Why modern Architecture is horrible (crime, schools, development, class)

[Jen1981]

We are being indoctrinated to accept ugliness as a form of beauty.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GapUEKYLE1o

“Why Beauty Matters?” https://vimeo.com/128428182

[JR_C]

I stopped watching at about 1:40, and LOLed. The concepts behind modern architecture were formed long before WWII. The Bauhaus, for example, was opened in 1919: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bauhaus

If this topic gets moved to the architecture forum, I'm sure there will be posters who can comment more thoroughly about this, but I'm fairly certain the movement to modern architecture was apolitical. It was more about a disdain for ornamentation, ("form follows function," "less is more," etc.) and nothing about "colonialism," "racism," or "slavery."

[KenFresno]

I have seen this video before. The presenter has no idea what he is taking about. The information he provides is either wrong or partially correct.

For example:

The commentator mixes up modernism with post-modernism which are not only different but often at odds with one another. Which leads me to believe he doesn't know what he is looking at or taking about since anyone with knowledge of architecture could tell each movement apart.

The commentator wrongfully attributes Modernism with authoritarian. Modernism was despised by almost all 20th century tyrants at one point or another. The Bauhaus for example was driven out of Germany by threat of death after Hitler took power. Dictators much preferred knock off neo-classicism and kitsch national romanticism to actually functional modernism. Go look up the buildings built by Stalin, Hitler, Mao and Ceausescu as proof. What makes this argument so pathetic is that many modernist structures were built for the most civilized and democratic of reasons. Public housing, schools, art galleries, public infrastructure, research facilities, libraries, etc.

The commentator starts off by saying "Ascetic ugliness encourages ugly behavior". Well you have stark modernist cities like Singapore and Tokyo which are clean, have low crime and are generally socially healthy. Then you have cities with beautiful ornate architecture like Naples, which are trash littered and crime ridden. He attributes the dire state of modernist slums of Britain to their ascetic qualities. When most were barely maintained and largely neglected. Any building left to decay will eventually looked trashed and attract anti-social behavior.

[EastFlatbush]

I hate modern architecture as much as the next person, but like all the other stuff being posted by pseudo-intellectual bottom feeders on YouTube, that video is crap, and it's filled with sinister Alt Right propaganda. Not surprising that the comments section drew its share of the usual "Wah wah da globalist Jooz r ruining our cities" posts.

[Larry Siegel]

The video is more or less accurate. Modern (not postmodern) architecture reflects socialist realism and a hatred of the bourgeois values that gave us the London, Paris, New York, and San Francisco that people love. While some dictators were fond of gewgaws and sentimental nationalist features, they are the minority. The Soviet Union, postwar socialist Britain, and modern China outside the wealthy eastern central cities have given us the worst architecture in history.

Pay attention to meticulous intricate carving of details in every Architecture reference item. Really simple conceptual main ideas deep down to put into practice. Not only with classical European style. Able to incorporate on modern high rises. After discovery, only a fatal problem in some various mainland Europe countries especially (Netherlands, Denmark, Ireland, Finland, Norway). Rather than replicating their own relative past masterpieces, Architects over there lately are failing too often with enacting plain drab eye sores. Build up at least away from minimalistic types of modern melancholic. Aesthetics before anything else!

[UserFinn]

Question:
Why modern Architecture is horrible?
Answer:
Money and demands of efficient/fast construction.

[KenFresno]

Originally Posted by UserFinn

Question:
Why modern Architecture is horrible?
Answer:
Money and demands of efficient/fast construction.

I would argue that modern architecture isn't horrible at all. I would say that quite a lot of it is rather spectacular, imaginative, sublime, abstract and immensely creative. Would you call the architecture of Alvar Aalto horrible. I wouldn't.

[Hemlock140]

Originally Posted by KenFresno

I would argue that modern architecture isn't horrible at all. I would say that quite a lot of it is rather spectacular, imaginative, sublime, abstract and immensely creative. Would you call the architecture of Alvar Aalto horrible. I wouldn't.

He died in 1976, so I wouldn't call his work modern. Architectural design is a matter of taste. We no longer see the intricate detail found in many old structures now being destroyed due to new development or just because they are not up to current earthquake standards. There is some interesting and attractive work being done on exoskeletons, but what I see going up lately here in Seattle is just a lot of boring glass.

Interesting:
https://interestingengineering.com/t...ound-the-world


Boring:

[KenFresno]

Originally Posted by Hemlock140

He died in 1976, so I wouldn't call his work modern. Architectural design is a matter of taste. We no longer see the intricate detail found in many old structures now being destroyed due to new development or just because they are not up to current earthquake standards. There is some interesting and attractive work being done on exoskeletons, but what I see going up lately here in Seattle is just a lot of boring glass.

Are you referring more to Modern Architecture as being the period from 1920's through the 1990's or contemporary architecture being the work over the last 20 odd years?