5.09.2010




Architecture and war
are not incompatible.



Architecture is war.
War is architecture.



I am at war with my time, with history,
with all authority that resides in
fixed and frightened forms.



I am one of millions
who do not fit in,



who have no home,
no family, no doctrine,
no firm place to call my own,
no known beginning or end,



no "sacred and
primordial site."



I declare war on all icons and finalities,
on all histories that would chain me
with my own falseness,
my own pitiful fears.



I know only moments,
and lifetimes that are as moments,
and forms that appear with infinite strength,
then "melt into air."



I am an architect,
a constructor of worlds,
a sensualist who worships the flesh,
the melody, a silhouette against
the darkening sky.



I cannot know your name.
Nor you can know mine.



Tomorrow, we begin together
the construction of a city.






excerpt from:
war and architecture 2002
lebbeus woods





i still remember
the lecture he gave
at the guggenheim
5 years or so ago.




5 comments:

carl said...

this great poetic piece is all over you when you study architecture.. but then practicing the job , for instance working to redesign an old couples home or low budget projects for young families this attitude felt a bit too pompous and theatrical and at the same time comic.
never felt eames,mies or any one even woods "at war" with anyone - they were and are civil persons for me, the counterconcept to war.

Cerré said...

well said.


-2 or 3

Leslie said...

beautiful words -- loved it

Unknown said...

Fantasy and Innovation are VITAL to all creative disciplines. He is a Genius thinker. At war with intelligent mediocre talent and conformist practices. Bravo again Lee.

Anonymous said...

pompous, alcoholic, misogynist.
but that was 10 years ago. perhaps he's changed.