Belgrade is the ugliest city in the world in the most beautiful place in the world.
Le CorbusierRead
A hundred times have I thought New York is a catastrophe and 50 times: It is a beautiful catastrophe.
Interpretation
The quote reflects the dual nature of cities like New York, portraying it as both chaotic and beautiful.
Le Corbusier's quote captures the essence of New York City as a place of contrasts, where the chaotic energy of urban life can be seen as both disastrous and enchanting. By highlighting the city's complexities, he acknowledges that beauty can emerge from chaos, prompting a deeper appreciation for the multifaceted experiences that urban living offers. It suggests that one can have conflicting feelings about a place, recognizing its flaws while also seeing its captivating allure.
In practice
During a lecture on urban architecture, to illustrate the dichotomy of city life.
Belgrade is the ugliest city in the world in the most beautiful place in the world.
Our world, like a charnel-house, is strewn with the detritus of dead epochs.
The history of architecture is the history of the struggle for light.
Architecture is the learned game, correct and magnificent, of forms assembled in the light.
The purpose of construction is TO MAKE THINGS HOLD TOGETHER; of architecture TO MOVE US.
Light creates ambience and feel of a place, as well as the expression of a structure.
Everything is vain and tortures the spirit instead of calming and satisfying it.
The present moment is the only moment available to us and it is the door to all other moments.
The discovery of a wine is of greater moment than the discovery of a constellation. The universe is too full of stars.
If I were personally to define religion, I would say that it is a bandage that man has invented to protect a soul made bloody by circustance.
The most notable thing about Time is that it is so purely relative. A large amount of reminiscence is, by common consent, conceded to the drowning man; and it is not past belief that one may review an entire courtship while removing one's gloves.
Every man who has lived for fifty years has buried a whole world or even two; he has grown used to its disappearance and accustomed to the new scenery of another act: but suddenly the names and faces of a time long dead appear more and more often on his way, calling up series of shades and pictures kept somewhere, "just in case," in the endless catacombs of the memory, making him smile or sigh, and sometimes almost weep.
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