| Title |
Communication in the City: Louis Kahn's Urban Projects in the 1960s |
| Authors |
Seo Jeong-Il ; Oh Kwang-Suek ; Kim Kwang-Hyun |
| Keywords |
Urban Space ; Communication ; Representation ; Louis Kahn ; Monumentality |
| Abstract |
This paper examines Louis Kahn's late urbanistic thoughts and practices by thematizing the issue of communicative aspects of the late modernist urban space. Kahn's commercial projects such as in Kansas City and Baltimore are discussed considering on their possible effects on city form and urban communities. Kahn's urban approach, often neglected, was based on his own ideas on the primary function and expression of the city: the 'availability' of the city and the representational characteristics based on the cultural agreement. Accommodating the thrust of urban development, Kahn's aimed to integrate the urban artifacts into the city, through the following principles: the architectural representation is not be confined in the pure aesthetic effects of buildings but was appropriated with the dimension of social tastes; the urban artifacts establish the identities of urban communities with cultural plurality; the ornamentality of individual buildings to the city is restored; new availability to existing urban situation is consciously projected. Reconsidering these communicative possibility, a different view to the issue of monumentality of modern urbanism can be gained. |