Arch Itect Sn Ewspaper 09 5.25.2005
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
THE ARCH ITECT SN EWSPAPER 09 5.25.2005 NEW YORK ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN WWW.ARCHPAPER.COM $3.95 CRIT: JULIE V. lOVINE CO 03 SHADOWS FALL ON CHILD'S MOMENT AS A BIG-LEAGUE ARCHITECT I— z INSTITUTE OF FREEDOM TOWER STALLED VINOLY 05 For David Childs, the drawing board might Baum of Darby & Darby, rebutted with an o just have a silver lining. The architect of the equally detailed response, including a blow- BROOKLYN'S Freedom Tower is in the process of altering by-blow deconstruction of character witness FUTURE his design in response to security concerns Richard Meier's affidavit in support of Childs. WATERFRONT cited by the New York Police Department last His history-laced analysis, with 12 exhibits month. This latest turn of events is sure to rob attached, focuses on two towers designed 08 some thunder from Yale architecture school by Shine for Pelli who had asked students SEASON'S grad Thomas Shine, who is hanging tough to design a media headquarters for NYC2012, READINGS with the copyright infringement lawsuit he sited next to the West Side stadium. The filed against Childs and SOM last November. first design, called Shine '99, evolved into PAINTER AND THEORIST 09 DIES AT 75 But Childs, also a Yale alumnus, doesn't a second, called Olympic Tower. TSCHUMI ON seem to be taking any chances with Shine's At issue is the distinctiveness of the claim that skyscraper designs he created in a MONEO architectural elements in the work presented Robert Slutzky, 1999 Cesar Pelli senior studio look remark• by Shine, including models, site plans, cur• 04 CURBSIDE ably like the Freedom Tower. On March 25, tain wall details, elevations, sections, floor 11 BOOKFAIR Childs' lawyer Richard A. Williamson filed a plans, and massing models. A key feature An Appreciation 57-page brief with the U.S. District Court of of both of Shine's designs is a twisting the Southern District of New York to dismiss tower with an expressed structural grid of Robert Slutzky, artist, theorist, and teacher, the lawsuit on grounds that Shine's work elongated diamonds weaving in and out graduate of Cooper Union and Yale, and LMDC LOSES HEAD does not qualify for copyright protection. from base to top and flattening out as it rises. former professor in architecture and art Late last month. Shine's lawyer, Andrew The structural system continued on page 6 at Cooper Union and the University of Pennsylvania, died on Tuesday, May 3. EXIT RAMPE His painting and three-dimensional tion of a 6-acre strip of land modeling, in the tradition of Piet Mondrian, The timing was bad—coinciding with the that served as a graveyard for Theo van Doesburg, and Josef Albers new confusion at Ground Zero, it made him Afi-icans in the 17" and IS" (who was his teacher at Yale), explored look like a fall guy—but Kevin Rampe's centuries. The burial ground the dimensions of color and abstract recent announcement that he was stepping lay forgotten until workers form in relation to the picture plane, and down as director of the Lower Manhattan uncovered it while excavat• its three-dimensional implications. It was Development Corporation (LMDC) was a ing the site for a new federal these implications, of course, that made long time coming. As far back as November building in 1991 (see his work and theoretical investigations of 2003, within months of his appointment, "Invisible Memorial," AN serious interest and importance to archi• there were rumblings that he wanted out 12_7.13.2004). Activists tects, and his teaching at Cooper Union and his hat was in the ring when the Port continue to worry that the between 1968 and 1990 formed genera• Authority searched for its own new director winning design does not tions of students sensitive to color, light, last year. After all, his job was rather thank• touch lightly enough on and space. His dedication to teaching n's winninq design less: shepherd of the unruly mob that fate the grave site, but Leon sees was legendary—he even gave his course and politics conspired to entrust with the things differently. "We feel to select groups of students who were redevelopment of the World Trade Center AFRICAN BURIAL GROUND very strongly about com• listed on his roster. His trenchant but site. Rampe stood between the all-too- memorating the memory of reasoned criticism was a stimulus to familiar players—Larry Silverstein, the MEMORIAL RESURRECTED those who have passed with intensive study. Slutzky's work was always Port, victims' families, nearby landholders, a strong, visible symbol," envisaged in the collaborative mode that the menagerie of architects, the feisty power The eight-year saga to choose ral path and jutting stone he said. "The reason people informed his teaching continued on page 2 brokers on his own continued on page 4 a memorial for downtown chamber, bested four other have been