Erdogan's Palace

But the problem is not confined to tyrants”€”if only it were. Tyrants are a species in decline, though it is too early to predict their total extinction. Not only are they less numerous, but they are less bizarre. If we must have tyrants, give me a colorful one at least who will inspire a magic-realist novel or two. If tyranny were the problem, our architecture would be the most beautiful the world has seen. But we must acknowledge that we have moved decisively from the age of grand tyranny to that of petty tyranny, and the problem does not lie with tyrants in the old sense of the word.

Our problem lies elsewhere: Our architects have no ability and our patrons have no taste. The disappearance of taste from the population is an interesting phenomenon, and one that has been little studied (partly because the loss of taste means that it is not even seen as a problem by those who might study it).

Who will look with admiration in coming centuries at the mansions the rich build themselves now? They mostly look tawdry even before they are finished. They are derivative without partaking of the virtues of what they supposedly imitate. Where they are pastiche of former styles, decisive qualities such as proportion are often wrong, as if the architect is ashamed to copy exactly, though he can do no better himself. Admission of that fact, however, is a wound to his amour propre, the avoidance of which is far more important than the beauty or otherwise of that which he builds. Where, on the other hand, originality is the quality sought, what is produced more often than not is something more evocative of a laboratory than a house”€”let alone a home”€”and a bacteriological laboratory at that. We build for petri dishes, not for men.

So perhaps we should not be too hard on the Erdogans of the world who spend hundreds of millions of their people’s money in imitation of Louis XIV only to end up with Cecil B. DeMille (one half expects Charlton Heston to come down the stairs of Erdogan’s palace in his chariot, or Victor Mature to wrestle with a toothless lion at the entrance). In our own small way, we can do no better than Erdogan, the latter-day Suleiman the Magnificent. Kitsch rules the world, and the production of kitsch”€”in all its manifestations”€”is probably the largest industry of all.