today's manners

rafael moneo

It can be said that there is a common ground on which today's attitudes are based. While I'm aware of the risk in being reductive, I think it can be said that today's consensus recognizes :

• that there are no more shared values allowing a universal langhat there are no more shared values allowing a universal language.
• that architecture very rarely is used today to represent power because of its uncertain role in society.
• that today buildinr because of its uncertain role in society. that today building techniques are less restrictive than what they were and as a consequence it is difficult to develop an architectural theory based on the logic of construction.
• that the city has dissolved physically with the explosive growth of communication and transportation. Such a dispersion brings a new encounter with nature. Without confidence in an urban theory based on modern architecture, pencounter with nature. Without confidence in an urban theory based on modern architecture, pbased on modern architecture, people do not accept the utopian descriptions of the city. The connection between social justice, fear and appropriate urban design is not any more accepted. Society today seems to be more the result of considering each and every individual rather than an abstract entity with a collective character.

So, without shared values, without any clear expectations of architecture, with the easy application of sophisticated technical tools, and with the awareness that the old city is gone, architects no longer believe in an architecture founded on disciplinary principles inspired by other work in the visual arts. Architects do not believe that today's world is represented either by artistic trends or by a common figurative language which might give form to a universal culture. Without such help, eager to participate in the extremely active and energetic world of today, architects immerse themselves in the search for an architecture able to reestablish the links with the world around. Architects once again are urgently seeking the spirit of the time, the 'zeitgeist'. I believe that is where we are today in architecture.

Today there are no more theoretical approaches, no more French philosophers at the inception of the project and no more obscure quotes. Architecture wwants to find its inspiration in the currents of social and economic energy. This lack of confidence in an architecture more consonant with language and figurative experience brings us to an architecture that is more direct, more spontaneous, and more connected with daily life. A wave of pragmatism � more or less veiled � runs throughout today's architecture. Even though today's critics and theoreticians do not emphasize the importance building techniques have had in the past, contemporary architecture can be seen through the lens of the building industry. Today's trends, such as minimalism, can be understood as an aesthetic, based unconsciously on the new building techniques, that emphasizes the cladding of the building, the wrapping skin. This value given to the skin explains why and how architecture oscillates between an architecture restricted to the most elementary volumes and a fragmented composition of abstract pieces. In either case, there is a reluctance to admit form or iconography. But having said that, I should add that the new technology is today more about computers than the building industry. Computers are more and more present in architecture, mostly in the design process. Computers are indeed enlarging the universe of available forms by allowing the description and representation of whatever volume or surface, including forgotten geometries, practically lost to us because of their difficult representation. Moreover, computers help to handle the transformation of familiar forms bringing innovation and a broad range of operations. As a result, design itself becomes the most important moment in the production of architecture, its sophistication obscures the more mundane issues related to the site itself.

Without the earlier desire for a universal