The Apostle and the Apostate
Long ago in Chicago, after the fire, America began to rebuild itself. There emerging out of the ashes of the ground were entire new systems of building, and the opportunity to by expression, birth an American Architecture, true to its People.
Many technologists grew up and contributed in Chicago. At the turn of the 19th to the 20th Century the two giants of American Architecture and Chicago were two firms: Burnham and Root, artistically headed by Daniel Burnham,and Adler and Sullivan, artistically headed by Louis Sullivan. At first there was little to differentiate these firms. They competed arduously for commissions, but their early works were very like each other. They each began by expressing in wide open glass areas the new steel construction and its long spans, each ornamented throughout with new details. Adler and Sullivan began to build more complex buildings, buildings with performance auditoriums, offices, retail and living spaces within them. Adler and Sullivan built their buildings each one as a individual whole artwork designed ,yes to meet the needs of financial return, but also to fulfill the human spirit.
Burnham and Root built bigger, taller, and always with an eye towards immediate and maximum return. Often their buildings are functional, well planned and totally joyless, commercial space.
As time went on, Louis Sullivan more and more refused to compromise Art for money. Burnham was only too happy to take the money and run. Eventually all of Burnham's buildings had whatever ornament or decoration they possessed ordered out of standard office catalogues. Major portions of floorplans were lifted, one building to another, standardized. The Greek, Roman and whatever piled on top of each other, meaningless, but appealing to those who felt the need to borrow from others, thier culture. Burnham and Root prospered and the firm lives on today.
Sullivan would have none of it. No mans hard won work would adorn even his smallest structure. He was no thief, no vampire, he was an honest hard working Craftsman, Artist and MAN. His buildings were that, HIS. Every line, every shadow, every curve, shade color and reflection, came from his fertile mind and was meant to excite and free every spirit that beheld and entered it. These were each temples to the ideas of Whitmans transcendence, to what would have been the American Spirit. This was to be the form of Americas true religion.
The forces of America's False religion, Mammon welded to a false Christianity, would have none of this. All art was to be subjigated to immediate fiscal return. The Human Spirit? The Soul? Where are those found at autopsy?
After Sullivan's triumphal Transportation Building at the Chicago Worlds Fair, the gauntlet had been flung upon the table, the direction and intent were clear, and Mammon arrayed itself to destroy Louis Sullivan. They did for decades, deprive Sullivan of his greatest joy, work.
The man who once built the tallest most complex structures then known to the world was reduced to building a few homes and banks far far away from Chicago in little Midwestern rural towns. They stand and are known and loved throughout the world. In the end, he was able to write books and do one last treatese on Ornament. Mammon celebrated his death and in puriant detail regaled would be Architects, would be MEN with the tale of his misfortune.
Sullivans firm died. Only his disciples remained, each in small practices, Purcell, Elmslie, Frank Lloyd Wright, himself by the time of Sullivans death in 1924 also at that point in (temporary) decline.
Burnham and Root, the masters of commerce, of lunch, of the sublimation of all artistic intent to immediate return, the men who invented quarter hour billing, they survived, they prospered, full of unknown un named interchangeable Architects who made buildings of interchangeable universal inspecific parts and plans. Burnham and Root eventually became Haliburton. Today they stand world wide for corporate greed, destruction of the earth, and all that is indecent in the Corporation. Many long to be them, and thus, serve only Mammon. Their buildings,rightfully, are reviled by all who enter.
Out of Louis Sullivans office was birthed Frank Lloyd Wright, who himself also offered the world transcendent Architecture. Out of Frank Lloyd Wright either by direct apprenticeship or extreme influence, came Richard Nuetra, R.M. Schindler, John Lautner, James De Long, Dwain Lind, Harwell Hamilton Harris, Bruce Goff, Jack Himmler,Eric Lloyd Wright, Elizabeth Ingram, Edgar Tafel, Lloyd Wright, Wes Peters, Aaron Greene, John Lloyd Wright, Bart Prince, and many others go forth and preach healing to the mind, body and Spirit of Man. Their buildings are treasured.
Today the fight wages on in America, and around the world. Architects sublimate their authority, power and knowledge to the profit of greedy debased clients, who add nothing to their communities, dishonor the landscape, and have no idea of the Spirit. Others, work less, but they do more, because what they do must endure, as each small example of their work brings with it life.
In the Long run, Louis Sullivan will triumph. The tale of the shabby spiritual life of Burnham and Root will some day be spoken of in hushed tones, and MEN will clebrate Louis Sullivan as the Apostle of the One True God he was.
