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The Cybertruck is not brutalist

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Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#42

Brutalist philosophy always sounds cool with its honesty and showing of how it works. But then you look at what it actually produces and it's usually, you know, brutal. If brutalist architects could just find it in their hearts to make their buildings have nice shapes along with all the other properties, maybe they wouldn't be so reviled.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goetheanum

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#43
post #6
post #2

Maybe it's not brutalist, but it's certainly brutal to the eyes.

Behold the power of a mistranslation: > The term ‘brutalism’ was coined by the British architects Alison and Peter Smithson, and popularised by the architectural historian Reyner Banham in 1954. It derives from ‘Béton brut’ (raw concrete) and was first associated in architecture with Le Corbusier, who designed the Cite Radieuse in Marseilles in the late-1940s. But since the word can be used as an insult in English, i…

“Brut” (fr) and “Brute” (en) share the same Latin-via-Old-French etymology though, they’re related concepts demoting being untamed and simple (compare: “raw strength” vs “brute strength”)

Furthermore, “brutal” is also a word in French, meaning the same thing as it does in English.

I think it’s reasonable to assume that the Frenchmen who coined the phrase intended it to refer both to the rawness or the concrete and the brutality of the design, they can’t have been unaware of the associations.

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unnecessarily exposing innards doesn't feel brutalist to me. Covering up the innards is a functional requirement of being a reliable car - you don't want the engine exposed to the elements, for example. You don't want to expose the driver to rain and snow. You don't want to have the frame rust. A huge part of brutalism is not letting design compromise functioning of the object and not hiding the materials that compos…

I agree with you mostly - slight contradiction you say "Unncessarily" and then talk about the functional use of those covers to prevent water and snow ingress. I think what I was alluding to is that a piece of cover for 100% decorative use - no safety, functional or any reason but to make things look nice. That is the "guilt". :) Definitely agree, unpainted stainless steel is a brutalist trait.

I suppose then you could argue about the inside of the car, as that is where most of the unnecessary covering would exist.

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#45

Kind of off topic but: > Mark Pasnik is a founding principal of the Boston-based design firm OverUnder and a professor of architecture at Wentworth Institute of Technology. If you go to the OverUnder website, the proposal to “revamp” the existing Boston City Hall is just an admonition that brutalism sucks and is miserable to be around. > The design creates vibrant counterpoints of light and liveliness to City Hall's…

The Boston City Hall can suck without meaning that all brutalist architecture sucks. For example, the Glen Park BART station in SF is widely considered an architectural achievement

www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/amp/Glen-Park-BART-station-could-soon-be-an-official-14189658.php

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#46

I disagree. If one definition of Brutalism is to be honest about materials - then Cybertruck nails that. Unpainted stainless steel is as brutalist as it gets. We can argue about the design intent of the way it looks and whether that’s Brutalism. Aesthetics is only one aspect of Brutalism. Another aspect of Brutalism is to expose innards without guilt - If Cybertruck doesn’t have non-structural decorations, farings, e…

The Cybertruck is very carefully designed to hide a lot of it's structural components. It's designed to look "brutal", but it's not brutalist. It is very carefully designed to look a certain way.

A brutalist truck would be something like a Land Rover Defender, or in the concept car world something like the trucks from Bollinger Motors.

A brutalist truck does not use internal hinges that are hidden from sight; a brutalist truck just has bolted on hinges.

A brutalist truck does not have elaborate LED lighting seamlessly integrated below the hood. A brutalist truck just has lights bolted on somewhere.

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#47
post #3

It's also more subtly curved than most people give it credit for. I know a guy that is creating 3D models of the truck for some people that want to simulate it in simulated wind-tunnel. He was flabbergasted at how much they could keep the straight looking form while also smuggling in critical curvatures here and there to stop eddy currents from forming.

Literally the only curve I see on it is on the fascia.

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#48

Kind of reminds me of this copypasta that has become a meme in the emo music scene: "Real Emo" only consists of the dc Emotional Hardcore scene and the late 90's Screamo scene. What is known by "Midwest Emo" is nothing but Alternative Rock with questionable real emo influence. When people try to argue that bands like My Chemical Romance are not real emo, while saying that Sunny Day Real Estate is, I can't help not to…

I believe that comes from a satirical Facebook page, but in an effort for a serious response, this page does a decent job categorizing the different sub-genres:

http://www.fourfa.com/styles/index.htm

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#49

I disagree. If one definition of Brutalism is to be honest about materials - then Cybertruck nails that. Unpainted stainless steel is as brutalist as it gets. We can argue about the design intent of the way it looks and whether that’s Brutalism. Aesthetics is only one aspect of Brutalism. Another aspect of Brutalism is to expose innards without guilt - If Cybertruck doesn’t have non-structural decorations, farings, e…

How about the Bollinger as a brutalist truck?

https://www.equipmentworld.com/electric-truck-maker-bollinge...

Re: The Cybertruck is not brutalist

#50
post #20

Brutalist philosophy always sounds cool with its honesty and showing of how it works. But then you look at what it actually produces and it's usually, you know, brutal. If brutalist architects could just find it in their hearts to make their buildings have nice shapes along with all the other properties, maybe they wouldn't be so reviled.

There are exceptions. The Washington DC Metro, for instance.

Interesting example. I use the DC metro every day and it would never have occurred to me to call it brutalist. I could see it for the tunnels themselves. Certainly the above-ground portions have lots of purely decorative detail; in fact it would be foolhardy to attempt to label all the above-ground parts with a single philosophy since they have a lot of variety.
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