Lists to Learn From

[JC Jones]

Mark -

I'd be intrigued by list-type #7 - a chronology of an architect's first 30 courses or his/her body of work.

Peter   

How would looking at 1 designer with, presumably, 1 style/philosophy provide an "education in architecture?"

Do you feel that you've had an education in wine by only drinking and learning about a single producer in Bordeaux?  Do you feel that you've had an education in art if you only study Rembrandt?

Would you even know that there were other styles or philosophies out there if you limited your study to one architect? 

[Peter Pallotta]

Mark - no, I assume it is as much a disconnected string as it is an evolution, and that it is right there at the centre of the apparent dichotomy where the most useful lessons might be learned, i.e. lessons about the unique nature and qualities of this particular art and craft, one that depends more on the raw material/medium of the artist's craft than any other art-form.   Strangely, I might choose Ross, specifically because he strikes me (rightly or wrongly) as unusually un-Zelig like.

Peter

[Rich Goodale]

Mark, JC, Peter and Adam

Keep this going, please as I am in full-bore sprog coddling mode.  I think we are getting somewhere.

Rich

[Peter Pallotta]

"Do you feel that you've had an education in art if you only study Rembrandt?"

JC - I think I do, yes.

If what I really want is an education in what art actually and fundamentally IS and what art actually and fundamentally DOES, how could I not learn  a great deal by studying in detail the works of a master like Rembrandt?

Does my education have to include the desire/ability to make endless comparisons between artists? Would my education in art be less useful if I couldn't speculate and philosophize over cocktails about the network of influences that have shaped the art world and art history?

"In the room the women come and go// Talking of Michelangelo"

JC, Mark - not sure about any of this, of course. But Mark as always asks interesting questions, and this is what my fingers find themselves typing in response

Rich - good. I'll take your word for it.

[Sean_A]

I am not sure what to say about all this Zelig stuff - it don't make sense to me.  However, I can throw a few courses out there (that I have played) for consideration - as a would be part of my personal 30 courses - though I am not at all convinced it takes 30 courses to get a good idea of architecture.  

Sandwich - The only Championship course I know of that takes big hitting and still retains an element of "luck" due to how the land was used.

St Enodoc - A study of short 4s amongst other things

Woodhall Spa - How penal bunkering can make or break a course.  How flat terrain can still be made relevant.

Huntercombe - A look at the architectural bridge between Victorian and Modern architecture.  Also, a study in how the features cab be transferred to nearly all traditional golf sites.

Tobacco Road - Modern architecture doesn't need to be boring or conventional to be good

Pinehurst - How a championship course can test the top players, but 24 cappers needn't lose a ball

Painswick - Accepting the limitations of the land and maximizing what the land has to offer.  Why the "vital statistics" don't matter.



There a few others I have played and some I haven't which I can imagine would be great additions.

Ciao  

[JESII]

I would think studying an individual architects evolution would be very informative...but 30 courses from one might be a bit much...how about 10 courses from three different individuals...of different eras?

See, that's my point, Rich.  Is the constraint 30 designers or 1 course per designer? If the former, picking the "best 30 designers" first and then one course for each is backwards.  We learn from the product not the producer.

I wonder...I think it's a combination...sort of why, or how, did that designer and up with that product?

[JC Jones]

"Do you feel that you've had an education in art if you only study Rembrandt?"

JC - I think I do, yes.

If what I really want is an education in what art actually and fundamentally IS and what art actually and fundamentally DOES, how could I not learn  a great deal by studying in detail the works of a master like Rembrandt?

Because your whole idea of what art is would be Rembrandt's interpretation or better yet, art as manifested by Rembrandt's brush.  You would not have received an education in art, you would have received an education in Rembrandt.

The point of learning about more than one artist or more than one philosophy of art or more than one era of art isnt to talk about who is better over cocktails, but rather, to learn the entirety of what painting is.

When you study in college, philosophy, for example, you dont read Kant and call it good.  You read Plato, Aristotle, Kant, Nietzsche, etc.  Otherwise you arent learning philosophy, you are learning Kant.

[Peter Pallotta]

JC - maybe.

But for what it's worth, my degree is in philosophy. When I read Kant, I learn not only about Kant but about what philosophy IS.  I would have a pretty good idea of what philiosphy IS even if I never went on to read Plato or anyone else. That there are DIFFERENT philosophies/philosophical positions out there would, of course, be a given. And learning how a master uses a brush to create art is a pretty fundamental education, don't you think? That someone paints the madonna while another paints a shoe-maker is, again, a given - and of secondary importance, no?

