well one of the miracles of any artistic
great artistic work is that they are
timeless as Paul valéry the poet writes
an artist is worth a thousand centuries
it is a fact that greatness is measured
by this timelessness today we enjoy a
cave painting of twenty-five thousand
years just as much as a painting of
today it's the miracle of art that it
conveys the presence of the maker and
the presence of human consciousness
brings it right here for any artist I
would say or decide architect it is
important to work on yourself because
each one of us is a construction I have
constructed myself you have constructed
yourself
it is this self construction which is so
important as a young young person and
you can do it by by swallowing the works
of others having friends among artists
and writers and poets and handicraft
people that's how you build up and
construct yourself and only after that
there's a hope that you can also create
something by yourself and reading
reading is perhaps the most important
thing the the book good books are real
sources of wisdom and reading is a
fantastic exercise for imagination
because as we all know although we
rarely stop to think about it
when we read a good book we construct
each one of the figures the person's
every room every space every house every
a in entire cities we construct in our
imagination that's a wonderful exercise
for anyone to train one's imagination is
to keep reading good books and those do
not have to be books on your own
profession I often tell my students of
architecture don't read architecture
books read good literature poetry and
books on on Arts when I began to study
architecture and as a young architect I
I thought that architecture who were the
buildings out there in the world I have
then gradually learned that architecture
is not out there it is a mediation
between the world and our minds so
architecture is something that tells us
good architecture tells us something
about the world it tells us something
about history it tells us about culture
how the society works and finally it
tells us each one of us who we are and
good architectures good art in general
enables us to live a more dignified life
that then we could without the presence
of of art for me I very much believe
what what Dostoyevsky said beauty will
save the world I would say art will save
eventually save the world that is for
possibly the only trustworthy area of of
human culture in today's mad mad world
you