top of page
.png){kind=small}
"I'm often called an old-fashioned modernist. But the modernists had the absurd idea that architecture could heal the world. That's impossible. And today nobody expects architects to have these grand visions any more."
Standard
Customized
Exlpore more Architecture quotes
"It seems a fantastic paradox, but it is nevertheless a most important truth, that no architecture can be truly noble which is not imperfect."
"Poetry is not only dream and vision; it is the skeleton architecture of our lives. It lays the foundations for a future of change, a bridge across our fears of what has never been before."
"I was planning to go into architecture. But when I arrived, architecture was filled up. Acting was right next to it, so I signed up for acting instead."
"Modern architecture predominately specializes in designing what are essentially dimly lit caves."
"Rather than wait to see what the day or future holds, why not design and plan the future you want to experience?"
"Organic architecture seeks superior sense of use and a finer sense of comfort, expressed in organic simplicity."
"All architecture is great architecture after sunset; perhaps architecture is really a nocturnal art, like the art of fireworks."
"In architecture the pride of man his triumph over gravitation his will to power assume a visible form. Architecture is a sort of oratory of power by means of forms."
"The bungalow had more to do with how Americans live today than any other building that has gone remotely by the name of architecture in our history."
Explore more quotes by Thom Mayne
"I've learned that in order to achieve what I wanted, it made more sense to negotiate than to defend the autonomy of my work by pounding my fist on the table."
"Architecture is involved with the world, but at the same time it has a certain autonomy. This autonomy cannot be explained in terms of traditional logic because the most interesting parts of the work are non-verbal. They operate within the terms of the work, like any art."
"It's too simplistic to advance the notion of the autonomy of art as a reason for turning away from the public. You can have autonomy and simultaneously have connections with the social and political world."
"So I am totally aware that when I defend the autonomy of art I'm going counter to my own development. It's more an instinctive reaction, meant to protect the private aspect of the work, the part I am most interested in and which nowadays is at risk in our culture."
"So at a time in which the media give the public everything it wants and desires, maybe art should adopt a much more aggressive attitude towards the public. I myself am very much inclined to take this position."
"The huge problem in our society is the enormous ignorance of the ideas that underlie modern art."
"The aesthetic of architecture has to be rooted in a broader idea about human activities like walking, relaxing and communicating. Architecture thinks about how these activities can be given added value."
"Scientific reality is the modern human condition, and you can see that in the symbolic nature of my work."
bottom of page