Postmodernism

Andrew Paul Wood

​The word “postmodernism” often gets bandied about without much understanding of what it means.

In the architectural context it was a movement that arose with American architects like Robert Venturi and Philip Johnson in the late 1970s.

It was a response to a perception that modernist buildings were too machine-like and lacked a human dimension.

What the postmodern architects did was return to the past.

They looked at historical forms, particularly to the classical tradition and, to a lesser extent, the gothic, and reinterpreted it with modern pragmatism and materials.

They also observed the way architects from Michelangelo to Edwin Lutyens threw out the rule book and playfully experimented with what went where.

As a movement, postmodernism was a spent force by the 2000s, but Timaru does boast one or two examples.

The main building of Ara (the former Aoraki Polytechnic) on Arthur St is essentially inspired by the classical Palladian style of architecture, with a central porch with stylised columns and pediment, and wings on either side.

The modern façade of the Theatre Royal is also postmodern, loosely echoing the Victorian classicism of the earlier structure, but deconstructing the entrance into something lighter and more open.

The classical details have been stripped back or exist more as ornament than as something structural.