Unsatisfying 'Architecture'

Press, 12 October 1985, Page 20

Unsatisfying 'Architecture'

Positively Architecture! New Zealand’s Roger Walker. By Gerald Melting. Square One Press, Dunedin, 1985. 107 pp. Illustrations. $3O (paperback). (Reviewed by lan Lochhead) Along with lan Athfield, Roger Walker is one of the best, known New Zealand architects of his generation. He is, furthermore, one of relatively few New Zealand architects who have achieved some degree of international recognition, his work having been published in such prestigious journals as “The Architectural Review” and illustrated in Charles Jenck’s recent survey of contemporary trends, “Current Architecture” (1982).

L ~A book on Roger Walker, ■documenting his buildings, explaining I his highly individual approach to I design, and placing his work within the ’ context of New Zealand architecture ■as well as within the broader i framework of late modernism, would I be a welcome addition to the literature 'on New Zealand architecture. ! Unfortunately '‘Positively i Architecture!” is not such a book. !'* Gerald Melling provides the reader with an uncritical, chronological i survey of Walker’s career which takes i almost no account of the complex ' cross-currents of the contemporary 1 architectural scene. Indeed the i contrast between the conservatism of i the architectural establishment and r < Walker’s unabashed individualism is i presented in such black and white terms as to verge on parody. i Equally extraordinary is the ; omission of any reference to the work ! of the architect with whom Walker ? would seem to have most in common, i lan Athfield, the subject of Melling’s ; earlier book, “Joyful Architecture” ! (1980). The usefulness of the book is > further reduced by the absence of basic : information such as the subject’s birth date, or the dates when many of the . buildings discussed were designed. The j best section of the book is the first chapter in which Walker himself comments on his works and his • approach to architecture as a whole. Anyone who buys this book primarily as a photographic record of the architect’s achievements will be disappointed for many of the illustrations are of poor quality, although there are some noteable exceptions such as the colour photographs of the Wellington Club. The threat of demolition now hanging over this prophetic early example of Walker’s work perhaps explains the haste so evident in the ..book’s production. The Wellington Club is a landmark in this country’s recent architectural history and the reasons for its preservation need to be skilfully and eloquently argued. An important opportunity has thus been lost, for “Positively Architecture” adds little to this debate.