Postmodern Architecture in Boston

After this week’s discussions on structuralism, postmodern architecture and the optimum, I took time to reflect on buildings that I have seen in my daily life in New England, as architecture up north is clearly very different from that of the south. The discussion of the different types of postmodern architecture was particularly interesting, as it made me think about particular places that I have been to and seen in my life.
Growing up around Boston, I would walk around and see the Stata Center at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which was actually designed by Frank Gehry. A brick building featuring disjointed, randomly tilted silver pieces, the Stata Center is a great example of disharmonious harmony in architecture. The disjointed quality and the playfulness in structure contribute to a sense of balance and togetherness between the two differing pieces at play. The windows are exactly the same throughout the building, but there is a dichotomy in the way that they are presented between the two different pieces. On the brick portion, the windows seem like normal windows, but on the silver part, the windows jut out at different angles, disrupting the clean slate look. This fragmentation is another way that the building possesses disharmonious harmony.
The Stata Center is an example of how the disjointed appearance of deconstruction can work to create the “optimum:” the perfect combination of fluidity and disorder. Looking up at this building is pretty amazing; while many in Boston, including my parents, find it to be a hideous building, it is an awe-inspiring piece of architecture, and I can’t imagine how Gehry came up with and planned the idea. Looking up at this building can actually be pretty terrifying; above the entrance is a silver “awning” type of structure that looks like an aluminum windshield cover suspended over its visitors. If you look up as you’re entering the building, it will look like the awning is falling down on you. The look of improvisation, of everything being thrown together, seems to represent the free, creative thought that occurs inside of the building. It certainly is a sight to behold among the uniform brownstone buildings of Boston.