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| AUTHOR: | Bernard Tschumi, Matthew Berman |
| CATEGORY: | Book |
| MANUFACTURER: | The MIT Press |
| ISBN: | 0262700956 |
| TYPE: | Architecture, Architecture, Modern, Collections, Catalogs, Exhibitions, Columbia University, Graduate School of Architectur, History - General, Individual Institutions Of Higher Education, Modern Architecture, New York, New York (State), Organizations & Institutions, Reference, Sources, Study and teaching, Architecture / History |
| MEDIA: | Paperback |
| # OF MEDIA: | 1 |
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Customer Reviews of INDEX Architecture : A Columbia Architecture Book (D, Columbia Documents of Architecture and Theory, V. 7-9)
Speak English, Please This book basically dares you to read it.
As an aficionado of contemporary architectural thought, I expected that this book would be enlightening coming from the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, a program frequently renowned for leading contemporary architecture into the avant-garde. I was tremendously disappointed in the book in general. While there are worthwhile observations from many notable architects (and students), the book devolves into a self-congratulatory, politically correct collection of "insights" in language so obfuscating that the gist of the statement is normally impossible to determine.
The book takes it as a guiding principle that Occam's Razor (which requires the simplest of equal competing alternatives be selected as best) is never to be regarded, and that when one small word will suffice, ten large words will instead be used. Is it so hard for these obviously very bright people to speak English? Here is a prime example from page 10, which I obtained by opening the book at random: "In blob modeling, objects are defined by monad-like primitives with internal forces of attraction and mass. Unlike a conventional geometric primitive such as a sphere, which has its own autonomous organization, a meta-ball is defined in relation to other objects. Its center, surface area, mass and organization are determined by other fields of influence. The surfaces are surrounded by two halos of relational influence, one defining a zone of fusion, the other defining a zone of inflection." I will spare you the rest, but suffice it to say that that paragraph drones on and on, and gets even more ridiculous before it is concluded.
The organization of the book is so confusing that there is actually a key to decoding the format at the beginning. The format is extremely unpleasant. Avant-garde? Yes! Readable? No! Largely the book is an index (hence the title) taken alphabetically, but there is an abundance of information in tiny font adjacent to the text in the gutters, which are, inexplicably, the hideous color of green found in the interior of a school bus.
Among the horrid design of the pages and the tiny graphics that rarely are directly associated with anything else on the page or under discussion, there is some genuinely brilliant commentary on contemporary architecture, which is, after all, why someone would buy this book. Due to these occasional pithy insights, combined with a few brilliant illustrations, I give the book two stars.
I would not recommend this book to many people, probably only practicing architects, and only with the strong caveat that it is very unpleasant and annoying reading trying to sort the wheat from the chaff, hidden as the wheat is among the pomposity and pretentiousness of the text. This book could have been utterly wonderful; instead it was one of the most trying reading experiences in recent memory.