THE thirteenth ANNUAL
ROLAND BATTEN MEMORIAL LECTURE
on Architecture and Design
speaker- Louis Mannie Lionni
Heresies : Cultural Criticism in the context of the Commercialization, Privatization and Militarization of a small New England City. A shaggy dog story.
Wednesday, October 17 th 2012 at 6:00 P.M. 301 WILLIAMS HALL at The University of Vermont
Architecture can be thought of as a sub-set of the great synthesizing categories : art, science, politics, sociology, philosophy. But architecture, in its built form, ultimately gives material being to all of these, and preserves and expresses their conflicts and contradictions over time.
Architectural criticism attempts to describe the relationship of the built environment to the existential environment. In formal terms ; in functional terms.
The subject of architectural criticism can range from the structure of poetry to the poetry of structure, from graphic design to urban and regional planning.
05401TM ostensibly deals with architecture, planning, food and romance in Burlington, Vermont, on the east coast of Lake Champlain. The thing about it is that I often meet friends who tell me how much they enjoyed (liked) the most recent issue and then ask me without a trace of sarcasm what it’s about. I find that puzzling.
In any case, it would be irresponsible to overlook – in this context – the militarization of our environment, its privatization and commercialization, the F35 controversy and PlanBTV.
Louis Mannie Lionni is the Editor and Publisher of 05401TM.
The lecture and reception are sponsored by the Roland Batten Memorial Fund, TruexCullins Architecture & Interior Design, and The University of Vermont’s Visiting Artists, Art Critics and Art Historian’s Lecture Series. The events are free and open to the public.