Thursday, October 25, 2007

Robert P. Madison Strikes(out) Again

Why is Robert P. Madison continually awarded major design commissions in Cleveland? BOTC just doesn't understand. His latest abomination is about to start construction at Cuyahoga Community College's Metro Campus. See the press release below.

Let's hope the Steve Litt recognizes this building as crap and rips Madison's design thoroughly.

BOTC apologizes for not posting an image--we wonder why we cannot find an image of this on the Rock Hall or Tri-C website. Embarrasment possibly?

The joint project of Tri-C and the Rock Hall will feature 75,000 square feet of space that will enable the College's media arts, recording arts technology, music, theatre/dance, animation and other creative arts programs to be together in the same building. The Center for Creative Arts will also create the Rock Hall's library and archives, the most comprehensive repository of written, oral, audio and video materials relevant to the history of rock and roll.

"The Center for Creative Arts will establish a unique creative environment at Cuyahoga Community College," said Tri-C President Thornton. "The Center will be the foundation of artistic study at the College, and will allow us to centralize our creative pursuits, programs and facilities under one roof."

"The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has always sought to preserve and celebrate the spirit of rock and roll to make Cleveland a destination for fans and scholars from around the world," said Terry Stewart, president and CEO of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. "This new Library and Archives will help us achieve our next significant milestone, to make Cleveland the premier location for scholarly study and cultural appreciation of rock and roll music."

6 comments:

Dru McKeown said...

Doesn't this town have a design review board? Isn't there some sort of Constitutional Law protecting the citizens? This might have been cute if a second year student presented it as an early proposal sometime in the mid-sixties (no offense meant to second year students) but the habitual barrage of crap 'design' is getting out of hand. This constant and relentless reassemblage of base component forms in such an arbritrary manner is insulting. Why is there such a total lack of subtlety or even rational or dare I ask for, interesting intent? Congratulations for being promoted from producing projects I can be totally indifferent to to creating something that I feel actively degrades the entire region.

theodore said...

Pretty depressing, indeed. I guess he was trying to fit into the 'context' of Tri C's campus?

Stan said...

Litt did rip Madison a new one on this travesty - Center for Creative Arts planned for Tri-C Metro Campus is a disappointment

Bleech. Thanks Madison for giving local architects a bad rep.

Anonymous said...

I think of crap like this every time someone says "why don't more local architects get the great design commissions in this city."

I'm not even sure how someone could look at the Madison International portfolio of work and select them for a project. This works well in the collection of dull, uninspiring architecture one sees on their way into Cleveland via I-77. Way to miss out on a terrific opportunity.

This design as it currently stands is sophomoric, trite, and underdeveloped. There is little to no sign of design sensitivity or even intent; the possibly exception may be that apparently there's an intent to fit into a Tri-C Metro "context." The result is unsophisticated and borders on inappropriate.

I hope there is still time to salvage the design and create a viable option for this location.
Am I being unrealistic?

Anonymous said...

Madison was not selected for this commission because of his "talent." He was selected, as his firm often is, because he is African-American, and CCC sees itself as African-American. Design skill has not been a criteria at CCC in their selection process, just as a qualifiactions-based selection process has not been the pattern at many notable NEOH institutions.

So bash CCC's administration lead by Jerry Sue Thorton, who has actually resisted hiring talent in favor of "the people we have chosen to work with," which means Madison.

Let's not indict NEOH architects because of Bob Madison's utter lack ot talent and his failure over his long career to take the exceptional opportunities afforded him many, many times because of his race to develop a firm with talent and depth. Bob Madison's firm and CCC's ineptitude at design management illustrate the abject failure of minority set-aside programs. It's either incompetence or greed or both.

One notable clarification from Litt's article, which seemed to imply that the CCC project was so terrible because of its budget. CCC's project is costing aproximately $375/sf, which is a very substantial cost and well above average for projects of this type and size. It's not lack of resporces that explains this tragedy. As they say after a bad golf shot - its L.O.F.T. - Lack of X$%#ing Talent."

Anonymous said...

Wow... I am Robert P. Madison's eldest Grandson googling my Grandfather just to see whats going on back in Cleveland.

To read you ignorant folks on this page speaking on "He got the contract because he's African American, not because he has talent," hurts.

I mean, have any of you ACTUALLY seen Metro Campus? Its an atrocity in itself. The place was built to keep people out due to the projects across the street. It wasn't designed to look cute and nice. His building will add some flare to this disgusting location, and make it look that much better.

Honestly, comparing his building in Metro Campus CCC is like telling someone to build a house where LTV was. The area looks awful, but you'll have a decent looking structure in there.

And shame on you for pulling that race card, do you even have any clue what my grandfather / mother and grandmother had to go through for him to be this successfull? I mean have you had people throw bricks through your windows because of your skin tone? Or have had people turn you down at a college because of your color? The man is the hardest working person i've ever had the pleasure to talk to. And I'm not saying that because he is my grandfather, I'm saying that because as a small boy durring the great depression he sold paper carnations on Sunday's just to make some extra money.

Now please, he deserves everything he's got. He still doesn't use a computer (as much as I would like him to) and does all his drawings by hand. I know you'll get these "fresh-out-of-college" green people that have AutoCAD 2008 - which does it for them - and you'll think they are doing a good job because of well, their shear laziness and lack of true talent.

Please... what have you done for this starving city hmmm? Have you started scholarships so young kids can go to school? Have you build schools or places of interest to attract tourists?

I didn't think so. When someone on here has actually done 1/100th of what that man has done, please respond. Until then, your petty attempts to smear my grandfather's name are failing.

Good Day
-Ward