Kenneth Frampton & Eric Owen Moss: Dialectical lyric (December 6, 2013)

To Kenneth Frampton’s critique of architectural waste as exemplified by OMA’s CCTV Headquarters in Beijing, Eric Owen Moss proposes the exterior of Mies van der Rohe’s Seagram Building, initiating a debate on excess, elegance, structure, representation in early modernist and 21st century architecture. To Moss’s suggestion that the idea of critical regionalism might be a non sequitur, Frampton responds that while vernacular traditions are no longer accessible, architects can use traditional responses to local conditions to respond constructively to the trauma of modernization. They discuss whether there is any possibility for revolutionary architecture today. The debate concludes with questions from the audience concerning the CCTV, the new Barnes Foundation building, clients, and current architecture in Los Angeles.