Right now this conversation is very difficult to talk about in architecture schools. About aesthetics and beauty to be considered in architecture, it is always left unanswered or ignored and only says that it is subjective. I have to thank Sir Rojer Scruton for this because a traditionalist like me who wants to design traditional architecture, in today's architecture schools , they made it almost impossible for us to design or even build it , like if we were enemies and that we deserve no recognition because we are outdated according to them.
Thank you for posting this. Scruton's message needs to be spread far and wide to combat the continuous push of ugliness that we have been bullied into accepting far too long.
I am an architect but lived as an artist solely for about 15 years. I did not use the gallery system but sold very directly to the public through art and craft markets and retail outlets, it was. very commercial. I aspired to make beautiful art and found the direct correlation between what sold and whether I thought it was beautiful or not. It is not an absolute but generally we all share the common idea of beauty.
First intelligent question of Q&A occurs around 1:17:30. Architecture and art always reflect our philosophy, theology, and ideology: that which we value. Most postmodern architecture really values pragmatism above all else and cares little for the esthetic sensibilities because post-Enlightenment philosophy has destroyed our relationships to one another, the church, the village, the community, etc. and made us essentially little self-centered beasties.
No wonder that Berlin-Gropiusstadt became such a deprived area. Christiane F. describes the effects of it's life-hostile architecture vividly in her autobiographical novel The Story of Christiane F. (original: Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo).
23:46 A small correction: it's not the Edmonton Library, it's an art museum called the Art Gallery of Alberta. (Edmonton is Alberta's capital.) Quite a hideous thing to encounter on the street. It's the work of a California architect whom I shall not name.
Thank you for posting this lecture, which I've only just discovered. Scruton developed great insights into why modernity has not created a built environment worthy of its citizens. I agree with the judgment he expresses at the very end of the questions where he states that Wittgenstein would be in complete agreement with the views expressed in this talk.
To Kenneth Chow - cannot see your reply! I was making a subtle point, about form and function, I am saying that for the banking hall form does to an extent follow function since the basic requirements are a large floor space ie a banking hall will influence the form to follow function to some extent.
I feel bad for Scruton. Almost all the questions displayed a complete lack of understanding of everything he addressed in his talk. Maybe I have an easier time understanding his points because I was immersed in the theory and practice of building and design from a young age. It seemed to me, however, like his language was clear and plain enough for laymen to grasp. You could see his frustration with most of the questions and his relief when a decent one was presented to him.
I thought he was going to make a different point regarding the funeral buildings, i had an image of a deceased modern architect wanting to be laid to rest in an "original" way.
Brilliant presentation. I think there's room for everykind of architecture, but I prefer function following form. I think perhaps cities should lift job related architecture off the ground and keep the ground for joyous activities.
I find the projected slides quite distracting. Whenever I attend meetings like this, I focus entirely on the speaker, the slides are only important when a relevant visual is shown (e.g. an illustrating photograph or some such).
The concept of form ever follows function has been changed, becuase louis sullivan never took out ornament, he created his own style of ornament and implemented into his architecture. It's really sad when you hear many architects saying that term, but not using the original meaning.
In all fairness, the paris of le Corbusier's time was a disgusting place, filled with filth, pests and disease. His philosophy may have been an overcorrection, but not without honest motivation.
I do think he has confused the form/function debate...take the banking hall in London its design/form must have been to encompass its function to a large degree e.g. 'a large hall space', as an example of why he's confused it.
I see what you’re getting at. Palladio tells us that a building should have integrity (not flimsy), is should serve its function well, and it should ennoble the minds of the people who enter it (beauty). And to Palladio an ugly building is failing it’s function. Rogers point seems to be that beautiful buildings that possess value beyond their utility, do inspire us to find new fictions for them while giant steel and glass shoebox abortions do not.
