our House, I definitely found this less funny. After hearing an interview with this past president of Boston University, and seeing the structures built under his direction, I really wanted to dislike this book. And I sort of did. To repeat a line I used on another review, "this is the type of book my Mother-in-law might like, which means I hated the damn thing." As an architect, I found his arguments to be quite simplistic, yet at the same time I tended to agree - generally - with much of what he wrote. Sure Gehry is occasionally profligate with client’s money, programmatic needs, roof flashing details, and so forth. That can easily be construed as irresponsible, but the danger is that, like Wolf's also-simplistic book, this will sell a helluva lot more copies than any other more serious/scholarly investigations about recent architecture and will inevitably be used to shore up inane, anti-modern attacks by amateur local newspaper personalities � thus resulting in yet another 30 story hotel tower with Palladian windows and EIFS quions.
February 23, 2008
This book is HILARIOUS! It's basically one long soap box against the sort of artsy-wacky contemporary architecture. Every page made me laugh, which I can only assume is because I work in a building that would elicit just such a response from this author.
Here's a good example: Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall.
"Neighbors of the new Disney Hall have complained that the hall's shimmering stainless steel curves direct enough sunlight into their apartments to blind them and raise the temperature of their homes by as much as fifteen degrees. Maybe the neighbors are lucky: with a tighter focus, the reflecting curves might have set their apartments on fire."
So then they had to put a matte-finished cloth on the building exterior to reduce the glare, which the author says is very cheap-looking and "It reminds one of an evening gown made of burlap."
Hah!
Here's a good example: Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall.
"Neighbors of the new Disney Hall have complained that the hall's shimmering stainless steel curves direct enough sunlight into their apartments to blind them and raise the temperature of their homes by as much as fifteen degrees. Maybe the neighbors are lucky: with a tighter focus, the reflecting curves might have set their apartments on fire."
So then they had to put a matte-finished cloth on the building exterior to reduce the glare, which the author says is very cheap-looking and "It reminds one of an evening gown made of burlap."
Hah!
February 10, 2022
The book is well illustrated and raises some interesting ideas about professionalism versus attention seeking behaviour, and narrows its wrath (sometimes fairly) on Holl, Ghery and Libeskind in particular, but also Le Corbusier and Lloyd Wright. There are some squeamish moments, however, such as when he notes that the ‘decline in standards of taste� runs parallel to the prevalence of tattoos and body-piercing. Perhaps my biggest complaint is that there’s no excuse to still consistently gender architects as only male in a work published in 2007.
September 15, 2019
John Silber, former BU president, reviews a number of well known modern buildings and relates the unique story of how the buildings came to be and why or why not they fit with their purpose and environments. So many iconic buildings unfortunately have flows which Silber explain by the fact that the architect was more motivated by flattering the owner's ego than the functionality of the building. Easy interesting read with many pictures for those interested in architecture and urbanisme.
October 25, 2024
What I liked about Architecture of the Absurd is how architects made designs on their own terms and that took courage to step out-of-the-box to go against the norm.
It doesn't matter whether or not you like the designs. What matters is the thought and creativity that went into the creations and designs.
Though I would have liked for the pictures to have been larger, they were large enough to see detail and the bonus was they were in color!
It doesn't matter whether or not you like the designs. What matters is the thought and creativity that went into the creations and designs.
Though I would have liked for the pictures to have been larger, they were large enough to see detail and the bonus was they were in color!
February 8, 2018
This is a sharp and funny extended essay criticizing the enormous egos of some architects and their nonfunctional vanity projects. Also an exploration of some architecture that might be considered outlandish or strange, but is actually quite quite sacred, functional, and profound (i.e. Gaudi).
November 4, 2016
It was literate,simple,and brave.It is not easy facing up to artistes and their sycophants.They should put up a statue honouring Silber.Just don´t let any friends of Gehry or Pei construct it.
November 20, 2018
As rants go, fun. But it is a rant and shouldn't be taken too seriously.
