Is there anything juicier than a savage attack on one critic penned by another? How about when the evidence cited includes meaty topics like Frank Gehry, Jean Nouvel, Atlantic Yards, preservationists and other matters of big-time architecture in the Big Apple? Kaboom! In a Design Observer piece titled "Why Nicolai Ouroussoff Is Not Good Enough," journalist and architectural historian Alexandra Lange tees off on the New York Times' influential architecture critic for a number of alleged infractions, from a lazy approach to reviewing ("little history, less politics, occasional urbanism") to the damning accusation that the O-Dog "doesn't seem to live in New York City." Calling him "the perfect critic for the boom years," Lange echoes the oft-repeated Ouroussoff criticism that the dude is too in love with starchitects: "Yes to Gehry, Norman Foster, Zaha Hadid, Jean Nouvel; no to people you haven't already heard of." Not necessarily true! Ouroussoff totally crapped all over Hadid for the blinged-out Chanel Pavilion in Central Park, though that was more an indictment of the project's bad timing. What say you, armchair archicritics?
· Why Nicolai Ouroussoff Is Not Good Enough [Design Observer]
· Nicolai Ouroussoff coverage [Curbed]
Filed under:
Loading comments...