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The Forum > Article Comments > Harry Seidler - a man who lived by real values > Comments

Harry Seidler - a man who lived by real values : Comments

By Natasha Cica, published 11/4/2006

Harry Seidler had an untiring belief in the importance of the culture that informed his work, the causes he championed and his crusades against false values.

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Natasha, what part of our culture informed Mr Seidler when he designed that horrible mess known as Blues Point Tower? It resembles an erect male penis so is Harry saying that Sydney is a modern day Sodom or Gomorrah? Did Harry create the Tower as an architectural aridity; a box-like high-rise building that serves to stifle the human spirit?
Posted by Sage, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 11:00:03 AM
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The man should be applauded for his achievements, but at the end of the day he was only an architect. What about the guy who actually developed, envisioned the project and employed him to build it? that is where the real kudos should go.
Posted by Realist, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 1:58:22 PM
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An erect MALE penis, Sage? As opposed to all those female penises? But you'll get no argument from me on Blues Point Tower's aesthetic appeal.

On Seidler's death, I wondered if he would complain to the heavenly courts about the noise emanating from the choir of all the angels and saints, which pre-dated his residence much as Luna Park did on earth.

I'm no more a fan of amusement parks than Seidler was, but the uber-NIMBY was well aware the place existed before he graced it with his proximity. What right did he think he had to whinge about the sounds of plebs at play?
Posted by anomie, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 4:19:53 PM
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Maybe it is a sign:
Nephilim cryptic message. Sodom and Gomorrah: ha
And the end of day? By the Looters perhaps, not the Gods?
sorry I could not resist.
Posted by All-, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 5:01:34 PM
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Mordernism is a blight upon the once fair city of Sydney, now a stack of rusting eye-sores completely detached from our architectural tradition. It speaks of a drap internationalism which renders every single city exactly like the next.

It's no suprise that the most loved cities in the world preserve a tradition of architecture which develops step by step to give character and charm to the place, reaffirming the values of that society in the aestetics and design of the ages, into the ages. The modernist experiment, orginally brought on out of a cultural cringe, should end now, and permit our living architectural history to breathe anew.
Posted by DFXK, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 8:02:43 PM
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While admiring some of Seidler's architecture, and appreciating his single-minded adherence to his own values, I don't believe he is a figure of inspiration for us. He was the Jeff Kennett of Australian architecture, openly contemptuous of anyone who disagreed with him, incapable of accommodating an alternative viewpoint. In that way he is the perfect pin-up boy for the Modernist programme, the ruthless sweeping away of the past to be replaced by a rationalist nirvana.

The failure of Modernist architecture is that it was unable to produce housing that the average punter wanted to live in, at a price they could afford. Perhaps the closest it came was the work of Ancher, Mortlock, Murray and Woolley for Pettit & Sevitt. But these houses were only a tiny proportion of the housing stock and their preservation is becoming increasingly problematic.

Since then architecture has moved on, environmental controls will reshape Australian architecture in a way that Modernism never did. The undoubted ugliness of some Australian suburbs will not be cured by Modernism, it is a dead end. The McMansion is popular because it is cheap and it provides the space for all those shiny consumer goods. I don't want to live in one, but I'll leave it for the taste police to arrest people for "false values".

Harry Seidler was a shameless self-publicist, an elitist, a successful businessman, who worked for big corporations or government departments. I find it hilarious that such a man could see himself as a rebel "on the barricades", while going to the opera or hobnobbing with the rich and powerful. The smell of hipocrisy is almost overwhelming.
Posted by Johnj, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 11:25:09 PM
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Where does this stuff come from?

Everybody I know who met the man waxes lyrical about his arrogance, his snobbery and his misanthropy. This is therefore either a clumsy attempt at hagiographic revisionism, or a finely tuned satire on the life of one of those people you are sincerely glad you never met.

If it was "culture that informed his work" then Blues Point Tower is one of the most unkind judgements on Australian culture that has ever been made. One can only assume that if his original vision - of a series of these towers "marching up Blues Point Road" - is a real reflection of how he viewed Australia and Australians, this was a fundamentally contemptuous act.

