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180 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2009
“Fundamentally, in a work of art we encounter ourselves, our own emotions, and our own being-in-the-world in an intensified manner. A genuine artistic and architectural experience is primarily a strengthened awareness of self. An art work or building made thousands of years ago, or produced in a culture completely unknown to us, touches us because we encounter the timeless present of being a human being through the work, and consequently rediscover the actuality of our own being-in-the-world. One of the paradoxes of art and architecture is that although all moving works are unique, they reflect what is general and shared in the human existential experience. In this way, art is tautological; it keeps repeating the same basic expression over and over again: how it feels to be a human being in this world.”
“‘Architecture immortalises and glorifies something. Hence, there can be no architecture, where there is nothing to glorify.’ Haven’t we lost the dimensions in our culture and personal lives that could be worthy of glorification? Haven’t we lost the dimension of ideals in our obsessively materialist world? Architectural thought arises from given conditions, but it always aspires to an ideal. Hence, the loss of the ideal dimension of life implies the disappearance of architecture.”
“The art form of architecture does not only provide a shelter for the body, it also redefines the contour of our consciousness, and it is a true externalisation of our mind. Architecture, as well as the entire world constructed by man with its cities, houses, tools and objects, has its mental ground and counterpart. As we construct our self-made world, we construct projections and metaphors of our own mindscapes. We dwell in the landscape and the landscape dwells in us. A landscape wounded by acts of man, the fragmentation of the cityscape, as well as insensitive buildings, are all external and materialised evidence of an alienation and shattering of the human inner space or Weltinnenraum, to use a beautiful notion of Rainer Maria Rilke.”