Always Distinguish(ed).

I had a professor who once said “You can’t put something [a building] up that is funny and expect people to laugh at it for the next 50 years.” His point was, what seems vogue, cool, hip, in style today and makes a witty critique or a showy statement, in 50 years will just be trash. Mind you, he was a European Modernist. I think the same kind of principle goes for liturgy……. but before you say anything, that’s another conversation!

So, with some “free” time on my hands I can return to my ‘real’ passion: poking fun at Modernist and Postmodernist architecture. Er… I mean, talking about the pros and cons of contemporary design. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I have: I get more comments when I talk about things other than architecture. But, thankfully, I’m not in the business of getting comments.

You might not be as disappointed as I was when I realized it, but today one of my old images of the Swiss-French architect-high priest of the Modernist movement, Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris (otherwise known as Le Corbusier), as self-styled (re-)incarnation of all things “good and holy” about architecture… was shattered. That is, slightly so. You see, for a while now I had thought—in my limited knowledge about the French language—rather naïvely, I admit, that the pseudonym ‘Le Corbusier’ meant ‘The Builder’. Long story short, it doesn’t. Thus, Jeanneret’s choice of a new, reinvented name is not such a satisfying story of architectural delusions of grandeur as I had thought. Granted, there are still some overtones of classism in his appropriation of this name, but since it doesn’t mean what I was told it did (most likely a rumor perpetuated by anti-Corbu types like myself)… I was a little chagrined.

In ‘honor’ of my discovery, I decided to read an article on The New Liturgical Movement that I had been meaning to look at for quite some time now: “The Dangers of Architectural Positivism” written by Matt Alderman of the Shrine of the Holy Whapping. But, before a certainly more substantial foray into the world of cornerstones and filigree, a quick jaunt into the world of history:

In investigating good ol’ Corb, I found something more interesting to my now Dominicanly-sensitized ears, this:

Jeanneret [that is, "Corbu"] was also fascinated by his more distant ancestors, the Albigensians and Cathars passionate heretics persecuted by the Church. The persecution mattered to him as much as the passion, as Corb thought of himself, not without cause, as a despised loner. “Some men”, he groused in his autobiographical My Work, “have original ideas and are kicked in the arse for their pains.” [emphasis mine]

That explains, at least for me, why every time I heard him spoken of in school, my pre-Dominican hairs bristled with unease. Granted, I know little about what Le Corbusier would have appreciated about his dualist ancestors [who thought the material world was created by an evil demiurge in order to trap human souls in physical bodies], but how fascinating, nonetheless. It seems, of course, he was probably more interested in the fact of being persecuted—as it seems most (Post)Modernists are—but I think the question of dualism in Modernism and Postmodernism is still worth further investigation. I think it confirms, at least superficially, my observations about the dualism/spiritualism of minimalist design (see: Novy Dvur Monastery & “A Christian Critique of Minimalism”).

… … …

There is, it would seem, a strong ‘tradition‘ (I use this word rather tongue-in-cheekedly) among more than a few Catholics, when thinking about architecture (because I know, you think about it all the time!), to bemoan the rather destructive renovations and restorations of church buildings in the past several decades and, inevitably to blame modernism—”why are our churches so ugly?” I, personally, will admit to having done this. The blame, nowadays, is often laid squarely on the shoulders of the liturgical/architectural consultants, but their ideas and designs are founded in something much more basic that stems back to the beginnings of Modernism. So, in short, I think this criticism of Modernist trends in all fields is valid, and can be useful. After all, we learn from history and the mistakes, sins, and generally stupid things done, as well as the rare successes. It is, in my summation, highly important that people generally know that the horrible things done to their cities, homes and churches in the name of architectural progress were because of heinous totalitarian philosophies and utilitarian cultural-renovation machines like the Modernist movement. Postmodernism, we must remember, is a Modernist rejection of Modernism.

In reading up on my architectural history, something struck me though. It is the distinctly unfortunate but necessary character of historical study that it tends to ‘leave off’ at the point of current events. This is not what struck me though. Instead, it was a paraphrase of the words of Frank Lloyd Wright in 1901:

“the architecture of the future would be built of machine-formed elements; the modern architect would of necessity need to embrace the machine in every aspect of design.” [Understanding Architecture, first edition, p. 456]

Now, those familiar with architectural education today will know the fascination in the biz. with technology, especially in the way of innovative materials, prefabrication, SIPS panels, pre-stressed concrete, building ’skins’, computer-engineered shapes, and the ubiquitous plasma screen. Architecture students in general are heavily doused in this and many a thesis is about machine-engineered furniture, the manufacturing process, and the reuse of industrial technologies as architectural elements. In many ways, Wright’s vision has come true. The relative ease with which an entire subdivision can be constructed in several months out of mostly pre-fabricated materials, the reality that to work in the most prestigious of firms today you have to have extensive knowledge of 3D drafting programs, or the fact that you too can have a kitchen that looks like a Starbucks is certainly nothing new (back in ‘the day’ you could order a house from the Sears catalog).