But I think that there is less to Scruton's argument than may appear, or perhaps he has not thought thru his thesis fully and carefully. I'm left with wondering does he really know what he's talking about. I'll ignore his confusion in the lecture about the classical orders. Several of his slides are clearly of columns in the Doric order, but he refers to them as Corinthian. There're large differences between these two orders, and so his confusion is almost certainly not a result of ignorance, but more likely nerves. He attributes the phrase "Form Follows Function" to Louis Sullivan, and claims that "modern" architecture--which he dislikes--can be traced back to that perspective, and instead classical architecture--or at least, the architecture that he likes--instead follows the inverted formula of "function following form." Now, there's a lot about Louis Sullivan that I do not understand. (I'm told that F. L. Wright, who enjoyed listening to Sullivan when Wright was the chief draftsman in Sullivan's firm didn't feel he understood much of what Sullivan said.) But I'm pretty sure that the proper quote from Sullivan is "Form ever follows function;" that Sullivan was actually quoting someone else (I hazily recall he attributed it to Goethe); and that he wasn't advocating a strict utilitarianism in architecture. Many architects and critics thought he was: Scruton seems to, and some of the 1920 German avant garde considered Neue Sachlichkeit to be a key value, and invoked that phrase in support. What he was advocating in this phrase is unclear, particularly if you think of Sullivan's highly ornate terra-cotta or the cast iron of his Carson Pirie Scott building as obeying his "Form...follows function" dictate. Consider that a building in which "Form follows function" very clearly is a church or other place of worship. The functions of such a building is to provide a form of worship and to display what is believed. The form of those structures follow that function. Greek temples have a different form from Christian churches--temples don't provide a place for a congregation--temple rites were administered in the grounds--because their functions are different. (To have, in the case of religious structures--function following form would put architects in charge of doctrine, which some might regard as monstrous.) The fine points of, say, Catholic doctrine vs Baptist doctrine can be found expressed in some of the fine points of their churches. Scruton is correct in using a photo of London's Bank of England, Stock Exchange and the surrounding modern office towers as an illustration of "Form Follows Function." The form of the Bank and the Exchange reflect an earlier time (even though the Bank building was actually constructed in the 1920s), and the modern towers reflect modern times. People who work in modern cities now work in offices, and at least on a macroscopic level that work is identical: it is sitting at a desk, interpreting and writing reports, talking on the phone, and so forth. So the modern workspace, as Sullivan observed, is much like a bee hive, with its cells identical. The amount of regimentation is high, but most of the occupants are of similar rank. The Bank and Exchange buildings harken back to a time when office work was rare, and regimentation was low. Now maybe Scruton doesn't like modern life, and longs for some imagined simpler time of years past. That isn't pathological, or even uncommon. (There's a case that modern times are better than the days of yore, but I won't go into that.) Whether he likes modernity or not, modernity is indeed reflected in modern structures. Modernity might not be popular, but it's the only choice we've got. This anti-modernist lecture leaves Scruton open to a charge of upper-class bias: he speaks approvingly of the reuse of the London Exchange building--which is now contains an exclusive, expensive and very upper-class mall--and he speaks disapprovingly of the Slough Bus Station--used by travelers of a lower economic status. That reflects essentially what he doesn't seem to understand. Structures and ornaments and orders have meaning. The Bank and the Exchange buildings have the form they do because that form carries a meaning and a message: they are solid and conservative buildings because their builders want to say they are solid and conservative organizations. An organization that takes your gold and gives you pieces of paper--which is what banks and stock exchanges were and are--need to be thought of as trustworthy. So they put up trust-inspiring buildings. Organizations that need to be thought of as modern and dynamic put up modern and dynamic buildings. It's not just that moldings create relief (or that modern architects don't know how to draw shading.) Structures have significance. Gothic was chosen for the U of Chicago campus in the 1890s because of its associations with learning, yes, and its inspirational characteristics. But Regenstein Library 's brutalism was chosen to indicate modernity and massiveness--which the library of the University of Chicago certainly is. Walter Netsch's design of Regentein makes the modernity and great size fit well (in my opinion) with the Gothic structures across the street. The "brutalism" of many UK campuses is despised (probably because the institutions themselves are despised). A better name for "brutalism" might be "heroic" and the development of the many schools in the UK which have "brutalistic" campuses reflect the heroism of the UK in WWII and the UK's triumph over the many challenges of losing its empire. Scruton confuses architecture for urban planning. Urban planning is as best as I can tell impossible, or at least very few have ever done it consistently well. Le Corbusier's Plan of Paris is a pretty easy target. I think everyone considers that to be awful. He mistakenly asserts, however, that there was no objective. At the time that he proposed that, a huge amount of housing had been destroyed in Europe, and the challenge was where to put them all. The alternative to Corbusier's Ville Radieuse proposal for Paris turned out to be the ring of suburban slums around Paris. Certainly modern architects have made mistakes--some quite expensive. But so did architects of any period, but those mistakes have been pulled down and forgotten. As a graduate of St. John's College and an enthusiast for architecture, I am happy that architecture and art were discussed seriously there. But, to repeat, it is not clear that Scruton really knows what he's talking about.
