The Generic Sublime: Organizational Models for Global Architecture

Actar, Ciro Najle, Essay, Harvard GSD, High Density, Territory and mobility, The Generic Sublime

Architecture, Bigness, City Planning, Density, Emergent geographies, Essay, Global Awareness, Harvard University Graduate School of Design, Manhattan, New York, Planetary models, Planetary urbanizations, Skyscrapers, Sublime, Timeless Model, Urban conditions, Urban planning

Published in "The Generic Sublime. Organizational Models for Global Architecture", 2017 -- https://lccn.loc.gov/2016936850

Approximately 40 years ago, a set of wild images and poignant narratives borrowed from and simultaneously projected back onto the undeniably congested reality of Manhattan were condensed into a retroactive manifesto for contemporary architecture by the young architect Rem Koolhaas. With its “unconscious” theory of Manhattanism and its antiurban concepts of programmatic instability, auto-monumentality, vertical schism, the irresistible synthetic, and the technology of the fantastic, Delirious New York insolently challenged all remaining forms of public life and brought into question the alleged self-evidence of an urbanism of good intentions.