HSTARC1: Reaction Blog (West Asiatic Architecture)

My personal feed on the West Asiatic was a very religious point of time in Architecture because most of their structures are prior to their religion. It reminded me of one architect that we discussed during the last term’s ADESPRN. It was Cesar Pelli, because he was a very symbolic architect. He based all his works based on what religion of the specific place. Adding Religion to Architect for me is very essential because it symbolizes a whole city and the people who live on that specific place. Hence, it’s also a very practical way to express oneself through Architecture. 

I was even intrigued by the story that people build the Tower of Babel to match the level of God and be like God so they can also reach heaven. God got very disappointed and He destroyed the Tower. Another thing that I noticed on West Asiatic Architecture is that people that time was very competitive. They challenge themselves to create something innovative that time. Just for example the Hanging Gardens, the Babylonians only had the desire to build the garden because they want to break the monotony of their featureless level country. They wanted to build something so that people would also recognize their country. Another example is like what I’ve said the Tower of Babel, they challenged themselves to be like God, and they did well creating the Tower, but they weren’t very successful of it.

To sum this all up, The Babylonians and the rest of the West Asiatic people were very sensitive when it comes to their religion. They never forget to look back at their religion. They were very expressive about their thought on gods. They were very symbolic because of their way of expression through their religion. They worship their gods through their temples and shrines.

This quotable phrase from Cesar Pelli, I think relates the said era:

“We should not judge a building by how beautiful it is in isolation, but instead by how much better or worse that particular place ... has become by its addition. If the city has not gained by the addition, we should seriously question the design and the building itself, no matter how beautiful and theoretically correct it may be."”