"The "brutalism" of many UK campuses is despised (probably because the institutions themselves are despised)." no. they are despised because they are boring and ugly grey concrete boxes. "A better name for "brutalism" might be "heroic" and the development of the many schools in the UK which have "brutalistic" campuses reflect the heroism of the UK in WWII and the UK's triumph over the many challenges of losing its empire." what does "heroism" have to do with being grey prison-like boxes? It really does seem like you are blatantly making things up just to defend brutalism.
+Robokill387 I disagree that brutalism is ugly. I'm a lover of modernist architecture. I particularly love post war British concrete buildings. I do appreciate that many people do not like them. Convincing some people that they are beautiful is often difficult, but I have done it! Let me be clear. It's the international Modernist style, approx 1925 to 1980, that I'm defending. I consider Postmodern architecture, 1980+ an abomination. The Paris street scene @7:24 is perfection. The way it has grown organically over the decades is beautiful. The idea of replacing it with Le Corbusier plan is horrific.
Why don't you just send this "criticism" to Sir Roger, I am sure he would happily put the record straight. The points you raise are insignificant or just a result of Sir Rogers style of rhetoric
It is really clear, as he mentions it, that the column on the slide is a Tuscan one. Then, unrelated to the image on the slide, he mentions that there is, probably, hardly any architect able to draw shadows of a corinthian capital.
TLDR, but at the beginning, he obviously wasn't referring to the doric column as a corinthian column, he was talking about classical orders and saying that a modern architect couldn't shadow a corinthian column likely because that's the most complex of the orders, he wasn't claiming the doric was corinthian. Otherwise, didn't read cause it's too damn long.
Take it easy, speak slower. You are right about architecture. So stop trying to fill every moment of silence with nervous stuttering it is unbearable to listen to.
Right now this conversation is very difficult to talk about in architecture schools. About aesthetics and beauty to be considered in architecture, it is always left unanswered or ignored and only says that it is subjective. I have to thank Sir Rojer Scruton for this because a traditionalist like me who wants to design traditional architecture, in today's architecture schools , they made it almost impossible for us to design or even build it , like if we were enemies and that we deserve no recognition because we are outdated according to them.
Aesthetics is my favorite topic of Scruton talks.
4:52 starts
Thank you!
Thank you for posting this. Scruton's message needs to be spread far and wide to combat the continuous push of ugliness that we have been bullied into accepting far too long.
You make it sound like a truly terrible affliction placed on people...like a tyrant or virus. Get real!
@@aaron___6014 because it is a form of affliction as it affects those who are subjected to it frequently.
@@aaron___6014 it really is tyrannical
So glad this is posted. My husband and I had the privilege to attend and how fun to be able to watch.
Did you meet Scruton?
How fortunate of you both!
Q&A:
“Aren’t rules bad?”
“What about different rules?”
“Can’t ugliness be beautiful?”
Gentlemen, your education has surpassed your intelligence.
