Thom Mayne Quotes & Sayings (Page 5)

“I lived in a state of rage from 12 to 20. Until college, I was beyond an outsider. I was a voyeur of life.”

“I'm interested in conflict and confrontation.”

“Somehow, architecture alters the way we think about the world and the way we behave. Any serious architecture, as a litmus test, has to be that.”

“The age of recalcitrance is over. The best solution is no longer just to regurgitate a 19th-century design.”

“It's too simplistic to advance the notion of the autonomy of art as a reason for turning away from the public. You can have autonomy and simultaneously have connections with the social and political world.”

“I fought violently for the autonomy of architecture. It's a very passive, weak profession where people deliver a service. You want a blue door, you get a blue door. You want it to look neo-Spanish, you get neo-Spanish. Architecture with any authenticity represents resistance. Resistance is a good thing.”

“I think a lot of people have the Frank Lloyd Wright model in their brains. The architect comes in with this act of creation and lays it down, and that's it. But that's not me.”

“I'm not just influenced by the '60s - it's who I am. I grew up with Allen Ginsberg and Che Guevara. I flirted with various forms of communism when it was way out of style. It was this really strange and creative time in music and culture, and it was fabulous.”

“In Paris, there has to be a presence. History becomes the most interesting when it's compared to the present. I mean there's a whole group of people that want to build new buildings that look like old buildings.”

“No matter what I've done, what I've tried to do, everybody says it can't be done. And it's continuous across the complete spectrum of the various kind of realities that you confront with your ideas.”