Jim - yes, that's it in a nutshell I think, i.e. "how and why did that designer end up with that product?"

But it's probably time for me to bow out of this. When guys like Sean show up with concrete examples and insights into each, I'm reminded again that I'm in over my head...

Peter

[Mark Bourgeois]

You're not in over your head than any more than the rest of us and you are not allowed to leave.  The Eliot quote, JC's questions and the philosophy angle remind us of another Eliot exhortation, namely that we can't "have the experience but miss the meaning."

Evidence is using dead Wind to nominate Portmarnock, with commentary from a man who wrote the definitive portrait of the course after a speeding 9-hole tour in a @$% cart! (My G-d, have the editorial standards slipped that much over at the WAOG?)

No quitting, we're all staying until Godot shows up.  I'll be back later.

Mark

[Rich Goodale]

Marco, aka Parodi....

My 9-hole Jeremy Clarkson wannabe tour of Portmarnock in May was at the specific request of the Secretrary even though I told him that I had played the course many times before.  It was useful, even though it confirmed what I had already written.

Ricardo, aka Ricardo

[JC Jones]

JC - maybe.

But for what it's worth, my degree is in philosophy. When I read Kant, I learn not only about Kant but about what philosophy IS.  I would have a pretty good idea of what philiosphy IS even if I never went on to read Plato or anyone else. That there are DIFFERENT philosophies/philosophical positions out there would, of course, be a given. And learning how a master uses a brush to create art is a pretty fundamental education, don't you think? That someone paints the madonna while another paints a shoe-maker is, again, a given - and of secondary importance, no?

Someone w/ a philosophy degree is never in over their head

would you consider your education in philosophy complete if you only read kant?  Learning how a master uses a brush is learning how to run the bulldozer or draw w/ auto-cad.  The brush, however, is moved by the philosophy of the artist and the philosophy of the artist is dictated, generally, by their environment, upbringing, era and knowledge of other artists and their philosophies. 

The renaissance artist and the impressionist artist were both painters, indeed, but they had a different idea of how a picture should be painted and how something should be portrayed.  A study of one artist would yield an education in their style and perhaps the style of other similarly-minded artist of their day, but I dont think it would yield an education in art.

[JC Jones]

Sean,

w/ respect to your list, do the courses you name represent the "best" at showing what you've named them to show?  Does it matter?

[Mark Bourgeois]

Good thing you chose Clarkson as your avatar and not Hammond. Next time J-P P mustn't let the facts disturb the tale...

Mario-Paul Andretti


Sean, a very good start.  It's not so hard, is it?  Would like it very much if you went one level deeper, for example, what is it about #2 that enables it to accomplish what you mention?

 Peter, I tried to find a list of Ross's first-30 designs (first 30 being the original instruction), but couldn't.  Maybe "first 30" doesn't matter.  On the other hand, the man is credited with 407 designs -- one probably could construct any number of "narratives" via careful selection.

But I do see your larger point -- uh, I think -- and per Phil's comments re TOC, what about a list of courses which represented some type of "reply" to TOC?

People say Alister Mackenzie's designs were the least type-able or stereotypical; however, I have become convinced that virtually every design of his was an attempt to work out the core, "deep architecture" of TOC.  (I picture him as Richard Dreyfus in "Close Encounters," repetitively shaping his mashed potatoes into Eden.  A fantasy that sadly is undercut by Mac's criticism of plasticine models.  I digress.)

One way to execute Phil's point then would be to exclude TOC from the list (it's not going in, Phil!), but create a list of courses that were "responses" to TOC, be they amplifications in the case of Mackenzie designs or refutations.

And, of course, explaining how each one referenced TOC.

Alwoodley, Royal Melbourne, ANGC (NLE) and Meadow Club are perhaps the four designs that represent Mac's efforts to work out TOC's deep architecture.

Alternatively, you could do the same with Ross, although it seems like he might have sought the deep architecture of Dornoch.  Well, at least you'll have Speedcart Ricky in your corner.

In which case, we can always stick Phil with the TOC thing since he's the only one to stick up for "the biggest piece of mess I've ever seen."

Mark

[JC Jones]

People say Alister Mackenzie's designs were the least type-able or stereotypical; however, I have become convinced that virtually every design of his was an attempt to work out the core, "deep architecture" of TOC.  (I picture him as Richard Dreyfus in "Close Encounters," repetitively shaping his mashed potatoes into Eden.  A fantasy that sadly is undercut by Mac's criticism of plasticine models.  I digress.)

