Choose one work of architecture from your town, city, or state.

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Choose one work of architecture from your town, city, or state. Please include an image and as much identifying information that you can find (architect, date, materials, title, location). What intrigues you about this work? As you know, many structures are built for one reason but serve multiple functions. There was a day and time when churches were not only a place of worship but also a place of education, a location to celebrate local arts, and a public forum for politics and social engagement. As noted in the article “Why Architecture is Important,” “architecture must always reflect the age and cultural context that produced it” (para. 2). When thinking about the work you choose, how does it reflect the age and cultural context that produced it then and that uses it now? Does it function the same now and then? Mortice goes on to say that “When you learn about ancient cultures, the first thing people point to is their architecture, because it’s so expressive of who they were. The example they used was ancient Egypt. Take a look at the pyramids and the Sphinx, and you’ll get a good idea of how they regarded their rulers, their religion, and the qualities of the land that they drew their building materials from. The towering feats of delicate, narrative stone masonry that made up Gothic architecture, emerging in Europe in the Middle Ages, was a perfect counterpoint to its age of reverence verging on fear of divinity, during a period of grim instability. The Industrial Revolution, which re-organized the world along rational standards of machine production, inevitably birthed Modernism, which used mass-produced steel and glass to replicate this emerging order in cities. All revolutions, especially political ones, turn to architecture immediately to create their most prominent monuments. And this ability of architecture to explain its age happens whether a building is an elaborate showpiece or a banal standby” (para. 4). What does the work you have chosen represent? reflect? embody? How? Don’t forget to use our art elements and principles of design in your discussion. Also, be sure to cite any information quoted or paraphrased from any sources used. Ask yourself, what can we learn about the people the work serves as well as the city, town, square, etc. that surrounds it. Please make sure to respond to a minimum of two peers. To meet the minimum engagement requirements, please participate at the start, middle, and end of the week.

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