WE WERE ONCE HERE?

The above photo is a fine example of the Art Deco style that defined the Jazz Age or the "Gatsby Era" of the last century. This is my favorite architectural style. I took the photo with my old flip cellular phone, but I think it came out well enough.

This dry cleaners (which I expect wasn't always what this building was used for) is on Florida State Hwy. 41 as it runs through coastal Venice on Florida's west coast. Hwy. 41 is also known as the old "Tamiami Trail" that, before the Interstate system came along, was the only way to drive down the peninsula to Miami. (A lot of big-time mobsters, such as Al "Scarface" Capone, came this way on their way to Miami.)

The building looks entirely out of place and is by no means contextual with its surroundings. There is nothing like it anywhere else in Venice. (Other nearby structures include supermarkets, Walmart, some fast-food stops, and a car dealership.) I especially like the curved-glass treatment on the elevation or front of the building, and the playful use of color.

A Statement on Our Times

It's a statement on our times that buildings are no longer constructed like this. Art and craftsmanship have given way to high-rise monoliths of glass and steel; cheap, pre-fabricated commercial structures; and wood-frame houses slathered with stucco. In our age we will never build a Great Pyramid of Giza or a Taj Mahal, even as technically advanced as we believe we are. There will be few, if any, structures of lasting value to proclaim to future historians that "we came this way once...we built this monument to us to show we were once here...that we existed." Such structures have no place in a society where conspicuous consumption and planned obsolescence (to quote Arthur C. Clarke) are the driving forces behind everything produced for the masses.

Building such soulless constructs makes a larger statement about our age and the human condition. One must ask the questions: "When did we lose our moral compass? Where have our core values gone?" Consider the great gothic cathedrals of medieval Europe: Generational structures of hand-chiseled detail that took hundreds of years to construct, without any modern mechanization; monuments whose construction was passed down from father-mason to son-apprentice; structures that were lovingly hewn into being just to proclaim the glory of God.



The Austrian National Library

Where did such devotion and dedication go? At what point in the forward march of history did humanity lose its faith and begin shortchanging God with shoddy, lesser workmanship? The answers exceed the scope of this short essay. But it speaks ill of our times that so many things that were once held dear and sacred are steadily dwindling away, and nothing is built to last. So what will our distant descendants know of us? What banal legacy will we hand down to them? Our future society will most likely be a functional-only one, driven by the need to accommodate an already-overpopulated planet, and restricted by monetary concerns. Our best efforts today will pale by comparison to the high standards set by our ancestors so long ago.

The greatest monuments to mark this age will most likely be our massive sports arenas, our domed stadiums, much like the great Coliseum in Rome is the architectural centerpiece of the Romanesque period, when men slaughtered other men for sport. And just as the Romans' preoccupation with bloodshed for entertainment became part of their written history, their bloody legacy, so too will we leave behind us a footprint that will fall far short of any real, hallowed glory.