| Tzar, your understanding of architecture is the most idealistic one. I was, just like you, believed that the core value of architecture is beyond practicality. The most influential players in the business are brilliant and iconoclastic intellectuals who dedicated their lives to the search of simplicity/complexity, socio-political aspects of architecture. But let's be realistic here. MONEY STOPS ME FROM DOING WHAT I WANT TO DO.Since you are a student at Cooper Union (tuition-free and thus saves alot of money for your parents/yourself, access to the top-notch faculty, small-sized studio with very talented colleagues etc.), you are, in a sense, belongs to the hyper-elite group of future architects. Whereas at USC, folks are very different from the ones in NYC. They are being money-oriented, practical and intellectually lazy-- in short, they just want job security, which turns out to be a major dissapointment. People come to USC after they were rejected at Cornell and Cooper Union (myself included and I personally know some folks here who had just submitted their transfer applications to elsewhere due to their overall unhappiness at SC. Transfer means they will start over again as a 1st year student!Even though a few of them are on scholarships.)Ask an architecture student here, chances are they've never heard of Cooper Union or believe that SC is superior to Cooper, which needless to say, is an ethnocentric if not fully ridiculous statement. Please accept my apologies for being so negative, I just can't find any particular reason to cheer me up, architecturally.
Sashimi, I sense that you have a background in Chinese history. (Are you an ABC or moved to the US just as me?) Cultural destructrion only applies to the mortal, ( those who are regular human beings with no sense of self, knowledge and the value of individuals) not the immortal! Mao's movement had destroyed generations of people, but the real contributors to the Chinese society are the ones that just cannot be brainwashed. My grandpa was one of them, I am so proud of him for being wrongfully accused and still believed in what he believed. Theoretical or not, we should at least have an understanding of architecture as an evolutionary subject, not a revolutionary one. I still want to point out China's lack of original thinkers. Obedience keeps China going, the ones who dare to cross the line will pay for it. That's all I can say about what is really going on in China now. |