Architecture Words 7: Modernity Unbound ­ Detlef Mertins

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Architecture Words 7

DETLEF MERTINS MODERNITY UNBOUND: Other Histories of Architectural Modernity

MODERNITY UNBOUND PREFACE

‘Is glass still glass?’, asks the opening line of ‘Glass Architecture’, the first of nine splendid essays by Detlef Mertins collected together here. This inquisitive opening is anything but random, serving up as it does a carefully calibrated, iterative awareness of a repeated obsession of twentiethcentury architecture. The near-universal architectural fascination with the properties of this building material is such that glass has of course long expressed more than just the appearances of the world reflected in its polished surface – a point Mertins succinctly confirms in his swift response to his own opening interrogative: ‘… it can be said that glass is still glass because it never was just glass’. The writings of Detlef Mertins challenge through reappropriation any number of the well-worn narratives handed down to us by generations of modern architects and their apologists – not for the purposes of simply opposing or reversing long-held views through other equally univocal historical monologues, but rather as a way of opening up established ideas to unexpected and untested consequences. Whereas the discourses of modern architecture have long privileged an operative concept of transparency, Mertins’ language and historical method can be said

Detlef Mertins

Architectural Association London


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