July 4, 2021
SOME INTERESTING OBSERVATIONS ON CELEBRITY ARCHITECTS AND THEIR LESS THAN SERVICABLE PROJECTS.
November 29, 2021
4-
Still another pamphlet against contemporary architecture. It lacks both Wolfe's eloquence and Wolfe's consistency, but contains some interesting facts.
Still another pamphlet against contemporary architecture. It lacks both Wolfe's eloquence and Wolfe's consistency, but contains some interesting facts.
May 26, 2022
Estoy de acuerdo con el argumento, pero el libro es más bien insatisfactorio.
June 4, 2024
I work in a badly designed building and I have to say that it takes a psychic toll out of a person to have to deal with its deficiencies year after year after year.
November 5, 2011
I normally stay away from reading books like this. I try to avoid reading work related topics in my free time. I made an exception for this book as it was recommended by a friend.
This was an easy read. The language flowed well and the pictures were really well done. I find that in any number of books or articles I read falling into the loose category “scholarly� the authors somehow feel if they want to be taken seriously they should use complicated sentence structure with dictionary level words on constant display. I'm not opposed to an author flexing his vocabulary, and I do not oppose the use of multi-sylabic words, but there are times when I feel a simpler statement would work better. There were one or two occasions in the book when I think the author's words got in the way of what he was trying to say.
I agree with the author's sentiment. I considered this “preaching to the choir� in my case. I got the feeling from this piece it would have been better with narrowly directed criticism of each piece rather than the portions of text that felt like personal grudges against the individuals in question. Mr. Silber is sharp with his words, but skirts dangerously close to “bitter that I couldn't do that� territory. I understand he has a great deal of knowledge and experience working with the field, but he never designed or created and led a project (to my knowledge). Drawing for your father is not the same as being the creative driving force behind a multimillion dollar project. Again, he's not wrong, just more angry and bitter sounding than persuasive. I hope others take up this argument to start a much needed discussion of this topic in the field.
This was an easy read. The language flowed well and the pictures were really well done. I find that in any number of books or articles I read falling into the loose category “scholarly� the authors somehow feel if they want to be taken seriously they should use complicated sentence structure with dictionary level words on constant display. I'm not opposed to an author flexing his vocabulary, and I do not oppose the use of multi-sylabic words, but there are times when I feel a simpler statement would work better. There were one or two occasions in the book when I think the author's words got in the way of what he was trying to say.
I agree with the author's sentiment. I considered this “preaching to the choir� in my case. I got the feeling from this piece it would have been better with narrowly directed criticism of each piece rather than the portions of text that felt like personal grudges against the individuals in question. Mr. Silber is sharp with his words, but skirts dangerously close to “bitter that I couldn't do that� territory. I understand he has a great deal of knowledge and experience working with the field, but he never designed or created and led a project (to my knowledge). Drawing for your father is not the same as being the creative driving force behind a multimillion dollar project. Again, he's not wrong, just more angry and bitter sounding than persuasive. I hope others take up this argument to start a much needed discussion of this topic in the field.
October 16, 2013
I'm not usually one for arguing that artistic types should be constrained by "practical" considerations, but as Silber repeatedly points out, architecture is an "applied," rather than a "fine," art. In part this distinction means that, for architects, working within constraints, whether fiscal, physical, or aesthetic, is a part of the job description. Or at least, as Silber argues, it should be. As someone who has worked for almost a decade with and around professors of architecture, I found Silber's attitude refreshing, particularly his willingness to call bullshit on the high-fallutin' vacuity of what he calls "Theoryspeak," in which arbitrary (and too often out-of-place) design elements are given post hoc justifications by means of intelligent-sounding obfuscation.
December 1, 2007
Say what you will about the combative former president/chancellor of Boston University, you really can't argue with the main point he makes in this short book based on a speech he gave to an AIA meeting in Texas: Our worship of "genius" in architecture has given us buildings that don't work. Instead of satisfying the needs of the clients, "genius" architects focus on ego -- their own and those of the people who commission them and the critics who write about their work. Can we return to a world where form follows function? Silber hopes so, and this book is his effort to get us back to that happier state.