North Sydney residents are well aware of his activism against the re-opened Luna Park. He shamelessly used the influence of his reputation and his political contacts to force through a minority view. As a previous poster has noted, he was fully aware that Luna Park was outside his bedroom window when he bought the place, so it was not even NIMBYism, just pure vindictiveness. Whatever one thinks about amusement parks, this one had a tradition and a presence that attracted far-flung Sydneysiders (the ones that Seidler-the-snob despised for their "very barren life") to the centre of their city.

The irony of course is that largely thanks to Seidler's activism, Luna Park has no future except as a collection of hotels and office blocks, that will magically appear as soon as Multiplex has "straightened out" a few final wrinkles with the government.

Great legacy, Harry. Thanks for everything.
Posted by Pericles, Wednesday, 12 April 2006 10:10:41 AM
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"Nephilim
Genesis 6:4 states 'The Nephilim were on the earth in those days --and also afterwards-- when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them."
Sounds much more interesting than your, Life of Austrian-born, Jewish Australian architect Harry Seidler. I do like "Bach's music," I have not a clue about recent Sydney architecture, and this European modernism that you rave about. I am from the Queensland Country, and Only twice saw Sydney, once on way to Victoria, and once on return, and the tallest structure was the AMP Building.

Natasha Cica, could you not write of something we could all understand, and not some Excentric old has been. I live in Kangaroo country where they come up to my fence rip my sweet-pea & munch, or destroy. This horrid eye-sore, or great beauty of buildings etc.Will still be around when our dust is blowing up the noses of future generations, who'll wonder, what was he thinking of when he designed these monstrosities.
Posted by ELIDA, Wednesday, 12 April 2006 11:02:51 AM
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ah right, of course nothing should ever be published in this country that doesnt apply to inland queensland, and of course we shouldnt talk about modern buildings, good or bad, because the kangaroos are eating your peas.

dfxk, modernism as a 'cultural cringe' is a slight understatement, rather than a cringe, its proponents concieved of the modern experiment as a deliberate and permenant fracture of the present from the past, the 'end of history' 70 yrs before fukayama, a new ordering of reality based on modern science, medicine, production, politics and the greatest thrill of all, the freedom and exhilaration of modern construction, steel and concrete.

if anything characterises cringe, its postmodern architectures insipid and intelectualy lazy attemps to reverse modernities fracture by the application of stylistic decorations, faux classicism, doric columns made from foam glued to the junkspace of the mall and the office tower.

on siedler's work, i would agree that a number of his towers are of dubious quality, some however are excelent, and he remains one of the few architects to adequaetly tackle the austrailan climate and sun exposure in a tower building, unlike the vast majority of office towers.

on a global scale, his work really doesnt compare to oscar neimyer's work in brasil.

http://www.brasemb.or.jp/cultural/images/niemeyerg_06.jpg

http://www.brasemb.or.jp/cultural/images/niemeyerg_10.jpg

and the great cathedral of brasillia

http://www.brasemb.or.jp/cultural/images/niemeyerg_07.jpg
Posted by its not easy being, Wednesday, 12 April 2006 12:35:02 PM
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Harry Seidler, like most architects, needed a reality check. The position of the goods lift in the Australia Square building is a disgrace. Critical building functions like building services are typically added onto architects grandiose plans like they are un necessary afterthoughts that detract from the vision splendid of their pretty buildings.

I went to see "Orpheous in the Underworld" at the Sydney Opera House and I could not believe how tiny the stage was. Once again, we allowed some fool of an architect to design an overpriced, fancy building that is unable to perform the basic function it was designed for.

Architects don't do much except draw pretty buildings. They leave it to the engineers and the long suffering sub contractors to make their loopy designs work.
Posted by redneck, Thursday, 13 April 2006 5:13:02 AM
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So many petty posts. Australia is richer for his coming here.

Where are the architects to replace him? All around.

Where are the clients?
Posted by adin, Friday, 30 June 2006 1:50:06 PM
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and one more petty post…….

“An erect MALE penis, Sage? As opposed to all those female penises?” (Anomie 11 April)

Aaaaaahh haaa hah ahahahaahah.

The things you come across late at night while rummaging through the backwaters of the OLO forum!
Posted by Ludwig, Sunday, 30 July 2006 11:20:15 PM
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