I am an architect but lived as an artist solely for about 15 years. I did not use the gallery system but sold very directly to the public through art and craft markets and retail outlets, it was. very commercial. I aspired to make beautiful art and found the direct correlation between what sold and whether I thought it was beautiful or not. It is not an absolute but generally we all share the common idea of beauty.
sir roger scruton is the man of the man
One dreams of having Prof. Scruton sitting in an armchair at your home. Now, though he is gone, we have his writings and these media pieces.
First intelligent question of Q&A occurs around 1:17:30. Architecture and art always reflect our philosophy, theology, and ideology: that which we value. Most postmodern architecture really values pragmatism above all else and cares little for the esthetic sensibilities because post-Enlightenment philosophy has destroyed our relationships to one another, the church, the village, the community, etc. and made us essentially little self-centered beasties.
It's not even pragmatic. It uses ugliness as a symbol of practically.
I miss the presece of such man... Kisses from Italy
Brilliantly simple truths and the awe life brings. The same must be said about Roger Scruton himself.
No wonder that Berlin-Gropiusstadt became such a deprived area. Christiane F. describes the effects of it's life-hostile architecture vividly in her autobiographical novel The Story of Christiane F. (original: Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo).
What a beauty this man is, one point in question, too educate the natural talent we are already born with. A classic!
23:46 A small correction: it's not the Edmonton Library, it's an art museum called the Art Gallery of Alberta. (Edmonton is Alberta's capital.) Quite a hideous thing to encounter on the street. It's the work of a California architect whom I shall not name.
Thank you for posting this lecture, which I've only just discovered. Scruton developed great insights into why modernity has not created a built environment worthy of its citizens. I agree with the judgment he expresses at the very end of the questions where he states that Wittgenstein would be in complete agreement with the views expressed in this talk.
I find myself wondering how Sir Roger Scruton and Christopher Alexander would get along around their ideas about architecture.
Cool video, keep it up!
Man, it's sad that no one asked about Venturi's approach of less is bore in complexity and contradiction, and architecture like Zumthor.
What i wish i could have asked: how can we get more aesthetically informed planning committes making all the decisions on what's acceptable.
Roger is great
Very interesting talk. Thank you.
Sir Roger starts around 5:00
Pretty is balance , beauty is balance in motion -- beauty leads us to the future . Beauty is temporally creative .
Lecture starts at 4:35
4:52 scruton starts speaking
To Kenneth Chow - cannot see your reply! I was making a subtle point, about form and function, I am saying that for the banking hall form does to an extent follow function since the basic requirements are a large floor space ie a banking hall will influence the form to follow function to some extent.
I feel bad for Scruton.
Almost all the questions displayed a complete lack of understanding of everything he addressed in his talk.
Maybe I have an easier time understanding his points because I was immersed in the theory and practice of building and design from a young age.
It seemed to me, however, like his language was clear and plain enough for laymen to grasp.
You could see his frustration with most of the questions and his relief when a decent one was presented to him.
I thought he was going to make a different point regarding the funeral buildings, i had an image of a deceased modern architect wanting to be laid to rest in an "original" way.
why is it muted? or its just for me?
Everyone wants to be composed after they're dead, but instead they just lay there decomposing
Tradução para português, alguém pleeeaseee!!
Now I know, why I always disliked Bauhaus.
14:47
Is there am mp3 of this talk ?
I believe CZcams converter sites can be found online :)
Brilliant presentation. I think there's room for everykind of architecture, but I prefer function following form. I think perhaps cities should lift job related architecture off the ground and keep the ground for joyous activities.
I find the projected slides quite distracting. Whenever I attend meetings like this, I focus entirely on the speaker, the slides are only important when a relevant visual is shown (e.g. an illustrating photograph or some such).
And yet Louis Sullivan designed some really nice 'classical' buildings ...
The concept of form ever follows function has been changed, becuase louis sullivan never took out ornament, he created his own style of ornament and implemented into his architecture. It's really sad when you hear many architects saying that term, but not using the original meaning.
