Thursday 8 September 2011

Dereliction and revival

Former railway buildings near the spiffy new/restored St Pancras International Railway Station. Their current and (to me at least) attractive use by a variety of interesting art- and craft-oriented small businesses looks to be short-term. No doubt either demolition or upmarket refurbishment awaits - I don't know which.  This put me in mind of a new book that I'd very much like to read:

Hal Foster in his new book The Art-Architecture Complex turns his attention to how art and architecture have informed each other over the past 50 years. He argues that their fusion has become a defining feature of contemporary culture and provides a scathing critique of the post-industrial cultural economy in which art prompts the transformation of disused warehouses and factories into galleries, and depressed, run-down working-class areas are reborn as stylish art-tourist destinations.

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