nomination by the Government of Australia - Sydney Opera House

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46 Part 3. Justifi cation for inscription 3.C COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS Since its opening more than three decades ago, the Sydney Opera House has attracted widespread and intense commentary, discussion and analysis across a number of professional disciplines and in popular culture. Architects, engineers, cultural theorists and architectural historians have dissected the building and assessed Jørn Utzon’s contribution to the history and development of modern architecture. As with the history of the Sydney Opera House, this outpouring has been marked by energy, enthusiasm and debate; yet there is overall agreement that the Sydney Opera House is one of the great buildings of the 20th century. The Sydney Opera House is unique for its diverse and outstanding architectural and cultural heritage values as a masterpiece of modern architecture, as an internationally famous icon, and for its great engineering feats and technological achievements. It is outstanding for the unique composition of all these features. Architectural historian Richard Weston has described the Sydney Opera House as ‘the most recognisable contemporary man-made structure in the world’ which is, quite simply, one of a kind (Weston 2004b). The image and tectonic integrity of the Sydney Opera House are powerful, original and unrepeatable (Frampton 2004: 21). The Sydney Opera House can be compared with other masterpieces around the world on the basis of architectural excellence and outstanding engineering achievement. The following discussion compares it with a small number of modern buildings that have either reached a comparable outstanding level of design understanding, architectural excellence, poetic expression and human inspiration or achieved advances in architectural thinking and practice equal to those of Utzon and the collaborative teams of architects and engineers who worked on the Sydney Opera House. The buildings discussed fall into one or more of the following groupings: outstanding examples of late Modernism; masterpieces that challenged accepted norms of building expression, siting or planning; masterpieces that stretched the boundaries of the possible and demanded exceptional architectural, engineering or construction feats; and international iconic buildings. 3.C (i) Masterpieces of late modern architecture Third generation Modernism Utzon is today widely recognised as one of the leading architects in a creative architectural current known as ‘the third generation’ of Modernism. The Sydney Opera House is his masterwork. Swiss architectural historian Sigfried Giedion added a new and lengthy chapter on Utzon and the ‘third generation’ to the fi fth edition (1967) of his seminal history Space, time and architecture. This group built on the traditions of Modernism and share common characteristics that are manifest in the Sydney Opera House. These characteristics include: a powerful relationship between architecture and its environment (the genius loci); the elevation of monumental architecture to a great urban platform; a synthesis of traditions from the past to provide continuity with previous cultural ideals; and a relaxation of the Modernist ideology of ‘form follows function’ resulting in expressive forms, sculptural responses and spatial freedom. According to Giedion and Norwegian architectural historian Christian Norberg-Schulz, the Sydney Opera House realised the synthesis of the humanisation of modern architecture, the next necessary step in the functional achievements of early Modernism (Norberg- Schulz 1996: 172). Utzon’s achievement in the Sydney Opera House, his masterwork, is what clearly marks him out from many of his contemporaries. The holistic vision of Utzon’s work—the synthesis of organic
3.36 qualities and precise, geometric defi nition—was a clear departure from what went before him. Giedion claimed that, for Utzon, the machine is subordinated to the creative process in a way that other modern architects had not previously accomplished (Giedion 1967: 694). Norberg-Schulz wrote a compelling argument for the rightful place of Utzon in a line of great modern masters including Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Alvar Aalto and Louis Kahn. Utzon’s Sydney Opera House represented an important contribution to the emergence of ‘a new monumentality’ and ‘new regionalism’ in modern architecture (Norberg-Schulz 1996: 172). The poetic and environmental ambitions of the third generation are exemplifi ed in two masterpieces— Utzon’s Sydney Opera House and Le Corbusier’s Notre-Dame-du-Haut Chapel at Ronchamp (France 1950–1955). Neither building can be separated from its outstanding landscape setting. In each case, the outcome is a product of the timelessness of intense beauty, form and the meticulous care and attention apparent in all parts of its design and assembly. The design of both buildings is exceptional, defi ning architecture in terms of ‘sun, shade, size, form, light and colour’ (Sharp 2005: 6). Both buildings display the same outstanding qualities of imagination, splendour and poetry. Peter