This just leaked – February Ice Storm

For this Friday's send-off a sneak peak at a conference to honor Philip Johnson.

The symposium schedule hasn’t been released yet, but DOWC? just got this advanced copy of the program of discussions for the Phillip Johnson Symposium at Yale on February 15th. It’s due that such an influential Architect would get a grand remembrance at an Ivy league school, and this all-star cast makes the event one we want to attend. Curious thought, the selection of Yale. Sure, it’s dean is a post-modernist sympathizer. But Associate Dean Peggy Deamer wrote a trenchant send-off in the AN a few months ago. It’s worth the read; there are some well crafted barbs tucked in there (3rd one down).

The schedule is eyebrow-raising because of the closing comments. In the interests of stagecraft, some devilishly clever soul has put Peter Eisenman and Rem Koolhaas on the same stage to fight for the last word. We can only remember these fellows sharing the stage twice in the last few years. At the last Any Conference Rem got upstaged despite recently winning the Pritzker (well, 3 years before). Any[Whatever] has always been Peter’s show. But at the (The New School, 2004) Tall Buildings Symposium, it was Rem’s treating of Pete like a 6th grade bully that actually drew laughter from the audience. We’ll be wondering if this event can help them put there differences aside.

[Update:] The minute you make statements about when the last time these two shared a stage, someone corrects you. Today it was mentioned the two will/may have a public debate Jan 30th, 2005 at the Architectural Association.