On Hiatus
Monday is when I would normally post a new book review, but instead, this blog and its related newsletter are going on hiatus indefinitely due to a family emergency.
Posts
Architectural Exhibitions and Their Books
Preparing for this post I counted roughly one hundred books in my library that are related to exhibitions. Surprisingly, given that I tend to buy catalogs and other companion books to exhibitions I visit, only a quarter of those hundred are exhibitions I have seen in person. Granted, a fair number of them are classics that predate my existence, such as The International Style , the book version of MoMA's Modern Architecture: International Exhibition from 1932, or are from exhibitions that happened on the other side of the world, including two of the exhibition catalogs featured here. The fact I have so many catalogs that do not function as souvenirs to exhibitions I visited points to their enduring value: They are permanent records of temporary displays and, as such, expose the research and contents from exhibitions to considerably more people than who attended. Not all books coming out of architectural exhibitions are the same. Many of them function like art catalogs and have a ...
From the Mouths of Architects
I'm not sure when it happened, but at some point I went from disliking interviews — preferring texts written by architects, much of it in the vein of theory — to gravitating to them. Now I find myself opting to read interviews, be they online or in printed matter, over other content; interviews are only below critical reviews in my rankings. I chalk up the switch to a few things: preferring the informal and clear language of interviews over the theory-/archi-speak used my too many architects; a wide prevalence of interviews, especially online; and an appreciation for them after having done a few of them myself . From the reader's perspective it may seem that interviews are easy: turn on the mic, ask some questions, transcribe the interview (or have AI software do it, more likely), lightly edit, publish. But each step of the process has its concerns, from making sure to hit "record" (yes, that happens) and having the right mic in the right location in the right room (A...