Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Black Prince















Estudio Entresitio's subsidized rental housing tower in the Vallecas Ensanche of Madrid is the subject of my latest article in Bauwelt: Wider den postmodernen Städtebau (Against Postmodern Urbanism), in Bauwelt 15.10, April 16, 2010, pages 26 - 31.

The tower was built by the Municipal Housing Authority of Madrid, and is probably the best of some 40 public housing projects completed or underway in the development.

It is an ambivalent monument, offering no illusions of utopia or mythic triumph, no narcotic thrill or calming anesthesia. Could it be proposing instead a new, post-Matrix realism, in which the precise, sensual facts of the architectural object attempt to shake us out of our media reveries and back into the present fallen world?

Photo © Roland Halbe, used with permission.
Two more pictures from the Bauwelt webpage.


Look here for a video of the building made by Diego Hurtado de Mendoza for the architects.

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