Blake went so far as to say that the Ronchamp Chapel had a ‘plastic inventiveness and grandeur comparable with the most powerful monuments produced by man since the beginnings of recorded history’ (Sharp 2005: 6; Blake 1960: 136). Richard Weston has identifi ed Ronchamp as the ‘closest modern sibling’ of the Sydney Opera House and has noted that each is a compelling and outstanding expression of a new organic form in architecture (Weston 2004b). Figure 3.36 Le Corbusier’s Notre-Dome-du-Haut Chapel, Ronchamp, 1950–1955 3.37 The Sydney Opera House elegantly embodies the highest aspirations of this new expressionism, elevating a public building to a monumental position reserved in traditional architectural practice for buildings with spiritual meaning. The Sydney Opera House has become one of the popular faces of modern architecture. Norberg-Schulz is clear about the magnitude of Utzon’s achievement—‘in the Sydney Opera House, Jørn Utzon realised the great synthesis of earth and sky, landscape and city, vista and intimacy, thought and feeling in terms of a unity of technological and organic form … [It is] a most signifi cant step in the history of modern architecture’ (Norberg-Schulz 1996: 172). The Sydney Opera House also shares specifi c architectural qualities with other masterpieces of late Modernism, notably Frank Lloyd Wright’s Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (New York 1956–1959). The Guggenheim Museum has become an urban icon because of its striking form and as one of the more publicly accessible works of Frank Lloyd Wright. Like the Sydney Opera House, the Guggenheim Museum occupies a prime site near the heart of its city and is an exceptional symbolic focus and showcase for human achievement in the arts. According to Charles Jencks, it has taken on an importance usually reserved for a great city hall or temple primarily because of its formal and spatial contrast to the rest of New York City (Jencks 1973: 137). Figure 3.37 Frank Lloyd Wright’s Solomon R Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1956–1959 47
Page 1 and 2: SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE NOMINATION BY TH
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Page 6 and 7: 4 PREFACE Australia is pleased to p
Page 9 and 10: 1.A COUNTRY Country - Australia 1.B
Page 11 and 12: The topographic map shows the locat
Page 13: PART 2. DESCRIPTION 11
Page 16 and 17: 14 Part 2. Description 2.2 The comp
Page 18 and 19: 16 Part 2. Description 2.6 2.7 2.8
Page 20 and 21: 18 Part 2. Description The glass wa
Page 22 and 23: 20 Part 2. Description 2.19 Further
Page 24 and 25: 22 Part 2. Description 2.23 Interna
Page 26 and 27: 24 Part 2. Description The Sydney O
Page 29 and 30: … we’re here to nudge forward t
Page 31 and 32: Utzon’s design modifi ed the esta
Page 33 and 34: In the Sydney Opera House Jørn Utz
Page 35 and 36: Utzon’s reading and use of histor
Page 37 and 38: 3.17 3.18 Utzon’s genius is manif
Page 39 and 40: The podium The construction of the
Page 41 and 42: 3.24 Figure 3.24 Arups’ summary o
Page 43 and 44: 3.28 engineers Jorg Schlaich and We
Page 45 and 46: 3.32 The Sydney Opera House holds a
Page 47: 3.34 3.35 The setting of Bennelong
Page 51 and 52: 3.39 3.40 3.41 Masterpieces of the
Page 53 and 54: 3.43 also inspired by the laws of n
Page 55 and 56: 3.45 3.D INTEGRITY AND AUTHENTICITY
Page 57 and 58: Materials and substance The use and
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Page 67 and 68: 5.A OWNERSHIP The Sydney Opera Hous
Page 69 and 70: 5.C MEANS OF IMPLEMENTING PROTECTIV
Page 71 and 72: 5.2 Sydney Regional Environmental P
Page 73 and 74: 5.3 Sydney Opera House: a plan for
Page 75 and 76: 5.5 5.6 • • • • • An on-s
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Page 80 and 81: 78 Part 6. Monitoring 6.2 Figure 6.
Page 82 and 83: 80 Part 6. Monitoring 6.C RESULTS O
Page 85 and 86: 7.A PHOTOGRAPHS, SLIDES, IMAGE INVE
Page 87 and 88: 7.B TEXTS RELATING TO PROTECTIVE DE
Page 89 and 90: Baume, M 1967, The Sydney Opera Hou
Page 91 and 92: Hall, P 1981, Great planning disast
Page 93 and 94: Sommer, D, Stöcher, H & Weisser, L
Page 95: 893 PART 8. CONTACT INFORMATION
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96 Part 8: Contact information 8.C
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98 PART 9. SIGNATURE ON BEHALF OF T
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10.A BIOGRAPHIES OF JØRN UTZON AND
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Awards In addition to the awards de
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10.3 Ove Arup (1895-1988) Ove Nyqui
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10.B LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Front co
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Figure 3.30 Photograph by Max Dupai
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Other contributors Sydney Opera Hou
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Figure 10.6 1902 Fort Macquarie is
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B 10.E PLANS, SECTIONS AND ELEVATIO
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EASTERN ELEVATION WESTERN ELEVATION
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