Many technologists grew up and contributed in Chicago. At the turn of the 19th to the 20th Century the two giants of American Architecture and Chicago were two firms: Burnham and Root, artistically headed by Daniel Burnham,and Adler and Sullivan, artistically headed by Louis Sullivan. At first there was little to differentiate these firms. They competed arduously for commissions, but their early works were very like each other. They each began by expressing in wide open glass areas the new steel construction and its long spans, each ornamented throughout with new details. Adler and Sullivan began to build more complex buildings, buildings with performance auditoriums, offices, retail and living spaces within them. Adler and Sullivan built their buildings each one as a individual whole artwork designed ,yes to meet the needs of financial return, but also to fulfill the human spirit.
Burnham and Root built bigger, taller, and always with an eye towards immediate and maximum return. Often their buildings are functional, well planned and totally joyless, commercial space.
As time went on, Louis Sullivan more and more refused to compromise Art for money. Burnham was only too happy to take the money and run. Eventually all of Burnham's buildings had whatever ornament or decoration they possessed ordered out of standard office catalogues. Major portions of floorplans were lifted, one building to another, standardized. The Greek, Roman and whatever piled on top of each other, meaningless, but appealing to those who felt the need to borrow from others, thier culture. Burnham and Root prospered and the firm lives on today.
Sullivan would have none of it. No mans hard won work would adorn even his smallest structure. He was no thief, no vampire, he was an honest hard working Craftsman, Artist and MAN. His buildings were that, HIS. Every line, every shadow, every curve, shade color and reflection, came from his fertile mind and was meant to excite and free every spirit that beheld and entered it. These were each temples to the ideas of Whitmans transcendence, to what would have been the American Spirit. This was to be the form of Americas true religion.
The forces of America's False religion, Mammon welded to a false Christianity, would have none of this. All art was to be subjigated to immediate fiscal return. The Human Spirit? The Soul? Where are those found at autopsy?
After Sullivan's triumphal Transportation Building at the Chicago Worlds Fair, the gauntlet had been flung upon the table, the direction and intent were clear, and Mammon arrayed itself to destroy Louis Sullivan. They did for decades, deprive Sullivan of his greatest joy, work.
The man who once built the tallest most complex structures then known to the world was reduced to building a few homes and banks far far away from Chicago in little Midwestern rural towns. They stand and are known and loved throughout the world. In the end, he was able to write books and do one last treatese on Ornament. Mammon celebrated his death and in puriant detail regaled would be Architects, would be MEN with the tale of his misfortune.
Sullivans firm died. Only his disciples remained, each in small practices, Purcell, Elmslie, Frank Lloyd Wright, himself by the time of Sullivans death in 1924 also at that point in (temporary) decline.
Burnham and Root, the masters of commerce, of lunch, of the sublimation of all artistic intent to immediate return, the men who invented quarter hour billing, they survived, they prospered, full of unknown un named interchangeable Architects who made buildings of interchangeable universal inspecific parts and plans. Burnham and Root eventually became Haliburton. Today they stand world wide for corporate greed, destruction of the earth, and all that is indecent in the Corporation. Many long to be them, and thus, serve only Mammon. Their buildings,rightfully, are reviled by all who enter.
Out of Louis Sullivans office was birthed Frank Lloyd Wright, who himself also offered the world transcendent Architecture. Out of Frank Lloyd Wright either by direct apprenticeship or extreme influence, came Richard Nuetra, R.M. Schindler, John Lautner, James De Long, Dwain Lind, Harwell Hamilton Harris, Bruce Goff, Jack Himmler,Eric Lloyd Wright, Elizabeth Ingram, Edgar Tafel, Lloyd Wright, Wes Peters, Aaron Greene, John Lloyd Wright, Bart Prince, and many others go forth and preach healing to the mind, body and Spirit of Man. Their buildings are treasured.
Today the fight wages on in America, and around the world. Architects sublimate their authority, power and knowledge to the profit of greedy debased clients, who add nothing to their communities, dishonor the landscape, and have no idea of the Spirit. Others, work less, but they do more, because what they do must endure, as each small example of their work brings with it life.
In the Long run, Louis Sullivan will triumph. The tale of the shabby spiritual life of Burnham and Root will some day be spoken of in hushed tones, and MEN will clebrate Louis Sullivan as the Apostle of the One True God he was.
posted by Red Taliesin at 10:39 AM
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