Originally Posted by
petromax
No, not really. The buildings (that last) almost all have their strengths. It's their appreciation that is question. It's strange that lovers of old buildings are so vehemently opposed to their often prehistoric politics and how can someone hate a building with a passion one minute and several million minutes later think, well it's ok...
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Well, this has often been the criticism with Liverpool's stock of 18th & 19th century buildings, and it's involvement in the slave trade. 'The joints cemented with the blood of Africans...' is often cited. I sometimes wonder whether the fillling in of the Old Dock was an act of forgetting, or a way of erasing earlier memories of the trade? Burying the dead? Even if the reason was entirely commercial, it would have carried with it some psychological benefit in this regard, acknowledged, or otherwise. Perhaps the growth Liverpool's theatre also played an important role in masking, or escaping from these realities? A papering of cracks, eager to present a new and acceptable facade to it's citizens, and visitors alike. In Liverpool today, appreciation of any public building of that age, still carries with it a tang of unpleasantness, which can be traced back to the city's involvement in the trade. I guess this appreciation would undoubtedly be different for a visitor stepping off at Lime Street and breathing in the city at first glance, with fresh eyes, and knowing nothing of the city's past?
It's not an easy question to answer, so I'll leave off for now...
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Whatever the wrongs of history, applying the morals and ethics of today anachronistically to the past is unhelpful. If you were unburdened with all that you know today, and were forced to live in any period in history, would you behave, and think differently to your peers? I think not, or not that much.
More recently - I hated the politics behind the dome, and didn't visit it on principle. I think the lottery and taxpayer's ?789,000 could have been put to better use? Now the mother of all white elephants has been reborn as the O
2 - a successful gig and entertainment complex. I have a different appreciation of it these days, and it's all happened in recent living memory. So, to borrow a phase from Obama, believe in change.
Originally Posted by
petromax
If you're talking about the NT, I like Denys Lasdun's work; there's an honesty and strength. Royal Festival Hall? Yes, beautiful manners. Grimshaw at Waterloo? I felt it must have looked like a grand steam hall on the drawing board but sadly underscale in truth. I wonder what's happening to it....
There's 'honesty and strengh' in Volvo's - doesn't mean I'm going to run out and buy one though! Royal Festival Hall I agree with you. and esp. since it's recent refurb. Grimshaw's Waterloo looks even sader now Eurostar has left.
Originally Posted by
petromax
As for the Shell Centre, it can be windy but so can a storm-tossed beach! In neither case does the wind make them ugly (as voted; not 'worst' as quoted)
You like Dungerness then?
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