Ice Cream Castles

There's this delicious tidbit nestled in Witold Rybczynski's review of Sydney Pollack's "Sketches of Frank Gehry" in today's edition of Slate. The verdict on the film is that Pollack doesn't know much about architecture or making an interesting film about it. The verdict on Gehry is less clear, but in the excerpt below, the reviewer uses a tasty metaphor to suggest that Gehry isn't qualified to design an entire neighborhood.

"Pollack includes a token negative critic in the film, art historian Hal Foster. The Princeton professor is unconvincing, but there is a real criticism of Gehry to be made. He is currently designing two large urban real-estate development projects, one in Brooklyn and one in downtown Los Angeles. How suitable will his whimsical, idiosyncratic approach be for city building? My guess: not very. It's not a question of size, or density, or art in the service of commerce. The urban renewal of the 1960s demonstrated the peril of architects designing entire neighborhoods. This is no less true of gifted architects. Expressionistic virtuosos—Borromini, Antonio Gaudí, or that Art Nouveau genius, Hector Guimard—created wonderful buildings, which are wonderful precisely because they are exceptional. An entire neighborhood of Gaudí—or Gehry—would be like a meal of only ice cream. Too much of a very good thing."

Superblock ala Mode?

Thanks to Daisy Parker for the, uh, scoop.

Comments

[JJ]

Gerhey's Atlantic Yards designs look like tilting skyscrapers and have little of the female curves of some of his other buildings........totally inappropriate in a place where buildings collapsed...........and his recent jewelry for Tiffany's is forgetable............he's not a consistant genius in my book.......J

[Laura]

Got here via CuteOverload (the squirrel photo). One of my good friends is Syndey Pollack's personal assistant (the perks of living near Hollywood!). He was so elated over the launch of the Gehry film that it was silly. Good to be proud of your boss and all but, really now... I viewed the online preview clips and have to agree with the negative reviewer. But, then again, I never was a big fan of Gehrey's style and doubt any film about an architect could hold my interest. A PBS special? Maybe. But a full film? Uh-uh.

Anyhoooo - nice blog. I like your adventures.