Sunday, September 09, 2012

Cityshapes - Angle Tangle


Especially for Vanda, our first - somewhat arty-farty - glimpse of London's latest thrusting phallus,
The Shard.
More overcompensation to follow.

12 comments:

Alifan said...

Would not fancy going to the top of that one!
Hope you like my sky pictures from Southwold.In contrast from your lovely buildings.

dive said...

Those are fabulous skies. Spiffy!

These are hardly lovely buildings; the Shard is a braying monument to crass commercialism with no æsthetic merit whatseover and the foreground is the tatty canopy and bus stop outside London Bridge Railway Station (a depressing shithole on the best of days).
I just liked the angles and the use of negative space (hi, Neetzy).

Speedway said...

Pretty sharp picture, Dive. I love the tension of the negative shapes you created. No matter how ugly it is, the Shard helps to make some really interesting space.

dive said...

I find the ratty old station canopy makes better shapes, Speedway; I really don't like the Shard that much. Compared to the Gherkin or most other London landmark buildings it's unutterably boring and uninspired.
Most of the time the top third of it is hidden in cloud anyway (this is London, after all) so anyone dumb enough to rent space up there will get the view they deserve: grey, damp and miserable.

Speedway said...

I thought the building's surface resembled
in the spacing and proportions, the grid of the wire grocery carts we have here.

dive said...

That's a pretty apt analogy, Speedway, except it's neither as elegantly designed nor as useful as a grocery cart (that's "shopping trolley" in English).

savannah said...

My first reaction was: OUCH!

xoxoxoxo

Bit of regional trivia:

grocery cart=shopping trolley=buggy here in the dirty south!

dive said...

Oh, you dirty Southerners!
If you think "ouch" Savannah, just wait until you see the pointy end. It'll make your eyes water. I'll post it later. xoxoxoxo

Speedway said...

I recall from some years back, that Chaz went on a rant about ugly architecture in London, compared to the older buildings. Which of those was he carrying on about?

I'm reading a biograhy of artist Chuck Close, in which he speaks of architectural history classes taught by Vincent Scully. Your pictures reminded me of the title of one of Scully's talks, "The History of the Cornice - The Way Buildings Meet the Sky." I've looked up Scully's books on-line, but can't find a listing of that talk, or some version of it. Would you have an idea of where I could find it?

dive said...

No idea, I'm afraid, Speedway. I never read anything on architecture, just as being a rock musician I only listen to classical music.

As for Jug-Ears: the idiot has no æsthetic sense and no credibility and whoever gave him the chance to blather about things of which he clearly knows nothing deserves a hard slap upside the head.

Ms M said...

Nice angles! And textures. And I like the "blue sky arrow" framing.
But I agree that the Shard is a bit too sharp and pointy for my taste.

dive said...

Mine too, Ms.M. I prefer my buildings to have a bit of character.