Essay
The Farmer and the Cowman
PHOTO BY JEAN ALLSOPP.
by Brantley Hightower, AIA
The Costal Living Cottages designed by Michael Imber, FAIA, appear traditional, but the materials and construction techniques are thoroughly modern.
The second act of the 1943 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Oklahoma! opens with a song about two seemingly opposing groups: the farmer and the cowman. The sequence includes an impeccably choreographed dance routine, an equally impeccably choreographed fistfight, and some incongruously violent gunplay. It advances the idea that regardless of their differences, “territory folk should stick together� if they hope to forward their case for statehood. Texas architects could learn a thing or two from those Oklahomans: Whether we consider ourselves modernists, traditionalists, or something in between, it is in our best interest to learn to dance together. In contemporary practice and on the pages of this and many magazines, there is a tendency to laud a particular, modernist approach to design. But perhaps it is time to broaden our perspective. Although Modernism began as a self-conscious response to (and oftenconspicuous rejection of) traditional modes of design, a century later it has become the status quo. It is the traditional project that is now the noteworthy outlier.
9/10 2015
Texas Architect 41