The Long View

摘要

The modern architect in his effort to produce architecture possessed of original style is confronted with difficulties of a kind altogether unknown to his predecessor who practised prior to a period commencing about 50 years ago. Then but few enjoyed a range of vision acquired by travel and experience sufficiently wide to encumber them with the responsibility of choice. The great majority of architects and designers saw only the works of their contemporaries, and of those who had gone before them which existed in their immediate vicinity. The responsibility of selection remained with the travelled few, the Inigo Joneses, the Wrens, the Cockerells, and it was upon these men and the use they made of their scholarly knowledge that the advancement of the art depended. Nowadays, the science of photography, the free publication of literature, the facilities afforded for travel, and the easy access to measured drawings of almost every important building in the world are acquisitions which, although bringing with them their attendant responsibility of choice, have placed each one of us in a position enjoyed only by the gifted and favoured few.