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In 1909, when he was commissioned to build First Church of Christ, Scientist, Berkeley, Bernard Maybeck recalled the Romanesque churches he had seen in France that were built at the turn of the first millennium. Assuming his legacy survives a thousand years beyond the commission of First Church, Berkeley, will anyone recall Maybeck’s work in the year 3000 A.D.? Few of the essayists read any of the other contributions before submitting their own, yet a number of themes recur. Almost unanimously, the writers express their commitment to and concern for the preservation of the entire body of Maybeck’s work. In concert with that concern, they enumerate various and growing threats to the buildings, including, ironically, First Church’s location in the East Bay, a beautiful, popular, and populous region of the San Francisco Bay Area. In the spirit of the participants in the Arts and Crafts Movement at the end of the last century who decried the dehumanizing aspects of the growing industrial world, many of the contributors contrast the humane quality of Maybeck’s buildings to the potentially deleterious effects on architecture and society of unbridled reliance on computerization. In the end, most of the essayists find that their own hopes for the future of Maybeck’s buildings are founded on their knowledge of Maybeck’s own insights into the nature of architecture and of humanity. LINKS TO SCHOLARS’ ESSAYS: Paul Goldberger, Building Poetry: Part I Timothy Culvahouse, Building Poetry: Part II Alan Temko, Not Wright But Not Wrong: Part I Gray Brechin, Not Wright But Not Wrong: Part II Jeffrey Limerick, A Challenging Future: Part I Kenneth Cardwell, A Challenging Future: Part II Ross Selmeier, Beyond Calculation Charles Duncan, A Vision For The Ages: Part I William Marquand, A Vision For The Ages: Part II Jeanne Colette Collester, And What Of Principia? Part I Robert Craig, And What Of Principia? Part II Jay Turnbull, In Conclusion: Part I |
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