Reducio Ad Facadism
So don’t become some background noise,
A backdrop for the rich white boys
Who’ll tear you down, cause they don’t care
And we won’t recall when you were there,
You had your time, your Colonial power,
You’re now in your final hour,
In Sandstone, in sandstone…
All we see is Classical ga ga,
Classical goo goo
Classical ga ga
All we see is Classical ga ga,
Classical goo goo,
Sand-stone was beaux,
Bridge Street, someone still loves you!
In the manner of Queen, Radio Ga Ga.
It is perhaps Freddie Mercury’s vision of flying through the Metropolis of 1927 lamenting our love of ‘the new’ and disregard for ‘the old’, which sets the appropriate melancholic and cynical tone for this piece. The beloved city of Sydney is once again standing over a precipice and facing another architectural crisis, with the impending doom of selling three iconic sandstone structures along the all too historic Bridge Street – The Colonial Chief’s Secretary Building, the Department of Education and Training Building and the iconic Lands Department Building.
R.I.P. "Here lies Bridge Street, conceived by genius, descecrated by mediocrity." (Chan, 2015)
The same philistine government party which felt that Jorn Utzon’s architecture was hideously devoid of merit and ultimately led to the project’s downfall in 1966, has now re-reared its hatred of civilisation, art and cultural cultivation. It would appear that they have sided with Robert Venturi, champion of architecture’s teenage drug binge into the decorated shed, known as post-modernism (Schumacher, 2009). It seems the intention of current policy that privatisation of public architectural icons is essential for the government to make money, sorry, I mean preserve buildings, of course. What is clearly lacking however is a lack of understand that architecture is not a skin merely to be applied, keeping only the exterior in a ‘preservation’ process known as facadisms. In as early as 1985 in New York, critics realised that “to turn an older building into a fancy front door for a new tower is to respect neither the integrity of the new or that of the old…” (Goldberger, 1985, p. B3). Yet, thirty years on, it would appear the State Government of New South Wales has had little thought for innovative architecture and preservation, instead believing that destruction of the past is the best path toward a daring, brave new world.
Indeed as Elizabeth Farrelly, the eloquent architectural critic of the Sydney Morning Herald has declared, “The government’s determination to flog them betrays a deep disregard for the public spirit that built this state and this country.” (Farrelly, 2014.) These are buildings which embody the grace, elegance and sophistication of Sydney’s transition from prison colony into flourishing Commonwealth and should not be cast away into the dirty deceits of the business world. What we must recognise is that “the city is not a place of make-believe, a place of illusion where little buildings exist to be pinned like brooches, on the front of bigger structures…” (Goldberger, 1985, p. B3). By retaining merely a meaningless outer skin of these historically significant buildings and privatising them so that they maybe ‘preserved’ as well as eternally closed to the public realm is hardly the solution. Ignorance of alternatives for preservation for the sake of the public good, such as the transformation of these spaces into an extension of the already overcrowded Art Gallery of New South Wales, a desperately needed urban high-school for inner city inhabitants and the recycling of use for other government departments are all ideas which have been tabled (Farrelly, 2014; Gorman, 2015). Indeed it might even be possible to rehouse the city’s iconic technological museum, The Powerhouse Museum in this prime location, given that the government has already seen fit to sell-off that section of our nation’s worthless heritage (Powell, 2015). Sadly of course all these ideas for keeping the domain of the city public and open to all has been naturally declared unsuitable, as the government would not benefit financially.
Detail of the Colonial Secretary's Building, Lady Wisdom.
Does the government have any left? (Chan, 2015)
Preserved, but devoid of meaning. The GPO, an apparently successful PPP, though none of its original interiors remain... (Chan, 2015)
Whilst the architectural rhetoric of the Classical Orders is now lost to all except those learned few passionate about the past, they nevertheless represent a part of Sydney’s public history. Indeed these buildings, originally government structures, was envisioned by James Barnet as part of a wider public urban vision for the city, a place of the people, for the people, by the people. It is now up to the people to save the little which remains of Sydney’s architectural heritage. It is time to take a stand for our public spaces, because interest in the people is clearly not the government’s priority, in Le Corbusier’s words, ARCHITECTURE OR REVOLUTION.
References:
Farrelly, Elizabeth. “Sandstone Sell-Off Betrays Public Legacy,” The Sydney Morning Herald, 4 December 2014 from: http://www.smh.com.au/comment/sandstone-selloff-betrays-public-legacy-20141203-11z1g5.html
Goldberger, Paul. “’Facadism on the Rise: Preservation or Illusion?,” The New York Times, 15 July 1985, p. B1 and B3.
Gorman, James. “Sydney’s historic sandstone properties are up for sale despite the dismay from concerned residents,” The Daily Telegraph, 18 Februay 2014 from: http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/newslocal/city-east/sydneys-historic-sandstone-properties-are-up-for-sale-despite-the-dismay-from-concerned-residents/story-fngr8h22-1227222750437
Powell, Rose. “Powerhouse Museum site in Ultimo to be sold to developers,” The Sydney Morning Herald, 26 Feburary 2015 from: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/powerhouse-museum-site-in-ultimo-to-be-sold-to-developers-20150226-13pn5o.html
Schumacher, Thomas. “Facadism Reutrns, or the Advent of the Duck-Orated Shed,” Journal of Architectural Education, 15 June 2009, p. 127-138.