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| The now demolished last of the second level pedestrian bridges that once connected all of the University of Illinois Chicago campus. (Photo by Matthew Messner) |
Walter
Netsch's University of Illinois Chicago campus is everything a Brutalist
project should be. Even in its
incomplete form the campus represents one of the most complete, and complex,
examples of modernist field theory, rendered in concrete. Time has not been kind to Netsch's UIC, and
the campus is being reshaped by
additions, renovations, and demolition.
Like the ruins of Rome, the campus will eventually be all but completely
consumed, leaving only a trace of its original grandeur.
Formerly
known as the Circle Campus, named for the Circle freeway interchange just to
the northwest, elevated “Pedestrian Expressways” once crisscrossed the campus
tying the buildings into a field of
concrete suspended as the canopy of
Netsch's “Urban Tree” columns.
The center of the campus even had
its own interchange in the form of the Circle Forum Amphitheater. Each major building was an ever more
ambitious field theory experiment, as rotating geometries intersected into
labyrinthine masses.
Much
of the campus was never finished. The
School of Architecture was only 40% constructed and the library is missing its
wings. As if to ensure that Brutalism
can never strike again, new structures have been erected preventing the
completion of the original design or rebuilding impossible. The epic elevated walkways were demolish in
the 90s, their material cast into Lake Michigan to produce a new reef. This is just as well.
In
time the few remaining aspects will only hint at what once was. Moments of confusing clarity will pop up in
places where bridges go to nowhere and stairs lead into walls. No longer will it be clear why these things
happen. Whether from an uncompleted
building or a dismantled one, it will not matter. Once the remaining artifacts achieve a level
of “archaeological” abstraction we will be able to remember the campus as it
should have been, if not how it actually was.