This emphasis on technology, as far as I can tell, will not die out soon. It is patently more enticing to the 20 year old iPod-carrying architecture student than Palladio and Vitruvius. And, of course, maybe it does not have to die out. However, if we are expecting a resurgence in beautiful Catholic churches we have to take some things into consideration, as we do in other cultural matters when it comes to Catholics in contemporary North American culture. It is true, I think, that Catholics are more and more craving the splendors of their religion’s traditions, especially among the youth. Now, I’m not interested in the traditionalist-progressive debate here. We can, as I said, bemoan the destructive, renovationist tendencies of the past that, in so many words, ruined many a well-designed church. But, and this is what I was thinking of when I read Wright’s thoughts, we can also recognize that, again, secular humanist culture is still exuberantly flying off tangentially from generally ‘religiously-minded’ world views. That means, and I think that New Urbanism learned this the hard way, that for all the re-creating we can try and do, we’re recreating a physical world stylized by a culture that no longer exists. We can make of that observation whatever we like, suggesting that now we have to build modern, or that now we have to close ourselves off at times from the influences of contemporary society, or that now we have to find a synthesis of the two. But, and especially if the answer is either the first or the third, how can that be achieved? Are we satisfied with the results so far? (Re: Cathedral of Christ the Light, Oakland) For the sake of argument, I’m going to make some generalizations.

Architecture school, like most higher education, produces a kind of idealism which can certainly be healthy. But, in most, I would say, this tends to wear off. After a few years of being a ‘CAD-monkey’ [computer draftsman] one tends to be at least a little disillusioned and shaken of those ideals. This is probably to be expected. What happens, however, is that over time the exigencies of career advancement take precedent over delusions of revolutionary architectural innovations. Practically, this means that most will be designing shopping malls, public schools, office buildings, restaurants and the occasional bank. These architects are, for lack of a better term, cheap—they cost less, and they spend less. What’s the result? Well, more people hire them. Most likely, they, not Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris or Bernini nor even those brave and chosen few who spent their money on a good (and rare) classical education, will be designing the new sanctuary for your parish. They follow, sometimes slavishly, the trends of the business that are presented to them monthly in publications like Architectural Record. It’s not necessarily their fault, they don’t have the time or money to explore these kinds of things. What’s more, these students graduating today, the Catholic ones, grew up in these churches we tend to think are ugly: auditorium churches, churches in the round, churches with nothing but crucifixes (if even that), university chapels with huge graffiti murals behind the altar, etc… or, they’re converts! But, there is a good chance that they won’t think they’re ugly. There’s a good chance they will have emotional attachments to these buildings and see good in them that others do not. There’s a good chance, dare I say it, that they will see the ‘old’ and think ‘ah, that’s nice…’ and that’s about it. These new architects are now further removed from the church designs even of the not-so-distant past. They see them in Architecture History courses, and they see them in cathedrals every now and then, and in books… but they don’t know how to produce anything like these things [at least I don't!].

Most graduating architecture students don’t know the first thing about how to design a column [myself included]. “Design a column?” we might say, “You mean, like, structural sizing? You know, figuring out how big it needs to be?” Not exactly. I mean, like, this:

In the time between when I started and graduated from architecture school there was a considerable change. When I entered first-year, the only reason you took your computer to studio was to check e-mail and play music. We did not produce drawings using computers for the first two years of our education [I think this was a good thing]. By the time I graduated, however, new students were coming in and very early-on learning the latest techniques in 3D design. I would be surprised if many schools haven’t altogether stopped teaching students how to draft on paper.

The implications are that, perhaps apart from Notre Dame, architecture schools are few and far between that are producing architects that will be capable of successfully designing new Catholic churches expressive of the values of a contemporary American Catholicism that cherishes a real cultural continuity with the past and not just an “in the Catholic tradition…” slogan.

In the Baroque style, the Catholic Reformation had a unique style of its own to express its values and ends. In the Gothic, likewise, the entire spirituality and worldview of the Medievals was expressed in stone and glass. What… however… will be the architectural expression of Evangelium vitae and the Culture of Life? Where will it come from? Can it legitimately find a home in the Post-Postmodernist highly industrialized, over-technologization of contemporary architecture? Or must it resort to drumming up the best and brightest of 13th-16th century design?

If Thomism could survive all these years and still find refreshingly new (and faithful) expression in the writing of some of today’s philosophers, why not the same for Gothic, Renaissance, Romanesque, and Baroque architecture? Now, this is an analogy of course. When it comes to the plastic arts we are dealing with a rather different creature—not exactly a question of transporting or copying buildings like snippets of the Summa transplanted into modern texts—but, all the same, what can be done, practically speaking, to put all the right elements in place that future Catholic architects, nourished in a revived faith, can develop a true embodiment of the ideals of the Culture of Life in a language intelligible to modern sensitivities? That is, must we, really, first reproduce architecture like that of the past before we can hope to move again in the direction of a true physical expression of our time?

If we take the route of recovering architectural forms of the past, which I don’t think is a bad idea, what happens when this intersects with modern technology? What happens when it runs up against modern budget constraints, or modern skill limitations? I’m talking about your friendly neighborhood parish now, built by your friendly local architect who wears black all the time, not this diocesan cathedral or that one, this monastery, or even this university chapel.