I was looking at the upcoming Sotheby's auction of Bertoia works. They are selling a model screen, for the Lambert St. Louis airport, which is well worth the look.
http://browse.sothebys.com/?count=20&hp=&hpc=&i=1&omit=WDN&q=&st=Bertoia&u1=st&v=l
A further search for the above screen, lead me to this article. The Lambert screen is really cool, as are the bronze dividers. These are both big events this year. Sad to see these items go into hiding. I would love to see these screens in person.
I am shocked that these Bertoia works go missing! The article says the GM Tech Center screen is gone, the Lambert original gone, and now this.
I have a love/ hate opinion of "land marking" private property
In doing so, the government effectively wrests control of the land-marked property from its owner.
So, while I'm a fan of art & architecture (and Harry Bertoia in particular), I'm an even bigger fan of civil rights-- such as property rights.
I can't exactly side with the article's writer, who bemoans the fact that the land marking regulations weren't quite strict enough, effectively allowing the owner to remove the enormous sculpture screen.
Go ahead, call me a philistine.
William That's a good point...
William
That's a good point you make. I pretty much agree with you, and yet we arts types always cringe when some new developer shows up with a supposed better idea. I think much of this country can only handle looking at something new. Just because its shiny, its better. When the housing bubble was on, I observed this first hand in the new side of Naperville Illinois (way out Chicago suburbs). I found a culture of all new everything, from cars, houses, stores, churches, businesses and everything that met the eye. These people had nothing old in sight.
At least the Design Addict types, support and ask for the works to be preserved in some fashion. Last night I went to the Bertoia website, and was thrilled to see all the content, links to preserved sculpture, art galleries that hold his works, and his history of installations. so it really cheered me to see the Bertoia site, and I found some great destinations to visit.
http://harrybertoia.org/public-works.html
Results are in... 80K for...
Results are in... 80K for the model screen.
218K for the bronze screen.
http://www.sothebys.com/app/live/lot/LotResultsDetailList.jsp?event_id=3...
Thanks for posting this
This raised some really important issues about heritage listing and the way we as a society value art and design. I do believe in protecting our design history in cases where something is deemed an important example. Top mid-century design deserves to be preserved for future generations to enjoy as we do today. There are plenty of ugly buildings that can be torn down instead, because let's face it, good architecture is now often rare in our price driven cities.
I live in Melbourne, Australia and I am appalled by the ugliness of contemporary homes and office buildings. It's like modernism never happened here. Be interested to know others opinions on their cities.
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