TRADITION -- MODERNITY -MODERNISM: some necessary explanations

by LON KRIER
Statement prepared for the Skidmore, Owings & Merrill Architectural Institute. Published in Architectural Design, volume 57 (1987), January/February pages 38-43. Revised portions included in: "Eisenman versus Krier", Architectural Design, volume 59 (1989), September/October pages 7-18.

At present, lack of clarity in vocabulary, a confusion of terms, and the widespread use of strictly meaningless professional jargon stand in the way of clear architectural and environmental thinking. To help clarify that muddle is one of my goals. The terminology used here is in itself sometimes an object of disagreements, for which reason I feel obliged to explain the main notions and concepts.

PART A. I use the terms Traditional and Tradition in contradistinction to Modernist and Modernism; not in contradistinction to Modernity. At present, artists, historians, critics and the public endemically confuse the terms modern and modernist. This is absolutely central. Modern merely indicates time and period, whereas modernist has unequivocal ideological connotations. When historians write of "The Modern Movement" they clearly mean "The Modernist Movements" as opposed to "Traditional Movements". Traditional and modern; tradition and modernity, are therefore not contradictory notions. One can be a modern person of tradition. Traditional (artisan) cultures are concerned with the production of OBJECTS for longterm USE. Modernist (industrial) cultures by contrast are concerned with the production of OBJECTS for short-term CONSUMPTION. These produce very different worlds for us to inherit or to live in.

In such antagonistic or complementary philosophies, INVENTION, INNOVATION, and DISCOVERY have a different status and meaning. There is, of course, the claim that in a traditional culture you can't have innovation. But this statement is simply not true; it's mere slander. In traditional cultures, INVENTION, INNOVATION, and DISCOVERY are a means to improve handed-down and time-honored systems of thinking, planning, building, representation, communication, etc. ... in the Arts, philosophy, town-building, language, sciences, industries, agriculture, etc. They are a means to an end, namely to conceive, realize and maintain a solid, lasting, comfortable and beautiful human world. That is the goal. Fundamental aesthetic and ethical principles are considered to be of universal value, transcending time and space, climates and civilizations. This is where the controversy lies. In traditional cultures, industrial rationale and methods are in a subservient role. They are subordinate to larger themes, to larger concerns. In modernist cultures, INVENTION, INNOVATION, and DISCOVERY are ends in themselves. It is claimed that constantly changing socio-economic and political conditions necessarily revolutionize all concepts. It is further claimed that there are no universal ethical and aesthetic categories, and hence traditional values are but accumulations of life-impending and regressive straight jackets. In modernist cultures industrial rationale and methods tend towards dominating all aspects of life; education, culture, recreation, all polity and politic.

PART B. Modernist urban planning essentially works through fragmenting any part of a territory (city and country) into separate monofunctional zones. This leads to the effective and habitual mobilization of society in its entirety (all classes, all species, all ages) in order to perform basic life functions. As a result, CIRCULATION of people, hardware and software become the main industrial activity. Artificial ARTERIES and MEANS of circulation become the necessary extensions of the human body and mind. Functional ZONING guarantees the maximum and obligatory consumption of units of hardware and software in the accomplishment of all social activities. Functional zoning is the principal cause for our wastage of TIME, ENERGY and LAND. It is by nature ANTIECOLOGICAL. Traditional urban planning realizes mankind's basic right to reach all habitual urban functions on foot. While making the best use of artificial means of circulation and communication, the good city provides the totality of urban functions within a

comfortable and pleasant walking distance. Like all mature organisms in nature, it cannot grow by extension in width or height, it can only grow though multiplication. It is a complete and finite urban community, a member of a larger family of independent urban quarters, of cities within the city, of cities within the country. The traditional city is economical in the use of TIME, ENERGY and LAND. It is by nature ECOLOGICAL.

PART C. The symbolic poverty of current architecture and townscape is a direct result and expression of functional monotony as legislated by functional ZONING practices. The principal modern building types and planning models such as the skyscraper, the groundscraper, the Central Business District, the commercial strip, the office park, the residential suburb, etc. are invariably horizontal or vertical overconcentrations of single uses in one urban zone, in one building program or under one roof. Uniformity of use (functional monotony) faces even the best designers with a limited choice between either the expression of true uniformity, or that of fake variety. Blandness or Kitsch, artistic cruelty or caricature are the almost inevitable result. The symbolic richness of traditional architecture and the city is based on the proximity and dialogue of the greatest possible variety of private and public uses, and hence on the expression of true variety as evidenced in the meaningful and truthful articulation of public spaces, urban fabric, and skyline.