In all fairness, the paris of le Corbusier's time was a disgusting place, filled with filth, pests and disease. His philosophy may have been an overcorrection, but not without honest motivation.
I do think he has confused the form/function debate...take the banking hall in London its design/form must have been to encompass its function to a large degree e.g. 'a large hall space', as an example of why he's confused it.
I see what you’re getting at. Palladio tells us that a building should have integrity (not flimsy), is should serve its function well, and it should ennoble the minds of the people who enter it (beauty). And to Palladio an ugly building is failing it’s function. Rogers point seems to be that beautiful buildings that possess value beyond their utility, do inspire us to find new fictions for them while giant steel and glass shoebox abortions do not.
But I think that there is less to Scruton's argument than may appear, or perhaps he has not thought thru his thesis fully and carefully. I'm left with wondering does he really know what he's talking about.
I'll ignore his confusion in the lecture about the classical orders. Several of his slides are clearly of columns in the Doric order, but he refers to them as Corinthian. There're large differences between these two orders, and so his confusion is almost certainly not a result of ignorance, but more likely nerves.
He attributes the phrase "Form Follows Function" to Louis Sullivan, and claims that "modern" architecture--which he dislikes--can be traced back to that perspective, and instead classical architecture--or at least, the architecture that he likes--instead follows the inverted formula of "function following form."
Now, there's a lot about Louis Sullivan that I do not understand. (I'm told that F. L. Wright, who enjoyed listening to Sullivan when Wright was the chief draftsman in Sullivan's firm didn't feel he understood much of what Sullivan said.) But I'm pretty sure that the proper quote from Sullivan is "Form ever follows function;" that Sullivan was actually quoting someone else (I hazily recall he attributed it to Goethe); and that he wasn't advocating a strict utilitarianism in architecture. Many architects and critics thought he was: Scruton seems to, and some of the 1920 German avant garde considered Neue Sachlichkeit to be a key value, and invoked that phrase in support. What he was advocating in this phrase is unclear, particularly if you think of Sullivan's highly ornate terra-cotta or the cast iron of his Carson Pirie Scott building as obeying his "Form...follows function" dictate.
Consider that a building in which "Form follows function" very clearly is a church or other place of worship. The functions of such a building is to provide a form of worship and to display what is believed. The form of those structures follow that function. Greek temples have a different form from Christian churches--temples don't provide a place for a congregation--temple rites were administered in the grounds--because their functions are different. (To have, in the case of religious structures--function following form would put architects in charge of doctrine, which some might regard as monstrous.) The fine points of, say, Catholic doctrine vs Baptist doctrine can be found expressed in some of the fine points of their churches.
Scruton is correct in using a photo of London's Bank of England, Stock Exchange and the surrounding modern office towers as an illustration of "Form Follows Function." The form of the Bank and the Exchange reflect an earlier time (even though the Bank building was actually constructed in the 1920s), and the modern towers reflect modern times. People who work in modern cities now work in offices, and at least on a macroscopic level that work is identical: it is sitting at a desk, interpreting and writing reports, talking on the phone, and so forth. So the modern workspace, as Sullivan observed, is much like a bee hive, with its cells identical. The amount of regimentation is high, but most of the occupants are of similar rank. The Bank and Exchange buildings harken back to a time when office work was rare, and regimentation was low.
Now maybe Scruton doesn't like modern life, and longs for some imagined simpler time of years past. That isn't pathological, or even uncommon. (There's a case that modern times are better than the days of yore, but I won't go into that.) Whether he likes modernity or not, modernity is indeed reflected in modern structures. Modernity might not be popular, but it's the only choice we've got.
This anti-modernist lecture leaves Scruton open to a charge of upper-class bias: he speaks approvingly of the reuse of the London Exchange building--which is now contains an exclusive, expensive and very upper-class mall--and he speaks disapprovingly of the Slough Bus Station--used by travelers of a lower economic status.
