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Defining Modernist Architecture

By: Owen Hatherley

The roots of modernist architecture are explicitly reformist and socialist – yet it continues to defy contemporary characterisation as either an elite conspiracy or a monument to unfulfilled utopia, writes Owen Hatherley.

Bird’s eye view of the Phase I zhilkombinat, New Kharkiv ‘socialist city’, 1930. Architect: Giprograd (Pavel Aleshin, et al.).

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In 2022, architecture’s social media is divided between ‘I Luv Brutalism’ accounts — all snapshots of the National Theatre — and ‘Traditional Western Architecture’ accounts apparently managed by Greek statues. Modernism, it seems, is still controversial. Except on the furthest fringes of the far right, debate does not still rage about whether or not Picasso or Stravinsky […]

Medium

In 2022, architecture’s social media is divided between ‘I Luv Brutalism’ accounts — all snapshots of the National Theatre — and ‘Traditional Western Architecture’ accounts apparently managed by Greek statues. Modernism, it seems, is still controversial. Except on the furthest fringes of the far right, debate does not still rage about whether or not Picasso or Stravinsky […]

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In 2022, architecture’s social media is divided between ‘I Luv Brutalism’ accounts — all snapshots of the National Theatre — and ‘Traditional Western Architecture’ accounts apparently managed by Greek statues. Modernism, it seems, is still controversial. Except on the furthest fringes of the far right, debate does not still rage about whether or not Picasso or Stravinsky […]

In 2022, architecture’s social media is divided between ‘I Luv Brutalism’ accounts — all snapshots of the National Theatre — and ‘Traditional Western Architecture’ accounts apparently managed by Greek statues. Modernism, it seems, is still controversial. Except on the furthest fringes of the far right, debate does not still rage about whether or not Picasso or Stravinsky […]

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