“Manifesto” – Lebbeus Woods (1993)


“Architecture and war are not incompatible.
Architecture is war.
War is architecture.
I am at war with my time, with history,
with all authority that resides in fixed and frightened forms.
I am one of millions who do not fit in,
who have no home, no family,
no doctrine, nor firm place to call my own,
no known beginning or end,
no ‘sacred and primoridal site’.
I declare war on all icons and finalities,
on all histories that would chain me with my own falseness,
my own pitiful fears.
I know only moments, and lifetimes that are as moments,
and forms that appear with infinite strength, then ‘melt into air’.
I am an architect, a constructor of worlds,
a sensualist who worships the flesh, the melody, a silhouette against the darkening sky.
I cannot know your name. Nor can you know mine.
Tomorrow, we begin together the construction of a city.”
Lebbeus Woods

Sixteen tons

Some people say a man is made out of mud
A poor man's made out of muscle and blood
Muscle and blood and skin and bones
A mind that's a-weak and a back that's strong
You load sixteen tons, what do you get
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store