Abstract calls for creative activity and enthusiastic striving to shape the future without cognition of contemporary reality turns out to be fruitless and harmful dreaming. However good the impulses guiding some critics, or the disregard of architects for reality in creative work and thought, means that architecture itself is akin to illusory visions and vague allegories lacking vital social significance. However, architecture is founded on the purposeful generalization of life’s processes and phenomena and represents typical and universal features of human life through depiction of man’s changing relations with the actual world. Contrary to the narrowly selective approach of some nonrealistic trends, realism in the variety of forms and means of architectural expression is its essential feature. This variety of forms is the result of close contact with reality. The main thing to remember is that definitions are often only approximations and that the key to realism is in understanding the dialectics of its development. |
