Ornament and Crime is an essay written in 1908 by the influential and self-consciously “modern” Austrian architect Adolf Loos under the German title Ornament und Verbrechen. And it was under this challenging title that in 1913 the essay was translated into English:” The evolution of culture marches with the elimination of ornament from useful objects”, Loos proclaimed, thus linking the optimistic sense of the linear and upward progress of cultures with the contemporary vogue for applying evolution to cultural context.
This essay show Loos “ Passion for smooth and precious surfaces, informs his expressed philosophy that ornamentation can have the effect of causing objects to go out of style and thus become obsolete. It struck him that it was a crime to waste the effort needed to add ornamentation, when the ornamentation would cause the object to soon go out of style. Loos introduced a sense of the "immorality" of ornament, describing it as "degenerate", its suppression as necessary for regulating modern society.
Finished having this lesson, I was so surprise that some one would said this kind of things that no one ever though about, but sadly, It seem a bit truth. In many times, people design a space either interior or exterior, always will added some decoration, and in many case, style are mainly depends on what decoration are using? what material are using?But how about the style of building method or any others? It seems always ignored by people. Only less of them will focus and care about it.
The essay was written when Art Nouveau, which Loos had excoriated even at its height in 1900, was about to show a new way of modern art. The essay is important in articulating some moralizing views, inherited from the Arts and Crafts movement, which would be fundamental to the Bauhaus design studio and would help define the ideology of Modernism in architecture.
No comments:
Post a Comment