able to build over Manhattan's African Burial finalist designs for the GSA- the rest of the site and forget Ground drew to a close on owned site at Broadway and about it is that there was If fundraising proceeds on schedule, the faint April 29, when the U.S. Duane Street. The structure nothing permanent there to blue glow that bathes the faces of visitors General Services will be engraved with sym• memorialize it." to Times Square will soon be joined by a red Administration (GSA) and bols from African and Although there is no one: the much-heralded winning design for a the National Parks Service African-American cultures. schedule set for design final- new TKTS booth. On May 2, the revised plans announced that Rodney Leon The memorial process has ization or construction for Father Duffy Square and the TKTS booth of the New York-based firm been a tumultuous one, with of the memorial, the GSA were unveiled, and according to architect Aarris Architects won the community members dis• has budgeted the project at Nick Leahy of Perkins Eastman, construction competition. Leon's design, agreeing over what should $3 miUion. could begin as early as next spring. which features a ramped spi• occupy the site, a small por• DEBORAH GROSSBERC While the fundamentals of the project— the amphitheater-like red steps floating above 12 ticket windows—will be familiar to those who saw the 2000 exhibition at the Van Alen Institute, its scope and complexity has expanded significantly. Australian firm Choi Ropiha—surprise winners of the interna• tional competition sponsored by the Theatre Development Fund (TDF)—has been joined by the New York office of Perkins Eastman and the engineering firm Dewhurst McFarlane, while the Coalition for continued on page 3 00 CM 12 O THE ARCHITECT'S NEWSPAPER MAY 25, 2005 CO In the past 15 years New York City parks have undergone major Diana Darling improvements. Their renovation schemes are always presented EDITORS o to the public as attempts to upgrade overused and badly cared Cathy Lang Ho William Menking h-i for public spaces, as well as to increase safety. The renovated ART DIRECTOR LU parks (beginning with the controversial Tompkins Square and Martin Perrin later Mount Morris, Abingdon Square, and others) have undoubt• SENIOR EDITOR edly become more pleasant and functional environments, with Anne Guiney manicured plantings, safe and clear circulation, improved light• ASSOCIATE EDITOR ing, park benches, and the like. It must be said that many of Deborah Grossberg the makeovers, like that of City Hall Park, are ersatz Victorian DCSION AND PRODUCTION Daniil Alexandrov revivals, in the spirit of genteel 19"'-century promenade grounds, exacting polite behavior from all. Quaint iron fences are part of EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Gunnar Hand the vocabulary, imposing order and, more importantly, control• EDITORIAL INTERN ling spaces from squatter settlements, political demonstrations, Stephen Martin or other unruly or unsanctioned gatherings. In their "dangerous and explosive little SALES AND MARKCTINC DIRECTOR Washington Square is now slated for a $16 million renova• essay" as Rowe called it, however, Slutzky Karen Begley tion, which includes a 4-foot-high iron fence that will surround and Rowe worked to criticize this then-nor• MARKETING INTERN malized tradition through a rigorous appli• the park. The city wisely decided against closing the park at Irina Kosoy cation of Gestalt theory to the experience of night, heeding public outcry. But the redesign still raises ques• architecture, both modernist and humanist. tions about what's appropriate for the park—and all city parks, CONTRIBUTORS In their first essay, they distinguished MARISA BARTOLUCCI/ALAN G.BRAKE/ for that matter, which are being systematically remade in repeti• between what they called literal and phe• PHILIPPE BARRIERE / ARIC CHEN / DAVID D'ARCY / tive, nostalgic fashion. Washington Square functions differently nomenal transparency in the work of Le MURRAY FRASER/RICHARD INGERSOLL/ Corbusier, and especially his rejected proj• JOE KERR/LIANE LEFAIVRE/LUIGI PRESTINENZA in the grid than a refuge at the end of a block or a shaded ect for the League of Nations competition PUGLISI/KESTER RATTENBURY/ respite tucked among the city's relentless buildings. In its past, D.GRAHAME SHANE/PETER SLATIN/ in 1927, demonstrating the extraordinary KATSU TANAKA / GWEN WRIGHT / PETER ZELLNER it has been a pauper's graveyard, a site for hangings, a military complexity of Le Corbusier's response to EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD parade ground. Traffic passed through it from the 1870s until transparency compared with that of Walter PAOLA ANTONELLI/RAUL A. BARRENECHE/ the 1950s. And it has always served as a gateway to New York Gropius. In their second essay, they took on M. CHRISTINE BOYER/PETER COOK/ Renaissance facades—the Ca d'Oro in University and Greenwich Village.