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The Totalitarianism of Le Corbusier

Posted by: Nate Berg

23 November 2009 - 5:00am

Le Corbusier's influence as an architect has spanned generations. Theodore Dalrymple argues he is more appropriately classified as a totalitarian.

"At the exhibition, I fell to talking with two elegantly coiffed ladies of the kind who spend their afternoons in exhibitions. 'Marvelous, don’t you think?' one said to me, to which I replied: 'Monstrous.' Both opened their eyes wide, as if I had denied Allah’s existence in Mecca. If most architects revered Le Corbusier, who were we laymen, the mere human backdrop to his buildings, who know nothing of the problems of building construction, to criticize him? Warming to my theme, I spoke of the horrors of Le Corbusier’s favorite material, reinforced concrete, which does not age gracefully but instead crumbles, stains, and decays. A single one of his buildings, or one inspired by him, could ruin the harmony of an entire townscape, I insisted. A Corbusian building is incompatible with anything except itself."

Full Story: The Architect as Totalitarian
Source: City Journal, November 20, 2009
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Couldn't disagree more with this article

Submitted by Scott Page on Mon, 11/23/2009 - 11:22.

This seems to have been written by someone that hasn't been through architecture school. At my school, Corbu was presented pretty objectively. Granted, we had to study him a lot, which always frustrated me as a student, but he was prolific in terms of his production. We were presented not with a predetermined Corbu is God curriculum but one that was pretty honest with his faults. Personally, I think he did a few great buildings but like many notable architects of the day, he wasn't much of an urbanist. So what? As a designer, he's inspired to create and generate discussion around a set of ideas. The french looked at his scheme to wipe out a chunk of Paris and replace it with free standing towers and rightly said he was a looney.

Its pretty out of control to even insinuate that an architect is equal to Pol Pot. To blame the architect affords them way too much power than they could possibly wield. Architects often think they can change the world but it requires a whole lot of people more powerful and influential than they to really make that happen.

As the article mentioned briefly, the mid-20th century was a period of enormous demand for new housing. Our government decided to borrow Corbu's ideas (and those of many of his contemporaries), distort them and mass produce housing to really poor effect. Should we not blame the politicians of the day for their hastiness and poor vision? I think this anger is just misplaced. Hate the ideas? Great. But lets keep it in perspective.

Don't blame the messenger

Submitted by Thayer-D on Tue, 11/24/2009 - 04:11.

"This seems to have been written by someone that hasn't been through architecture school"

That's exactly what makes his observations so accurate. He wasn't brainwashed into this perverse historical dialectic or whatever word salad they prefer to feed you now-a-days. To compare him to Pol-Pot is simply a literary device, would you prefer a "school bully"? Sure there where a lot of other factors that led to the wonton destruction of our cities, but Corb along with the early modernists in general provided the ideological framework through which these forces played themselves out. I don;'t just dislike his ideas, but the work they inspired. The main point is that someone with such an abysmal record shouldn't be afforded the place in academia he has, and that is the sort of perspective we should have.

its too bad you feel this way

Submitted by Scott Page on Tue, 11/24/2009 - 06:22.

if you were reading my reply, you'll see i was not brainwashed either. i think the danger in blaming ideas is that it discourages creative thinking. cities need that more than ever.

further, to say that comparing someone to Pol Pot is a "literary device" is akin to the hate speech of Fox news. i don't think tha's what we want in our profession as we all try to make our cities better places to live.

Fair Enough.

Submitted by Thayer-D on Tue, 11/24/2009 - 07:06.

I don't think I said you where brainwashed, but hiding failure under the guise of intellectual openmindedness is sophistry. If you can't criticize an idea, how can you think critically? Some ideas are just bad, and if you think saying so discourages creative thinking, we should just hand out medals for participating so no one feels hurt. Never mind the hurt those ideas have inflicted. Never mind the thousands that where forcably relocated because of Corbusian visions of urban renewal.

It's funny how you object to the writter's use of metaphore as some how too violent a description when the writter was objecting to the real violence suffered by people forced to live in in the bleakness and social isolation of Corbusian landscapes. Fair enough.

Architects And Urbanists On Corbu

Submitted by Charles Siegel on Tue, 11/24/2009 - 09:46.

"This seems to have been written by someone that hasn't been through architecture school."

I suspect so. Corbu is the nemesis of Planning schools but is still respected in Architecture schools.

That is one reason why we are moving toward more human scale planning, but we are still producing such inhuman architecture. "Zaha Hadid is but Corbu writ large" (as John Milton might say).

Don't believe the dogmas they teach in today's Architecture schools.

Read Siegfried Giedion and you will see that the politicians who built those mid-century housing projects were following the dogmas taught in mid-century Architecture schools. I predict that, before too long, the dogmas taught in today's Architecture schools will look just as bad.

Charles Siegel

Bring in a new age of enlightenment.

Submitted by Thayer-D on Mon, 11/23/2009 - 05:43.

Clear writing is such a balm in our maelstrom of architectural thought. I couldn't agree more with this article. All through Architectural school I scratched my head as to who let the barbarians in the gate and why nobody trying to get them the hell out. Now I don't mean actually repeating the mistakes of the totalitarian modernists themselves, namely to forcably exclude students from studying these works, rather stop exulting them in everyones eyes. That is the most sure fire way to get young architects not to believe their eyes because to behold Corbusian creations as anything but inhumane is to live in an alternate universe. But I really like the way this author disected the way in which this witchcraft is exercised in schools.

There's nothing for me to add towards the content of this article except to wonder why schools don't teach the reality of this kind of work and therefore have this dark ages of architecture understood simmilarily to the political totalitarianism of it's hey-day. That could clearly be described as status-quo. Those schools with professors steeped in this lie can't openly discuss this works shortcommings because to do so would be like a Catholic Priest discussing the finer points of Darwinism. It would be self defeating. I don't encourage a similarly aggressive revolt which the writter points out would probably bring about another overly simplistic and possibly totalitarian view of architecture. But it would be great if this chap got a job at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard.

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