June 16, 2008
This was a great read. It's more a big essay than a book, and is well-supplied with illustrations. I knew from a review that it was just what I was looking for. No, I am no student of architecture, art, engineering...but I know what I like when I see it. And I just ain't seein' it in so much modern architecture. To each his own, etc. But this book at least gave me a professional perspective on where willful architects have overstepped the bounds of sense in their quest for "originality." Give me a 150-year-old church converted to a public library over that Los Angeles Disney monstrosity anyday!
April 20, 2008
A cranky old man's views on architecture. I mean that as praise. This man has lived, knows architecture, and has strong opinions. He is not simply railing on creative visionaries, if the building works, he embraces it. Gaudà and Utzon (of the Sydney Opera House) are praised by Silber despite cost overruns and missed deadlines. It is Gehry that really riles this guy up. His crimes? Buildings that don't have form or function working for them.
This is really a printed and bound lecture, quick and to the point, and persuasive. A stick in the eye to a few big stars of architecture.
This is really a printed and bound lecture, quick and to the point, and persuasive. A stick in the eye to a few big stars of architecture.
July 13, 2015
- Dr. Silber, President Of Boston University, dares to peek behind the curtains of "genius" architects and expose their wilful disdain for their clients, their budgets, and the people who live or work inside their creations
- the growing popularity of 'absurd architecture' is critically dissected to reveal the vanity of a relatively new breed of architect striving to advance their careers by creating iconic, but absurd structures - tasteless, inharmonious, jarring - and often failing to respect the functional and economic needs of their clients.
- Frank Gehry is especially criticized.
- the growing popularity of 'absurd architecture' is critically dissected to reveal the vanity of a relatively new breed of architect striving to advance their careers by creating iconic, but absurd structures - tasteless, inharmonious, jarring - and often failing to respect the functional and economic needs of their clients.
- Frank Gehry is especially criticized.
January 6, 2008
Much more could be written about this subject, but Silber's short argument is well-considered and compelling. The stories from his time as president and chancellor of Boston University were insightful. I wonder what his peers at other Boston-area institutions think.
Many of the book's featured buildings are familiar sights to Boston area residents, which is kind of fun.
Many of the book's featured buildings are familiar sights to Boston area residents, which is kind of fun.
January 8, 2008
I start by agreeing with the poster who said much more could be written on the subject. However, I would go on to add that I did not find it to be well considered nor very thoughtful. While I agree with much of what Silber has to say, it seemed that some of his arguments were poorly-reasoned and not particularly well developed. In short, the book left me wanting a lot more.
March 16, 2008
I pretty typical/quick read for any ND Arkie. Felt like old discussions back at school. But for the non-architect, I'd think it's a nice viewpoint from a someone outside the profession. Plus, anyone from Texas (where the author's from) or especially Boston (where the author lives and refers to frequently) will identify with many of the authors points.
August 25, 2008
What a strange book. It's approximately a hundred pages of the author ranting about why he doesn't like a particular architect and why another practicing architect is dumb for doing a certain thing. The funny thing is I actually I agree with most of his criticisms. I just wish he had spent another hundred pages being persuasive on why everyone else should believe the way the author thinks.
January 6, 2009
An acerbic look at modern architecture and the starchitects who are responsible for it. John Silber is not a stranger to architecture having worked in his architect father's office. He is particularly critical of buildings that make statements but fail to work.
October 23, 2011
Would be totally irritating (except for a very good introduction, largely about his architect father), but not so much because it agreed with some of my prejudices. Skip this: read The Failure of Modern Architecture, or far better still, How Buildings Learn.
September 26, 2019
The direct simplicity of the authors point of view, is the exact opposite of the often contrived complexity of the architect as 'sculpture artist' (often ending as Sculpture Graffiti) while denigrating the structural necessities of projects well built and still beautiful to their purpose.
February 2, 2008
bleh. I agree with the premise but silber's an unconvincing doofus.
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