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Globe: Berlusconi's Viagra

TKTKTK said:
If they've become the standard sentiment, then doesn't that imply that it isn't the lunatic-fringe?
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It's more like, if blogs existed a generation ago, you'd find an awful lot of comment blather attacking "Voice Of Fire" and what not...
 
adma said:
It's more like, if blogs existed a generation ago, you'd find an awful lot of comment blather attacking "Voice Of Fire" and what not...
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Right, but...even then, those people weren't the lunatic fringe. They were just average joes who felt alienated by the work.
 
I think some of the criticism of the buildings is justified. But I do applaud Liebskind's unapologetic attack against Berlusconi. There really is no room in this world for nationalist fanatacism (otherwise known as fascism).

I guess I have lost touch because I thought Berlusconi was voted out in the last election shortly after proposing to make possession of pot a capital crime. I guess I better refresh my understanding of the situation seeing as I am planning to travel to Italy in a couple months....
 
Redroom Studios said:
But I do applaud Liebskind's unapologetic attack against Berlusconi. There really is no room in this world for nationalist fanatacism (otherwise known as fascism).
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True, but is it really surprising? We're talking about a monocultural society that is nothing like Canada.
 
It's almost inevitable that, when the average Joe criticizes art that he feels alienated from, he comes across as lunatic fringe - within the context of serious art criticism - regardless of the fact that his opinions are probably shared as standard sentiment with the legions of other average Joes.

Berlusconi, populist politician that he is, is setting himself up as an average Giuseppe in his criticism of Libeskind's building, and Libeskind is absolutely correct to fight back within the context of Italian politics when his creation is attacked for political reasons from that perspective.
 
To take another conservative politician of Italian background, Rudy Giuliani also knew how to milk that angle, railing against dung Christs, et al
 
Urban Shocker said:
It's almost inevitable that, when the average Joe criticizes art that he feels alienated from, he comes across as lunatic fringe - within the context of serious art criticism - regardless of the fact that his opinions are probably shared as standard sentiment with the legions of other average Joes.
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And I have a serious problem with that Divide, as well as the deference to it. It does nothing to improve the arts, culture, or society.

Architecture stands the least to gain from alienating itself from the public, whether its aspirations are high-minded, or just cruel.
 
I agree. Everyone should go inside art galleries, not just glance at them nervously as they hurry past. Literacy of all kinds, including the visual, is to be applauded.
 
Urban Shocker said:
I agree. Everyone should go inside art galleries, not just glance at them nervously as they hurry past. Literacy of all kinds, including the visual, is to be applauded.
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I think it's humorous that you don't think both states can co-exist. Alienation isn't only the result of ignorance.

I would say the uncritical acceptance of art for art's sake is equally born out of ignorance :S
 
Average Joe might be less alienated if he got out more. He doesn't have to like what he sees, and can be as critical of what the cultural community does as he wants. It's all part of the dialogue, just as Libeskind's buildings - which, as you point out, are "almost always polarizing works", are.
 
Urban Shocker said:
Average Joe might be less alienated if he got out more. He doesn't have to like what he sees, and can be as critical of what the cultural community does as he wants. It's all part of the dialogue, just as Libeskind's buildings - which, as you point out, are "almost always polarizing works", are.
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I'm not sure that it's right for architecture to polarize. Art, absolutely. But, I've always felt that Architecture has a social responsibility that Art doesn't.

Continuing to dismiss alienation as ignorance is convenient (it makes those that disagree seem like fools), but I really think it's over-simplifying things.

I think many Architects see themselves as building habitable sculpture. I think those Architects have, somewhat, lost the plot.
 
From Bauhaus to Spirit House? I'd live there! A short stay in the little Sculpture Garden mushroom might be fun too.
 
Urban Shocker said:
From Bauhaus to Spirit House? I'd live there! A short stay in the little Sculpture Garden mushroom might be fun too.
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I haven't cracked that book in forever! I'm going to grab it off the shelf right now.

I wonder what Wolfe would say now, two decades later? Ornamentation is back, sort of, but paired with an even greater degree of abstraction. Homogeneity is out in favour of personal vision, though applied just as indiscriminately :) The cult of personality still exists, but is it distilled into even fewer vessels now?
 
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