Montag, 10. Februar 2014

Ornament and Crime by Adolf Loos

Well I was reading the manifesto of Adolf Loss and it was shocking, how much he hated ornaments. It sounds like a child who doesn't want to eat his broccoli and thus things they should vanish.
But I agree with him, simplicity is what makes me look at modern architecture and don't get sore eyes.

Truth is beauty - beauty is truth

I think that especially the radical comparison between ornament and crime, or also ornament is crime, made such an huge impact on Modernism. Loos stated that the child is amoral as well as the Papuan, who tattoos his skin, but is not an criminal due to the fact that he slaughters his enemies and devours them. But the modern man tattooing himself would, on the other hand then, be a criminal.
To make it short, he states that if criminals wear tattoos on the skin as part of ornamenting themselves, then making ornaments on buildings would be the same. The architect would be a criminal, the building he designed would become crime against humanity. And I have to agree with Loos. I understand that, as an architectural student, we should learn about the history of architecture, to grasp the idea of their concepts at that time. But going into detail like knowing the Greek orders? That is not what I want to memorize. 



Unfortunately like all others who were masterminds and first to do some changes, Loos wouldn't get the agreement of what he stating. The Building Goldman and Salatsch Store in Vienna by Adolf Loos for an example was an attempt to get rid of useless ornaments and show functionality. The clear language of the upper housing floors with is contrast of the white painted facade and the minimal held windows had been totally disrupted by some ridiculous window sill, which Loos had to put on, because the emperor was afraid, the building wouldn't correspond with the neighboring  buildings. So he had to scar his own creation.



But what made his manifesto now having such huge impact on the way how architects thought at that time? Well throughout the world, there were others, who like Adolf Loos thought about the idea of an simple, functional style. In Italy the Futurists were fascinated by speed and movement as well as into industrialization, forms of cars, boats, planes, objects which show technical progress and that the design / form follow answers to the functionality.



That is what Peter Behrens did with the AEG Turbine Factory in Berlin. A building, which had a strong influence on the so called revolution of architecture, initiating the time of Modernism. Its a building, so simple held, we can understand by following the forms and shapes, what the purpose of the building is, to enclose the huge turbines of the so called company. It expresses what is inside.


In a way it is understandable why there was the desire of a change. It is now a 100 years ago when the world was at war; the World War I. Cities burned down to the grounds, a new era of architecture had to come, one which wouldn't anymore be unnecessary decorative, but responding to the needs of the people. Building which were functional, serve the purpose and could be mass fabricated. Like for example the Dessau Törten settlement by Walter Gropius


As a rational guy I always saw beauty in simplicity and forms. I can feel the intense hate rate that Adolf Loos had on the ornaments, all though I have to disagree with him under the term that not all tattooed men are criminals as I call myself one of those few who "decorated" themselves.
But it is this full of passion, simple wording and exaggeration that made the people thoughts shake. And it is this manifesto that made the ideology of architecture finally crumble and rebirth into Modernism, a more simple, functional and clean architecture I really appreciate. An appreciation because I think, that beauty comes from within, and a building is just an empty shell without what happens inside. And only a functional building can respond, in my opinion, to beauty.



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