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Great buildings that move the spirit have always been rare. In every case they are unique, poetic, products of the heart.

Arthur Erickson

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Arthur Erickson
Age: 84 †
Born: 1924
Born: June 14
Died: 2009
Died: May 20
Architect
University Teacher
Vancouver
British Columbia
Arthur Charles Erickson
Arthur C. Erickson
Every
Products
Always
Move
Badass
Cases
Buildings
Building
Poetic
Moving
Rare
Spirit
Architecture
Great
Case
Heart
Unique

More quotes by Arthur Erickson

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Does an architecture to assuage the spirit have a place in all this? Unfortunately we are no longer the interpreters of our culture's myths but the followers of that dubious client, the developer, who has little patience with the art of architecture, the fine detail and obscure promise, which can upset his financial activity.
Arthur Erickson
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The artist likes to seem totally responsible for his work. Often he begins to explain it, to make it appear as if it were a reasonable process.
Arthur Erickson
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There is a single thread of attitude, a single direction of flow, that joins our present time to it's early burgeoning in Mediterranean civilization...
Arthur Erickson
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With production alone as the goal, industry in North America was dominated by the assembly line, standardization for mass consumption.
Arthur Erickson
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No wonder the film industry started in the desert in California where, like all desert dwellers, they dream their buildings, rather than design them.
Arthur Erickson
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God's designs may be frequent justification for our actions, but it is we, the self-made men, who take the credit.
Arthur Erickson
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Rationalism is the enemy of art, though necessary as a basis for architecture.
Arthur Erickson
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We regard those other cultures such as that of India, where many people live and believe and behave much as they did 1000 or 2000 years ago - as undeveloped.
Arthur Erickson
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Life is rich, always changing, always challenging, and we architects have the task of transmitting into wood, concrete, glass and steel, of transforming human aspirations into habitable and meaningful space.
Arthur Erickson
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We are yet to have a conscience at all about the exploitation of human cultures.
Arthur Erickson
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Profit and bottom line, the contemporary mantra, eliminates the very source of architectural expression.
Arthur Erickson
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I plead for conservation of human culture, which is much more fragile than nature herself. We needn't destroy other cultures with the force of our own.
Arthur Erickson
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Our settlement of land is without regard to the best use of land.
Arthur Erickson
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Whenever we witness art in a building, we are aware of an energy contained by it.
Arthur Erickson
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We have today a fairly thorough knowledge of the early Greco-Roman period because our motivations are the same.
Arthur Erickson
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The innovative spirit was America's strongest attribute, transforming everything into a brave new world, but there lingered an insecurity about the arts.
Arthur Erickson
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We can appreciate but not really understand the medieval town. We cannot comprehend its compactness, the contiguity of all its buildings as a single uninterrupted whole.
Arthur Erickson
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We are guilty for sending teams into foreign countries to advise them how to be like us.
Arthur Erickson
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The obsession with performance left no room for the development of the intuitive or spiritual impact of space and form other than the aesthetic of the machine itself.
Arthur Erickson
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We are stymied by regulations, limited choice and the threat of litigation. Neither consultants nor industry itself provide research which takes architecture forward.
Arthur Erickson