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Sacred Ground
10 Sep 2004 by Matthew Linderman
Think it’s tough to fight off design by committee when you’re building a web site? Try designing the most famous building in the world. PBS’ Frontline: Sacred Ground takes viewers behind the scenes of the battle over the Freedom Tower (the skyscraper to be built at Ground Zero). It’s mesmerizing to watch the brutal clash between architects David Childs (the “corporate” one) and Daniel Libeskind (the “artistic” one), especially if you’re a designer. Emotion, politics, money, architecture, design, and (lots of) ego — it’s all there.
Here’s architecture critic Paul Goldberger on why the Childs-Libeskind collaboration was so difficult:
Do you ask Matisse and Dali to collaborate on painting a picture together? No, because they’re such different kinds of artists that they could respect each other’s work, perhaps, but not try to combine it. And so it was here.
I think it was a mistake to believe that two good architects, because they’re both good architects with intelligent ideas and a commitment to Ground Zero, therefore can produce a single work that will be a coherent and good work. We had what I think is actually an unsuccessful collaboration, because the end result is not as good as either of their buildings were when they had their own separate ideas and visions for them.
And that’s the sad part in all this. The end result, shown after the jump, is a watered down compromise that doesn’t really seem to make anyone happy. Sacred Ground airs again in Chicago on Sep. 11, 2004 at 10pm.
The Sacred Ground site also gives some background on
the architectural philosophies of David Childs and Daniel Libeskind, with a slideshow of their best-known works.
The collaboration between David Childs and Daniel Libeskind was a difficult one, not only because both men are architectural superstars accustomed to being in charge of their own projects, but because they approach architecture from two very different perspectives. Where Childs speaks in terms of engineering and a building’s physical and structural connection to its surroundings, Libeskind likes to use analogies, relating his buildings to their environment through a complex web of symbolism. Architecture critic Paul Goldberger wrote in his book Up from Zero that Childs started work on the Freedom Tower, believing that “the design of a skyscraper begins with its structure, not a pictorial ideal”; while Daniel Libeskind’s design “began not with a structural idea but with a visual goal, to create an abstract form that would suggest the profile of the Statue of Liberty.”
6 comments so far (Post a Comment)
10 Sep 2004 | Nick Finck said...
Crap, it only shows at 2:30 am this Saturday in Seattle. Looks like a very good case study about how not to handle creative conflict.
10 Sep 2004 | hartmurmur said...
I watched that show. Talk about egos.
10 Sep 2004 | Darrel said...
Got to agree with hartmurmur. I watched the show, and I had thought that I'd be siding with the 'artiste' but then quickly realized that it's the same-old big-ego designers at it again.
Good design can only happen if there is 'real' compromise/teamwork...and you can't have real compromise/teamwork if your ego is bigger than the project.
11 Sep 2004 | Paperhead said...
Kind of off topic, apologies.
I guess some of you might have already seen this article. Bleh.
11 Sep 2004 | -b- said...
I watched it in HD and it was even more captivating.
13 Sep 2004 | Holy Cow said...
Daniel Libeskind is the David Seigel of architecture.
Where is Seigel these days anyway?
