Architecture and Hygiene

Rating:
Summary: Semantic Incontinence
Review: "Semantic incontinence" is a term from the list of '100 Comments on Architecture and Hygiene' at the conclusion of this book by Adam Kalkin, and I feel that this two word turn of phrase encapsulates the narrative of this book as well as any other. The book is extremely difficult, no, impossible, to categorize. It is essentially a photographic primer on the stark, almost anarchist, ultra-modern architectural works of Kalkin. I am a great fan of contemporary and industrial architecture, but I have never seen it taken to this level before.

Interspersed with the architectural forays are hand drawn, child-like sketches of concepts that are far beyond the boundaries of normal architecture books. In particular, the "Sphincter of Loneliness" on p. 94 caught my attention, as did the test on p. 59, which features such questions as these:

Diaper is to Sari as:
a) urbanism is to classicism
b) rain is to fog
c) fez is to spanking

Who was the least well known:
a) Plotinus
b) Elvis
c) The Nancy Drew Series

Essay: Write twenty words or less on the following topic
Clinton: Sage or Bedwetter?

Clearly this is no ordinary architect. While some of his works are a bit too industrial even for my tastes, you will be hard pressed to find a more unusual, stimulating, weird, or fun book on contemporary architecture.

It is simply mind boggling.

Rating:
Summary: Semantic Incontinence
Review: "Semantic incontinence" is a term from the list of '100 Comments on Architecture and Hygiene' at the conclusion of this book by Adam Kalkin, and I feel that this two word turn of phrase encapsulates the narrative of this book as well as any other. The book is extremely difficult, no, impossible, to categorize. It is essentially a photographic primer on the stark, almost anarchist, ultra-modern architectural works of Kalkin. I am a great fan of contemporary and industrial architecture, but I have never seen it taken to this level before.

Interspersed with the architectural forays are hand drawn, child-like sketches of concepts that are far beyond the boundaries of normal architecture books. In particular, the "Sphincter of Loneliness" on p. 94 caught my attention, as did the test on p. 59, which features such questions as these:

Diaper is to Sari as:
a) urbanism is to classicism
b) rain is to fog
c) fez is to spanking

Who was the least well known:
a) Plotinus
b) Elvis
c) The Nancy Drew Series

Essay: Write twenty words or less on the following topic
Clinton: Sage or Bedwetter?

Clearly this is no ordinary architect. While some of his works are a bit too industrial even for my tastes, you will be hard pressed to find a more unusual, stimulating, weird, or fun book on contemporary architecture.

It is simply mind boggling.

Rating:
Summary: You cannot imagine how much you want this book...
Review: ...because you cannot imagine what is in it; I find it remarkable that anyone could. I bought this book mainly based on the cover picture, because I like looking at innovative design. I did not expect the combination of (1) delightful, radically imaginative, yet practical architecture / interior design with (2) insightfully sardonic Monty Pythonesque, Warren Zevonish humor. The blend, throughout, is liberating. There are many excellent photos as well as professional and kid-like drawings. You will feel admiration. You will laugh. You will want a house made of shipping containers. You will want to call the number that shoots the gun that misses the ...(buy book to find out what). The book includes plans and photos of the author's art exhibits. It will make you want to sit down with pencil and paper to design! Nothing could have prepared me to appreciate this book except all the crap I've been exposed to in the last 40 years that is supposed to be penetrating, funny, and original in art and building. It is what you really want on your coffee or bedside table. You'll feel badly if your dogs rip it up. It is not an imitation. It will damage that dead stuff that hangs out in your CNS.

Rating:
Summary: The perfect litmus test for friendship
Review: A venal and combustible mix of troglodytic patois. Perfect bathroom reading; small, but raw enough to inflate your bowels with a new sense of self. You will laugh, sweat and vascillate between repulsion and enlightenment. A perfect gift for someone you might befriend.

Rating:
Summary: A glimpse into mental illness
Review: If you are looking for a book from which to gleen ideas, this is not it. If you had written this book and handed it to a psychiatrist, he/she would ask if you had stopped taking your meds. I was grossly misled by the accompanying glorious reviews, thinking I was actually purchasing a useful architecture book. This is a book half filled with Adam Kalkin's work and half filled with the child-like scribblings, insane ramblings, and pornographic "art" of an obviously mentally ill person. Not genius, not deep or insightful, just insane. If you are a fan of Adam Kalkin's work as I am, but don't want the useless pages, you should buy PreFab Modern. It contains all of his important work with much larger and better photographs. Unless you are incredibly eccentric, this is a book you would literally be embarassed to show your friends and family. A waste of money.

Rating:
Summary: The Book of the Year
Review: This book is a big surprise for you!!!
You have not seen the book of architecture anything like this!!!
The book evolves a new field of architectural design thinking
which denies the mainstream of conceptual architecture of nowadays and will let you reconsider the humanism in the design process.

Even anyone who accepts Rem Koolhaas as such a leading architect will be moved by Kalkinfs powerful ideology.

Rating:
Summary: strange and wonderful
Review: This is a strange and wonderful book. I have never really seen one like it before. It violently yokes together images of Kalkin's buildings, performances, sculpture, technology, drawings and writing into an unexpectedly coherent psychobiography.

This book would be of interest to architects, artists, writers and people literate in the arts.

Rating:
Summary: Unspeakable
Review: Wear shades! What you see in Adam Kalkin's hyperpolished mirror might scare you. Aphasic and perverse, Kalkin throws knife-edged arcs into the sky. This is what you get when geometry sleeps with poetry. Sniff the pictures and then eat the book to complete the synesthetic experience.

Rating:
Summary: Unspeakable
Review: Wear shades! What you see in Adam Kalkin's hyperpolished mirror might scare you. Aphasic and perverse, Kalkin throws knife-edged arcs into the sky. This is what you get when geometry sleeps with poetry. Sniff the pictures and then eat the book to complete the synesthetic experience.