Modern Monuments

[Lokasenna]

I agree with the general gist of what most people are saying - it often comes down to personal taste, though I think (and I'm not the only one!) that some of them are trying to be ugly.

I'd heard of Dublin's giant needle-thing, but never actually seen a picture of it till now. It looks massively out of place - I don't know if Dublin has many tall buildings, but you can't see any in the picture, which must mean you can see the thing for miles..?

I do think the Angel of the North ugly, but like I said, opinion is divided. One of my friends has the Angel as the view from his living room, and he thinks it looks dramatic and wonderful (and you must like something if you buy a house that looks over the thing).

I do fear, like the examples given in Montreal, that a lot of these things will become obsolete once the event they were constructed for is forgotten, and they will just be left to rust and rot.

It's not the cost I object to - I'm all for building great monuments, and I certainly don't think we should measure our public endeavours in terms of baby incubators and such. It would be nice if the public was allowed a bit more of a say on them though, rather than a few select art critcs - if the people of Kent want a damn great horse (why!?!), then at least it's their choice, and the critics can be ignored.

We should celebrate the Olympics, but I think a nice park with a glorious baroque fountain would be infinitely more pleasent, and you'd only notice it if you actually went to see it - it wouldn't poision the skyline, like the Orbit.

...oh, and I HATE wind-farms. They've just built a load of the wretched things in the bay; this is a tourist town! Is destroying the view really going to help our flagging economy? They also continue to plant endless numbers of them on the Durham dales, which I have to look at every time I go walking. Anyway, that's a rant for another day.

[Emil Miller]

I agree with the general gist of what most people are saying - it often comes down to personal taste, though I think (and I'm not the only one!) that some of them are trying to be ugly.

I'd heard of Dublin's giant needle-thing, but never actually seen a picture of it till now. It looks massively out of place - I don't know if Dublin has many tall buildings, but you can't see any in the picture, which must mean you can see the thing for miles..?

I do think the Angel of the North ugly, but like I said, opinion is divided. One of my friends has the Angel as the view from his living room, and he thinks it looks dramatic and wonderful (and you must like something if you buy a house that looks over the thing).

I do fear, like the examples given in Montreal, that a lot of these things will become obsolete once the event they were constructed for is forgotten, and they will just be left to rust and rot.

It's not the cost I object to - I'm all for building great monuments, and I certainly don't think we should measure our public endeavours in terms of baby incubators and such. It would be nice if the public was allowed a bit more of a say on them though, rather than a few select art critcs - if the people of Kent want a damn great horse (why!?!), then at least it's their choice, and the critics can be ignored.

We should celebrate the Olympics, but I think a nice park with a glorious baroque fountain would be infinitely more pleasent, and you'd only notice it if you actually went to see it - it wouldn't poision the skyline, like the Orbit.

...oh, and I HATE wind-farms. They've just built a load of the wretched things in the bay; this is a tourist town! Is destroying the view really going to help our flagging economy? They also continue to plant endless numbers of them on the Durham dales, which I have to look at every time I go walking. Anyway, that's a rant for another day.

You are of course quite right about public consultation. It is obviously wrong that a handful of self appointed arbiters of public taste should be able to spend public money on their own pet projects. The ridiculous monstrosity planned for the olympic site won't bother me personally because I never go to that part of London but I pity the inhabitants who will have to live with it, and all because some vainglorious designer aided and abetted by an equally vainglorious Mayor of London have dictated that it should be so. In a true democracy all such public projects should be approved by the public they are supposed to be erected for. Unfortunately we live in an age of charlatanry where it is possible to foist almost anything on to a dispirited and gullible public as the above-mentioned examples clearly indicate.

[Niamh]

There is kind of a skyline preservation order in Dublin City Centre so you dont see anything (other than the awful liberty hall building) going above our Georgian skyline. At first i thought it was very out of place on O'Connell St, but after what.. a decade of lookin at it it has become a part of the city. It not all that bad...

[MarkBastable]

The ridiculous monstrosity planned for the olympic site won't bother me personally because I never go to that part of London but I pity the inhabitants who will have to live with it.