Mark

Mark,  this is a fascinating theory.  I would love to hear your elaboration and support, perhaps when you have a chance and in another thread. 

Question, which courses, off the top of your head, refute TOC.  And, how can you study something that refutes TOC without having knowledge of what it is refuting?

[Mark Bourgeois]

FYI, here's the GM world top 30, pulled off a thread from last year:

1 Pine Valley
2 Cypress
3 TOC
4 Augusta
5 Pebble Beach

6 Shinnecock
7 RC Down
8 Muirfield
9 Oakmont
10 Merion

11 Sand Hills
12 Portrush Dunluce
13 Pacific Dunes
14 Ballybunion Old
15 Royal Melbourne west

16 NGLA
17 Pinehurst #2
18 Royal Dornoch
19 Turnberry Ailsa
20 Seminole

21 Winged Foot West
22Crystal Downs
23 San Francisco
24 Carnoustie
25 Prairie Dunes

26 Kingston Heath
27 Chicago
28 Oakland Hills
29 Riviera
30 Royal Birkdale


Good news, we can bin this list straight off, not only because it's got TOC, but because it's got Augusta, Turnberry, Oakland Hills and Royal Birkdale, too.

Mark

[Mark Bourgeois]

People say Alister Mackenzie's designs were the least type-able or stereotypical; however, I have become convinced that virtually every design of his was an attempt to work out the core, "deep architecture" of TOC.  (I picture him as Richard Dreyfus in "Close Encounters," repetitively shaping his mashed potatoes into Eden.  A fantasy that sadly is undercut by Mac's criticism of plasticine models.  I digress.)

Mark

Mark,  this is a fascinating theory.  I would love to hear your elaboration and support, perhaps when you have a chance and in another thread. 

Question, which courses, off the top of your head, refute TOC.  And, how can you study something that refutes TOC without having knowledge of what it is refuting?

Third question first: easy, we'll leave it out.  It will play Hitchcock's MacGuffin to our list.

Second question second: what about Pine Valley, Pinnacle Point, Muirfield, and Carnoustie, desert and swamp courses (target-golf), and pretty much every "hard" course out there?  Re Muirfield, Wind contrasted it to TOC by calling it the "most orthodox" links on the Rota.

First question third: one thread at a time!

Mark

[JC Jones]

Third question first: easy, we'll leave it out.  It will play Hitchcock's MacGuffin to our list.

Second question second: what about Pine Valley, Pinnacle Point, Muirfield, and Carnoustie, desert and swamp courses (target-golf), and pretty much every "hard" course out there?  Re Muirfield, Wind contrasted it to TOC by calling it the "most orthodox" links on the Rota.

First question third: one thread at a time!

Mark

Although I wholly reject leaving out TOC, I'll do it for purposes of this exercise.  (or will I...)

While those courses are different than TOC, do they "refute it."  Was the intent of the designer to do as much as possible that is different than TOC?  Is TOC on the designers mind when the course is created and the designer is intentionally trying to refute it?

How do we know if the course refutes TOC if we dont know what the TOC is.  How can you say that target golf refutes TOC w/o knowing that TOC doesnt have target golf?

[Peter Pallotta]

Mark - okay, Pozzo and Lucky have just left, so we'll keep waiting. I may have to go out to the bathroom though...

Thanks for trying to find Ross material. I shouldn't have even tossed his name out; reacting to the Zelig concept off the top of my head.

BUT - you obviously DO understand my larger point, and your post on Mackenzie proves its worth (I think)

What could be a better education on golf course architecture AS golf course architecture than to explore how time and again -- on different sites with different clients and at different times -- Mackenzie tried to work out and manifest the core and fundametal principles of that art-craft?

If NOT ONE other architect had ever practiced or lived or left behind a single example of a finished work, what would be lacking in my knowledge about what golf course design actually IS and DOES and how it actually WORKS and can be MADE TO WORK on the ground, here and there, then and now if I only studied Mackenzie's work, the disconnected string and evolution of it both?

Peter

[JC Jones]

BUT - you obviously DO understand my larger point, and your post on Mackenzie proves its worth (I think)

What could be a better education on golf course architecture AS golf course architecture than to explore how time and again -- on different sites with different clients and at different times -- Mackenzie tried to work out and manifest the core and fundametal principles of that art-craft?

Peter

Peter

Good point and I agree that Mark's theory on MacKenzie supports your position.

