Sometimes I think Shocker doesn't even know what he's talking about. That said, his hyperbolic rants can be very entertaining.
 
I'm going to risk it and say that maybe Shocker's point was missed.

That said, while I like this building, I can see why others hold critical views of it. Obviously is doesn't appeal to everyone. I wish that there had been some distance between this and the neighbouring Corus building. Something different in between might have let the merits of each stand out that much more.
 
I don't hate the building itself but I do hate it here at this location. Context.

As for modernism I don't really think we're seeing an evolution of the language so much as a bastardization of a form... which is ok. Bastardized forms become new forms. Let's just not call it modernism or somehow think that Corus and the oeuvre of Mies have anything substantive in common, any more than Corus and the Renaissance do. Then again, why not? This is a forum and it's fun to speculate on these things.
 
I can't think of any local architect who has "kept the faith" with Modernism as much as Jack Diamond has, though.

In an article in Canadian Architect a few years ago, John McMinn referred to the entire set of Toronto's new cultural buildings as:

"Where previous building booms upgraded centres of governance and commerce, thereby transforming the city core into a coherent orthodoxy of International Style Modernism, the wave of new projects transforming Toronto's cultural institutions is an eclectic, stylistically varied sampling of Late Modernist Mannerism. These include Daniel Libeskind's Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) and Will Alsop's Ontario College of Art and Design, along with the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts by Diamond + Schmitt Architects Inc., and the Gardiner Museum of Ceramic Art by Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects ..."

I don't have a copy at hand, but I believe that in the KPMB book that was published a few years ago Bruce Kuwabara commented on the suggestion that Mannerism was afoot in how new buildings going up in our fair town now express their Modernism. So it's hardly a novel idea. And here's a link to a lengthy article by Colin Rowe on Mannerism and Modern Architecture, comparing early Modernists such as Mies and Le Corbusier with Michelangelo:

http://www.architectural-review.com...erism-and-modern-architecture/8612334.article

We've generally been referring to what our local architects do as Neo Modernism, and I'm suggesting that we're seeing an evolution to a more Mannerist approach. It's certainly not in the spirit of PoMo, because what's going on is as sculptural and abstract and most importantly free from historicism as it ever was.
 
Shocker, you teach us something new every day....Every time i read one of your posts, I end up on google or wikipedia for hours
 
Urban Shocker said:
I don't have a copy at hand, but I believe that in the KPMB book that was published a few years ago Bruce Kuwabara commented on the suggestion that Mannerism was afoot in how new buildings going up in our fair town now express their Modernism.
Click to expand...

Maybe we need a new label?
 
this evening:

9WnNz.jpg
 
^^ cool shot. From this angle, the building's lights make it seem as if it is facing the east with pride and turning its back on the Corus building in shame.
 
... meanwhile, the Corus shipping and receiving doors are flapping open and shut in animated conversation with the George Brown shipping and receiving doors directly opposite them in the Grande Allée between the buildings.
 
A very ugly and uninspiring design. And as if it couldn't get any worse, it's on the waterfront..
 
I was down on QQ East last weekend and gave it a good stare.

Two thumbs up.
 
Anyone know of an image sharing site that can take very very large image files? i have had to screen capture all my raw HDR images because IMGUR won't support their size

lsVty.jpg
 
Wonderfully artful photo someMidTowner! Definitely worth framing..

Below: GBC and Corus taken on July 20, 2012:
IMG_4473.jpg
 
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