Le Corbusier, both cursed and praised guru of modern architecture

PRAGUE, August 24 (ČTK) - The skyscrapers of Manhattan were too low for him. He had always thought big. His buildings were cold, but it was not the coldness of emptiness; it was a cold beauty and a celebration of space. He created a new style of living - cubic houses with flat roofs and large continuous windows. He dreamed of glowing cities in greenery, but in the end, he was criticized for promoting reinforced concrete and urbanism leading to today's panel housing estates. The Swiss architect Le Corbusier was born on October 6, 1887, and 40 years will pass since his death this Saturday.
Simple shapes and clean surfaces through which sunlight can freely pass, enveloping them in light and shadow. Gardens on the roofs. Dominant materials: reinforced concrete, steel, and glass. A building that does not rest on masonry but is supported by a steel frame. This was Corbusier's style, which he called purism - it was cold, creative, and "pure".
A great visionary was guided by the conviction that the modern age requires bold modern industrial architecture. He believed that machines should serve as the model for building structures: "A house is a machine for living," he liked to say. His buildings shocked and inspired enthusiasm. He promoted his ideas with apostolic zeal. He addressed the public with manifestos, pamphlets, exhibitions, and his own magazine. He wrote dozens of books on interior decoration, painting, and architecture. He literally created textbooks of the new style.
However, he first learned to engrave watch backs - at an art and design school focused on this skill. He gained further education in Vienna from the Austrian designer Josef Hoffmann. He was still named Charles Édouard Jeanneret, born in the Swiss La Chaux-de-Fonds. At twenty-nine, he set off for Paris, which was alive with the avant-garde and art. To start a new life, he needed a new name. The provincial architect Jeanneret was dead, and the visionary Le Corbusier (after his maternal grandfather) emerged.
He named his dream the Radiant City. It had neither streets nor sidewalks; people lived in hygienic high-rise towers set in nature. The city was to be divided into individual zones: an area for work and an area for leisure. Everything was grand in scale: large buildings, large open spaces, large highways. He tried to bring it to life in India in the city of Chandigarh; his students attempted the same in Brasília, but each time it was unsuccessful. The open spaces were inhospitable, and the separation of different components of life destroyed life in society itself.
His masterworks include the enormous collective house for 1,600 residents in Marseille built in 1952 and the famous La Tourette monastery. In the 1950s, he transitioned from airy constructions to buildings with massive brick and concrete walls. His buildings seemed
unfinished.
The sociologist of urbanism often referred to himself as Le Corbu (the raven), especially during times when he felt strong resistance and harsh criticism. This name also symbolized the freedom of flight - the freedom of his ideas. Occasionally, he signed letters or artworks with a drawing of a raven.
The father of modern architecture was also a painter and sculptor. In addition to world-famous furniture designs, he created a collection of paintings,
sculptures, drawings, gouaches, collages, graphics, and even tapestries. His concepts of space, light, volume, forms, colors, and human proportions and their interaction with architecture were often first expressed in his graphic works.
Even in the Czech Republic, traces of the illustrious architect can be found. He participated in the construction of nearly a thousand red brick duplexes and fourplexes on the hillside above Zlín. He collaborated on the construction of a Baťa store in Prague's Wenceslas Square. He fundamentally influenced Czech architecture of the 1920s and visited Prague in 1928. He was enthusiastic about the Trade Fair Palace and declared after visiting the Art Nouveau Karlovy Vary that it was a city full of cream cakes.
He recorded his ideas with a red pencil on paper napkins in cafes. "Architecture is a skilled, precise, and magnificent play of volumes accumulated under light, it is a harmonic rhythm of surfaces, light, and shadow," he said. Nevertheless, he called the Italian Dolomites the most beautiful building in the world.