Critical preoccupations
Architect and urban theorist Rem Koolhaas is doing a lot of critical thinking these days, about architects in popular culture, the West’s irrational moroseness, the transformation of Swiss landscape, and global warming. Koolhaas, who recently told The Guardian newspaper he’s his own “criticism machine” when it comes to analyzing his own work, dove head-on last night into a host of thorny issues – including criticism. “Everything we do and say is critical,” Koolhaas said. “But architecture itself can’t be critical of anything.” Koolhaas, a professor in practice of architecture and urban design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD), shared his thoughts on those and other subjects before an overflow crowd at Piper Auditorium with a presentation titled “Current Preoccupations.” Koolhaas, a Pritzker Prize-winning architect, featured a slide-show sampling of insights into the intertwined spheres of architecture, environment, history, and politics during his talk at the GSD. The Pritzker Prize-winning architect’s wide-ranging program riffed...