SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE COMPETITION

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28198, 9 February 1957, Page 6

SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE COMPETITION

A Gamble That Succeeded

"DISTINCTIVE PROJECT OF WORLD SIGNIFICANCE"

[By Professor H. INGHAM ASHWORTH, Professor of Architectural Design and History, Sydney University] SYDNEY, February 4. • 'T'HE Sydney Opera House competition was a gamble, which, as one of the assessors of entries says in this article, succeeded and produced a distinctive project of world significance.

The results of the International competition for the proposed new opera house have now been announced and the inevitable controversy has commenced. All architectural competitions are a gamble. The promoters hope the competition will produce a new and original solution to the problem, and each competitor naturally hopes he will be the fortunate winner. Between the promoters and the competitors are the assessors upon whose judgment they must relv.

While it is the assessors’ duty to ensure that, all things considered, the winning scheme is the best solution to the problem, they in their turn hope that among the schemes submitted will be one which in the widest sense will help to forward the development of the architecture of our time. I think that Sydney has proved fortunate in that just such a scheme was in fact among the entries submitted.

Obviously an opera house is a very special kind of building—one which may be erected, but once in a century or two and which thus becomes a landmark, as it were, expressive of the architecture of its day and age While we can appreciate the famous Paris Opera, La Scala in

Milan and. of more recent date, the well-known theatres in Utrecht and Malmo, the Festival Hall in London and the University Theatre in Massachusetts, what a great disaster and disappointment it would have been if this challenge to Australia generally and to architects in particular had resulted in another revival of a bygone age or, even worse, in a pedestrian building, guaranteed not even to evoke criticism.

It is worth reiterating how fortunate we have been in achieving a magnificent site. Fine ready made sites are virtually unobtainable in most capital cities in the world and invariably have to be created with much effort and expense over a long period.

Outstanding Site Here in Sydney the rocky promontory Benelong Point, jutting out with a wonderful harbour, provides a natural outstanding site with few disadvantages that can easily be corrected by man—the unsightly wharves and sheds on the west bank, for example, must ultimately go to provide a fine boulevard link with Circular quay. We have then a fine site and the opportunity to place upon it a great. significant building worthy of the best possible effort any architect could make. All the assessors were of the

opinion that it was particularly important to realise that any ouilding placed upon the site would be seen from all round the- harbour and in many cases from a high level—thus the building must look well from almost any point of view. - Professor Denis Winston has already said “that the winning design gives the impression of a wonderful piece of sculpture deliberately placed to be seen from all points of view” and this opinion expresses exactly the assessors’ initial consideration.

For this reason the assessors considered that the placing of large, massive, box-like buildings, however practical, upon this particular site would be wrong. It was felt that the building must have unity, a sense of movement, and should preferably build up towards the point thrusting out with the harbour.

Essential Requirement Thus the assessors considered that the first essential requirement should be a magnificent general concept—the fact that any building must function was, of course, accepted as a sine qua non. Einstein once said “perfection of means and confusion of aims seems to be characteristic of our age.” Our aim in this instance. I submit, was to find a fine piece of imaginative architecture —the means comprise a secondary issue.

Walter Gropins, one of the great architects of the world, visited this country in 1954 —and I feel a quotation from him is particularly apposite at this moment. He has said: “Our great heritage seems to have left us stunned and bereft of original impulse and, from being participators and creators, we have changed into connoisseurs and scholars. If we investigate the vague feelings of the average man towards the arts, we find that he is timid and that he has developed a humble belief that art is something which has been invented centuries ago in countries like Greece or Italy, and that all we can do about it is to study carefully and apply it.

“There is no natural eager response- to the works of modern artists who try to solve contemporary problems in a contemporary way, but rather a great uneasiness and a strong disbelief that they can turn out something worthy of the great works of their forefathers.”

Imaginative Design Imaginative and original architecture depends just as much on a sympathetic and understanding public as in its designers—an architect in fact can only be as sood as his client allows him to be.

Architecture is the mistress art. We now have the chance to produce a building which could rank among the great buildings of the world. We have a fine site, an imaginative design, and a practical solution to the problem, an imaginative architect behind the design who comes from a small country which already possesses world acclaim for its architecture. Let us not make a muff of our opportunity, and as has happened in the past, sell our birthright for a mess of cottages.—Associated Newspapers’ Feature Services.

(An illustration showing the design of the National Opera House planned for Sydney was printed in “The Press” on February 2,]