This article, taken from a lecture given by Jorge Silvetti at Harvard in 2002, criticizes contemporary academic architecture at that time around four themes, which he calls Programism, Thematization, Blobs, and Literalism. Having read this in 2011, I found it interesting how basically applicable each one was to my own sense of academic architecture, which only began developing in 2004 or so upon my own introduction to it in undergrad. Programism, the direct translation of graphical information to architectural form (to over-simplify, perhaps), exhibits a lack of criticality which would make such information relevant. Thematization, the architect's total imposition over a project's environment, seems like a denial of reality or perhaps an exercise of megalomania on the part of the designer. Either way, it challenges any sort of cultural relevance. Blobs, which deny culture in a sense, and Literalism, which involves forms that are based on words that seem to evoke physical conditions, are also prevalent in academia to this day.
Silvetti's analysis of these themes provides a good basis for critiquing student work. He is definitely of an older generation and his philosophies may be somewhat incongruous with some of the other academics and theorists we've talked about. Lavin and Somol, amongst others, certainly downplay the importance of formal criticality, for instance.
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