Ah - just as I was wavering, I find a reason to like the Olympic doodle. If BB hates it, it must be pretty good.

[Emil Miller]

Ah - just as I was wavering, I find a reason to like the Olympic doodle. If BB hates it, it must be pretty good.

I like helping people to make up their mind.

[The Atheist]

Somebody in another thread mentioned a giant, tacky illuminated cross that had been erected in their city as a monument, and that got me thinking about works of public art.

Whereas every time I see or hear about one of them, I laugh at my hypothesis on humans and art being confirmed.

On the other hand, some pretty idiotic structures become icons throughout the world. I don't know what the recognition factor of Eiffel, Rio's christ and the Sphinx have, but if you manage to nail a good piece of public art, it can give you historical immortality, so there's a good carrot for them.

With public institutions, it seems to manifest itself in dreaming up the most outlandish structures in a vain effort to emulate the Pharoahs. But even then, once in a while you get the Sydney Opera House.

Now, however, we come to Britain's latest planned piece of public art, the ArcelorMittal Orbit:

Now, this I can admire.

A bloke who has made billions of dollars from steel gets a public organisation to pay for a structure in his name.

No doubt, all that steel will go back to one of his mills when it falls over/rusts.

A masterstroke of 21st century self-promotion.

[Nightshade]

Now I'm no art critic but I totally love The Angel of the North, and I was pretty fond of The B of the Bang:



before it was dismantled, .

Didn't they close the road because in the big gale in my first year of uni so 2007 parts were wiggled loose and they were afraid it would start impaling people? I never liked that thing! But if you are talking Manchester modern art there funky metal christmas tree thing in sackville gardens. Oh and the peace garden opposite Town hall is abit odd. As is that stute outside Central library.
Though really manchesters greatest monuments are its big victorian building and industrial warehouses and factories although I can never help but feel the victorians would be horrified at the fact there beautifyul old banks and buisssness building being turned into pubs and discos which always amuses me I used to like to pretend scences where various charcters from Gaskell, Dickens and such novels turned up and saw manchester how would they react?

But I do like the Angel of the north, then again I LOVE the sight of wind farms... I find them beautiful and wind mills. So maybe the shape of the angel reminds me of that someohow?

[Paulclem]

The Whittle Arch



The Whittle Arch



Frank Whittle - inventor of the jet engine from Coventry.

These are views of Millennium Place in the centre of Coventry. It has the Whittle Arch with a traditional picture of Frank Whittle standing underneath. I once asked one of my students what he thought the Whittle arch was supposed to be, and he suggested that it was the vapour trails of the jet engines Frank Whittle invented. I think it is a good example of the combination of traditional and modern.

I do like the Angel of the North. I think, beyond like and dislike, it has become an iconic image of the North-east.

[Annamariah]

Finland is such a small country that we don't have any huge monuments (even in Helsinki buildings are so low that a high tower/statue/thing would really pop out and look out of place), but some smaller ones of course.

If you were shown just one photograph of Helsinki, it would most likely have Helsinki Cathedral in it.


Tampere is known for Näsinneula tower that stands in the amusement park Särkänniemi.


As I said, we don't have anything large here, but at least the designer of the Gateway Arch in Missouri was Finnish American



But hey, there's one piece of art about half a kilometre from where I live and I kind of like it. It's a big gorilla made of old car tyres.


It might not be what Helsinki is known for, but it's the thing to see in my part of the town

[OrphanPip]

Oh God, I remembered one interesting one left over from the world fair.

Habitat 67





People actually live in these things.

[Niamh]

wow! thats one funky apartment block!

[dizzydoll]

Interesting thread. We dont have money for monuments, altho who's to say after this world cup, I hope not the money can best be used elsewhere -- but I am practical like that.

[Lokasenna]

Oh God, I remembered one interesting one left over from the world fair.

Habitat 67





People actually live in these things.

Good God, it's like lego on crack!

[Niamh]

thats definitely one way of putting it!

[Annamariah]

I actually like that habitat 67 Of course you need to be careful about where that kind of building is located, placed in a wrong area it would look just ridiculous and completely out of place.