Failure in Architecture

The next speaker in the occasional HTA Guest Speaker Series will be Professor Timothy Brittain-Catlin of the Kent School of Architecture, University of Kent, Canterbury, UK. Tim is a distinguished scholar, innovative thinker, wonderful writer, and exceptionally nice person. I am very excited that he is coming to Carleton.

Tim’s talk, drawn from his recent book Bleak Houses, is called “Failure in Architecture.” Here is his abstract for the talk:

Architectural history and criticism tends to focus on success and innovation. This means that not much is said about the great majority of buildings that have neither and yet make up most of the backdrop for life. Novelists and others outside the architectural professions often have much to contribute to how buildings are written about, and yet their ideas are nowhere to be seen in architectural writing. One of the results of that is that that too many buildings are built outside architectural discourse, and they look terrible as a result.

Furthermore, many architects themselves have made themselves ‘failures’ by concentrating on the sentimental themes which are discouraged by critics who conflate sentiment with kitsch. Others are simply not very good. The more we can talk about buildings in varied ways, the richer criticism will become.

The talk will take place on Wednesday, September 24, at 4:00 PM, in Tory 340. You won’t want to miss this one.