“According to Loos, the crime lies in the misuse of ornament,” notes Christopher Long.

In the next episode of the podcast series on Adolf Loos, Petr Klíma talks to American art and architecture historian Christopher Long about his new book Adolf Loos: Ruminations and Revisions. Essays . Together they explore how Loos became a mythic figure and why he was long known mainly for his provocative writings, while his architectural work remained overlooked. Long also discusses how this image was reinforced by later interpretations in secondary literature as well as by Loos’s own reluctance to publicize and promote his architectural work.

The first part of the conversation focuses primarily on a new reading of the essay “Ornament and Crime” and on how Loos’s attitude toward ornament evolved over time. Long demonstrates that Loos’s famous formulation was not originally intended as a normative judgment, but rather as a description of a cultural and evolutionary process, referring mainly to objects of everyday use. He distinguishes between the early Loos, who observed these changes from a distance, and the later Loos, who—after a series of personal and professional disappointments—began to present himself as their initiator. The discussion thus develops into a broader reflection on why it is necessary today to reread Loos’s work in its full depth and within the historical context in which the architect’s ideas took shape.

The conversation is conducted in English.

What you’ll hear in the interview:

(00:00) intro

(01:18) Adolf Loos between myth and reality

(08:21) Loos’s intellectual standing

(14:05) Loos as a writer

(33:04) Reconsidering Loos’s Essay “Ornament and Crime”

Editing: Petr Klíma, Jan Balcar, Radka Šámalová

Music, sound design: Jan Balcar

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