„According to Loos, the crime lies in the misuse of ornament,“ notes Long

Together they explore how Loos became a mythic figure and why he was long known mainly for his provocative writings, while his architectural work remained overlooked. Long also discusses how this image was reinforced by later interpretations in secondary literature as well as by Loos’s own reluctance to publicize and promote his architectural work.

The first part of the conversation focuses primarily on a new reading of the essay „Ornament and Crime“ and on how Loos’s attitude toward ornament evolved over time. Long demonstrates that Loos’s famous formulation was not originally intended as a normative judgment, but rather as a description of a cultural and evolutionary process, referring mainly to objects of everyday use. He distinguishes between the early Loos, who observed these changes from a distance, and the later Loos, who—after a series of personal and professional disappointments—began to present himself as their initiator. The discussion thus develops into a broader reflection on why it is necessary today to reread Loos’s work in its full depth and within the historical context in which the architect’s ideas took shape.

The conversation is conducted in English.

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Link to podcast: https://podcasty.seznam.cz/podcast/od-zapadu-nefouka

What you’ll hear in the interview:

01:18 – Adolf Loos between myth and reality

08:21 – Loos’s intellectual standing

14:05 – Loos as a writer

33:04 – Reconsidering Loos’s Essay „Ornament and Crime“

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Key figures, projects, and publications discussed:

Prof. Christopher Long, Ph.D., studied at the universities of Graz, Munich, and Vienna, and received his doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin in 1993. From 1994 to 1995, he taught at the Central European University in Prague. His long-term focus is on the history of modern architecture, with a particular emphasis on Central Europe between 1880 and the present. Trained in history rather than architecture, he draws on approaches from cultural and intellectual history, as well as political and economic history. He has studied issues of cultural representation in architecture, the broader ideological context of architectural theory in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and the development of architectural education. Professor Long’s interests also include modern design in Austria, the Czech lands, and the United States, as well as graphic design. He has worked on several exhibitions and publishes on a wide range of topics. In 2022, he received an honorary doctorate from the Prague Academy of Fine Arts and Design. Since 2017, six publications dedicated to the works of Adolf Loos and his contemporaries have been published in Czech translation. This year, they should be followed by a Czech version of the aforementioned book, Adolf Loos: Ruminations and Revisions. Essays.

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Editing: Jan Balcar, Radka Šámalová, Petr Klíma

Music, sound design: Jan Balcar

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