That reflects essentially what he doesn't seem to understand. Structures and ornaments and orders have meaning. The Bank and the Exchange buildings have the form they do because that form carries a meaning and a message: they are solid and conservative buildings because their builders want to say they are solid and conservative organizations. An organization that takes your gold and gives you pieces of paper--which is what banks and stock exchanges were and are--need to be thought of as trustworthy. So they put up trust-inspiring buildings. Organizations that need to be thought of as modern and dynamic put up modern and dynamic buildings.
It's not just that moldings create relief (or that modern architects don't know how to draw shading.) Structures have significance. Gothic was chosen for the U of Chicago campus in the 1890s because of its associations with learning, yes, and its inspirational characteristics. But Regenstein Library 's brutalism was chosen to indicate modernity and massiveness--which the library of the University of Chicago certainly is. Walter Netsch's design of Regentein makes the modernity and great size fit well (in my opinion) with the Gothic structures across the street.
The "brutalism" of many UK campuses is despised (probably because the institutions themselves are despised). A better name for "brutalism" might be "heroic" and the development of the many schools in the UK which have "brutalistic" campuses reflect the heroism of the UK in WWII and the UK's triumph over the many challenges of losing its empire.
Scruton confuses architecture for urban planning. Urban planning is as best as I can tell impossible, or at least very few have ever done it consistently well. Le Corbusier's Plan of Paris is a pretty easy target. I think everyone considers that to be awful. He mistakenly asserts, however, that there was no objective. At the time that he proposed that, a huge amount of housing had been destroyed in Europe, and the challenge was where to put them all. The alternative to Corbusier's Ville Radieuse proposal for Paris turned out to be the ring of suburban slums around Paris.
Certainly modern architects have made mistakes--some quite expensive. But so did architects of any period, but those mistakes have been pulled down and forgotten.
As a graduate of St. John's College and an enthusiast for architecture, I am happy that architecture and art were discussed seriously there. But, to repeat, it is not clear that Scruton really knows what he's talking about.
"The "brutalism" of many UK campuses is despised (probably because the institutions themselves are despised)." no. they are despised because they are boring and ugly grey concrete boxes.
"A better name for "brutalism" might be "heroic" and the development of
the many schools in the UK which have "brutalistic" campuses reflect the
heroism of the UK in WWII and the UK's triumph over the many
challenges of losing its empire." what does "heroism" have to do with being grey prison-like boxes? It really does seem like you are blatantly making things up just to defend brutalism.
+Robokill387
I disagree that brutalism is ugly. I'm a lover of modernist architecture. I particularly love post war British concrete buildings. I do appreciate that many people do not like them. Convincing some people that they are beautiful is often difficult, but I have done it! Let me be clear. It's the international Modernist style, approx 1925 to 1980, that I'm defending. I consider Postmodern architecture, 1980+ an abomination.
The Paris street scene @7:24 is perfection. The way it has grown organically over the decades is beautiful. The idea of replacing it with Le Corbusier plan is horrific.
Why don't you just send this "criticism" to Sir Roger, I am sure he would happily put the record straight. The points you raise are insignificant or just a result of Sir Rogers style of rhetoric
It is really clear, as he mentions it, that the column on the slide is a Tuscan one. Then, unrelated to the image on the slide, he mentions that there is, probably, hardly any architect able to draw shadows of a corinthian capital.
TLDR, but at the beginning, he obviously wasn't referring to the doric column as a corinthian column, he was talking about classical orders and saying that a modern architect couldn't shadow a corinthian column likely because that's the most complex of the orders, he wasn't claiming the doric was corinthian. Otherwise, didn't read cause it's too damn long.
Take it easy, speak slower. You are right about architecture. So stop trying to fill every moment of silence with nervous stuttering it is unbearable to listen to.
This speaker’s expression is so narrow. He’s a bit of a fool and doesn’t know it.
No, he really isn't. He's quite brilliant.
complete and utter BS . deplorable .