Jan van Eyck, Arnolfini Portrait, 1434 ‘The painting is a small full-length double portrait, which is believed to represent the Italian merchant Giovanni di Nicolao Arnolfini and his wife, presumably in their home in the Flemish city of Bruges. It is considered one of the most original and complex paintings in Western art history. The illusionism of the painting was remarkable for its time, in part for the rendering of detail, but particularly for the use of light to evoke space in an interior, for “its utterly convincing depiction of a room, as well of the people who inhabit it”. Whatever meaning is given to the scene and its details, and there has been much debate on this, according to Craig Harbison the painting “is the only fifteenth-century Northern panel to survive in which the artist’s contemporaries are shown engaged in some sort of action in a contemporary interior. It is indeed tempting to call this the first genre painting - a painting of everyday life - of modern times”.’

Jan van Eyck, Arnolfini Portrait, 1434

‘The painting is a small full-length double portrait, which is believed to represent the Italian merchant Giovanni di Nicolao Arnolfini and his wife, presumably in their home in the Flemish city of Bruges. It is considered one of the most original and complex paintings in Western art history. The illusionism of the painting was remarkable for its time, in part for the rendering of detail, but particularly for the use of light to evoke space in an interior, for “its utterly convincing depiction of a room, as well of the people who inhabit it”. Whatever meaning is given to the scene and its details, and there has been much debate on this, according to Craig Harbison the painting “is the only fifteenth-century Northern panel to survive in which the artist’s contemporaries are shown engaged in some sort of action in a contemporary interior. It is indeed tempting to call this the first genre painting - a painting of everyday life - of modern times”.’

Map of the Cleomenean War, 229-2 BCE

Map of the Cleomenean War, 229-2 BCE

Martha Schwartz, Rio Shopping Center, Atlanta, GA, 1989 “A squadron of gilded frogs worships a geodesic globe in the courtyard of a specialty shopping center in midtown Atlanta. With architecture designed by Miami–based Arquitectonica International, Inc., Rio Shopping Center boldly asserts itself among the chaos of a cluttered intersection in an area ripe for revitalization. The globe serves as a beacon for the retail center whose first level of shops opens onto a courtyard ten feet below the street. Overlapping squares of lawn, paving, stones, and architecture form the basis of the design. The squares are layered with other geometric pieces — lines, circles, spheres, cubes. These elements meet in a mysterious black pool which is striated by lines of fiber optics that glow at night. A floating path, reflected above by an architectural bridge, connects one side of the shopping area to the other. The frogs are set in a grid at the base of the 40 foot high globe which is located on a slope connecting the road to the courtyard. Alternating stripes of riprap and grass cover the slope. The grid of frogs continues down the slope and through the pool, all facing the giant sphere as if paying homage. The globe, which also provides support for vines, houses a mist fountain. A square plaza beyond this focal point forms a meeting place which includes a circular bar, a bamboo grove that punctures the roof, and a video installation by artist Darra Birnbaum.”

Martha Schwartz, Rio Shopping Center, Atlanta, GA, 1989

“A squadron of gilded frogs worships a geodesic globe in the courtyard of a specialty shopping center in midtown Atlanta. With architecture designed by Miami–based Arquitectonica International, Inc., Rio Shopping Center boldly asserts itself among the chaos of a cluttered intersection in an area ripe for revitalization. The globe serves as a beacon for the retail center whose first level of shops opens onto a courtyard ten feet below the street. Overlapping squares of lawn, paving, stones, and architecture form the basis of the design. The squares are layered with other geometric pieces — lines, circles, spheres, cubes. These elements meet in a mysterious black pool which is striated by lines of fiber optics that glow at night. A floating path, reflected above by an architectural bridge, connects one side of the shopping area to the other. The frogs are set in a grid at the base of the 40 foot high globe which is located on a slope connecting the road to the courtyard. Alternating stripes of riprap and grass cover the slope. The grid of frogs continues down the slope and through the pool, all facing the giant sphere as if paying homage. The globe, which also provides support for vines, houses a mist fountain. A square plaza beyond this focal point forms a meeting place which includes a circular bar, a bamboo grove that punctures the roof, and a video installation by artist Darra Birnbaum.”

Hannibal Crossing the Alps, 218 BC

Aldo Rossi, San Cataldo Cemetery, Modena, Italy, 1971-6

Marguerite Nixon and John L. Fer, “I’m Scared of Post-War Houses,” House Beautiful Magazine, 1946

Marguerite Nixon and John L. Fer, “I’m Scared of Post-War Houses,” House Beautiful Magazine, 1946

"In the fifteenth century everything changed. Human thought discovered a means of perpetuation, not only more durable and more resisting than architecture, but also simpler and easier. Architecture was dethroned. To the stone letters of Orpheus succeeded the leaden letters of Gutenberg. “The book will destroy the building."
— Victor Hugo, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, 1831 (gbooks)
Carrère and Hastings, Rose Reading Room of the Public Library, New York City, NY,  1897–1911 (via archidose) Where Rem Koolhaas wrote Delirious New York in 1978.

Carrère and Hastings, Rose Reading Room of the Public Library, New York City, NY,  1897–1911 (via archidose)

Where Rem Koolhaas wrote Delirious New York in 1978.

Aerial overlooking the Ruins of the Sutro Baths, San Francisco, CA, 2011

Aerial overlooking the Ruins of the Sutro Baths, San Francisco, CA, 2011

King Champ Gillette, Metropolis, 1894 (via pedshed)

King Champ Gillette, Metropolis, 1894 (via pedshed)

Eduard Veith, Fountain of Youth, c. 1900 (via natgeo)

Eduard Veith, Fountain of Youth, c. 1900 (via natgeo)

"The richest ideas are left in the dustbin of history; the more discredited on the platform of good taste, the more innovative on the platform of content."
— Rem Koolhaas, c. 1991
"I’m horrified by the fatality that leads each generation to contradict the preceding one."
— Rem Koolhaas, c. 1990
"‘The only historian capable of fanning the spark of hope in the past is the one who is firmly convinced that even the dead will not be safe from the enemy if he is victorious.’"
— Walter Benjamin, c. 1940 (via marxandsparks)

(Source: e-schatology)

"A civilization is a heritage of beliefs, customs, and knowledge slowly accumulated in the course of centuries, elements difficult at times to justify by logic, but justifying themselves as paths when they lead somewhere, since they open up for man his inner distance."
— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, c. 1940
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