Architect, writer, teacher–and agent provocateur–Michael Sorkin was commissioned by the University of Chicago in 1998 to produce an “alternative” master plan for its architectural revitalization. His studio had barely begun before they were dropped from the process. In the capacity of concerned alumnus, however, Sorkin and his group soldiered on and, in Pamphlet Architecture 22,
The terrorist attacks of September 11 have created an unprecedented public discussion about the uses and meanings of the central area of lower Manhattan that was once the World Trade Center. While the city sifts through the debris, contrary forces shaping its future are at work. Developers jockey to control the right to rebuild “ground
Michael Sorkin is widely hailed as one of the best architecture critics writing today. Iconoclastic and often controversial, he is a witty, entertaining, yet ultimately serious writer. In this new collection, Sorkin reviews the state of contemporary architecture and surveys the dramatic changes in the urban environment of the past decade. From New York to
Based in New York, Michael Sorkin is one of the most talked-about and controversial architects working today. A critical and polemical (yet humorous) voice in contemporary culture, he is a highly respected and internationally known architect, writer, and lecturer. His previous books contained his critical writings, and he has never published a complete volume on
‘Exquisite Corpse’ was a game played by the surrealists in which someone drew on a piece of paper, folded it and passed it to the next person to draw on until, finally, the sheet was opened to reveal a calculated yet random composition. In this entertaining and provocative book, Michael Sorkin suggests that cities are
America’s cities are being rapidly transformed by a sinister and homogenous design. A new Kind of urbanism–manipulative, dispersed, and hostile to traditional public space–is emerging both at the heart and at the edge of town in megamalls, corporate enclaves, gentrified zones, and psuedo-historic marketplaces. If anything can be described as a paradigm for these places,