Your post leads me to this question, how would you know what the core and fundamental principles of the art-craft were by studying Mackenzie?  How would you know that he was trying to manifest the core and fundamental principles w/o knowing what those core and fundamental principles were?

Wouldnt you have to study TOC to know what the core and fundamental principles were and how, and to what extent, Mackenzie was able to manifest those principles at various sites?

[Peter Pallotta]

JC - that's the question alright, and one that I've mulled around lots of times over the months. But I always come to a dead-end.

I'd suggest that, if such a thing as core and fundamental principles exist, they exist independently of whether or not they were made manifest at TOC. So we'd learn about them "after the fact", as it were, from seeing and learning about what Mackenzie chose and tried to do time and time again at his various courses,

Peter   

[JC Jones]

I'd suggest that, if such a thing as core and fundamental principles exist, they exist independently of whether or not they were made manifest at TOC.

Wow.  I think you are absolutely correct w/ that statement.  I could not agree more.  Perhaps, TOC is the closest a course has come to a complete manifestation of those principles.

So, you would argue that those principles consistent throughout Mackenzie's designs would be indication of what the core and fundamental principles were and where he got them from is irrelevant.  What is relevant is what they are and that you can learn them from his courses alone.

I dont want to put words in your mouth, but am I correct in my interpretation of your argument?

[Mark Bourgeois]

In this case, you probably don't need to know exactly which principles you expect to find before you head out, just that the chosen set of courses could be expected to yield them.

JC, I would argue you have it backwards: to understand the principles of TOC, don't study TOC, study the other courses. The "problem" here is that designers somehow reacted to TOC.  It wasn't TOC that created the principles they used or refuted, they in effect chose the meaning, they defined the principle.

These theses and antitheses weren't TOC's choosing.  As Mackenzie wrote, TOC "simply growed."

There must be a virtually limitless number of axes along which these theses-antitheses can be posed, that's the problem.  Like cherry-picking 30 courses from Ross's 407, TOC (or for that matter any golf course) could stand for anything.  Until someone puts forth antithesis -- or thesis -- TOC means everything and nothing.

For example, Wind labeled Muirfield "orthodox" and therefore set it as opposite to TOC.  But TOC didn't set out to be heterodox -- that's ludicrous.

Easy, randomly-bunkered, out-and-back, etc.: TOC wasn't necessarily designed (modified) to these standards (thesis), but those who reacted to it (antithesis as well as thesis) effectively imposed their judgment upon TOC.  Mackenzie's principles are an example.

Anyway, I've wasted too much time on TOC.

Peter, how bout you write down your thesis, and a starter-list of 10 courses you'd like to see?

Mark

[Mark Bourgeois]

Peter, how did you manage to explain in one line what took me an entire freakin' essay!

[Mark Bourgeois]

Mark - okay, Pozzo and Lucky have just left, so we'll keep waiting. I may have to go out to the bathroom though...

Thanks for trying to find Ross material. I shouldn't have even tossed his name out; reacting to the Zelig concept off the top of my head.

BUT - you obviously DO understand my larger point, and your post on Mackenzie proves its worth (I think)

What could be a better education on golf course architecture AS golf course architecture than to explore how time and again -- on different sites with different clients and at different times -- Mackenzie tried to work out and manifest the core and fundametal principles of that art-craft?

If NOT ONE other architect had ever practiced or lived or left behind a single example of a finished work, what would be lacking in my knowledge about what golf course design actually IS and DOES and how it actually WORKS and can be MADE TO WORK on the ground, here and there, then and now if I only studied Mackenzie's work, the disconnected string and evolution of it both?

Peter

Thinking about this as a controlled or methodical search for principles, ideally you would want to vary as little as possible from one course to another, in order for differences to be both clear and meaningful.

So the idea of choosing a narrow band, be it types of courses or one designer, might be interesting.  The analogy I have in mind is Edward Tufte's graphical concept of "small multiples": "a series of graphics, showing the same combination of variables, indexed by changes in another variable."

The idea is to somehow represent each course, maybe along a set list of architectural elements, and notice how each element changes.  The changes are like a special light enabling us to divine the deep architecture, the underlying principle.

The danger of course is that designers with no variances sometimes masquerade as designers who make small variances.

Mark

[JC Jones]

Peter, how did you manage to explain in one line what took me an entire freakin' essay!

I agree, his one line is brilliant.  And he said this stuff was over his head....

I told ya Peter, anyone w/ a philosophy background is never over their head!!