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" Dullness is the enemy. "
Philip Johnson
Dullness
Enemy
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" The first complete sentence out of my mouth was probably that line about consistency being the hobgoblin of small minds. "
Philip Johnson
Line
Minds
Mouth
" I guess I want to make money just like other people, perhaps more than most people. "
Philip Johnson
Money
Want
Like
" Faith? Haven't any. I'm not a nihilist or a relativist. I don't believe in anything but change. I'm a Heraclitean - you can't step in the same river twice. "
Philip Johnson
Step
River
Faith
" I wish someone would ask me to design a cathedral. "
Philip Johnson
I Wish
Me
Someone
" I like the thought that what we are to do on this earth is embellish it for its greater beauty, so that oncoming generations can look back to the shapes we leave here and get the same thrill that I get in looking back at theirs - at the Parthenon, at Chartres Cathedral. "
Philip Johnson
Thought
Beauty
Looking Back
" The future of architecture is culture. "
Philip Johnson
Culture
Architecture
Future
" I'm a chameleon, so changeable. I see myself as a gadfly and a questioner. "
Philip Johnson
Chameleon
I See
Myself
" The people with money to build today are corporations - they are our popes and Medicis. The sense of pride is why they build. "
Philip Johnson
Pride
Why
Build
" I call myself a traditionalist, although I have fought against tradition all my life. "
Philip Johnson
Myself
Call
Tradition
" Don't build a glass house if you're worried about saving money on heating. "
Philip Johnson
Saving
House
You
" There's only one reason for my whole life, and that's art. Nothing else counts; nothing else gives me pleasure; nothing else gives me satisfaction. "
Philip Johnson
Art
Me
Nothing
" I like to be buttoned onto tradition. The thing is to improve it, twist it and mold it; to make something new of it; not to deny it. The riches of history can be plucked at any point. "
Philip Johnson
Improve
Like
Tradition
" You cannot not know history. "
Philip Johnson
Know
History
You
" Processionalism is primary - how you get from one place to another, the relationships and effects of spaces as you move about in them. That's worked out awfully well in the State Theater. I'm a 'straight-in' man myself; I'm too nervous, I like to know where I am. I also like to know where I'm going. "
Philip Johnson
Place
Myself
You
" If architects weren't arrogant, they wouldn't be architects. I don't know a modest good architect. "
Philip Johnson
Arrogant
Architect
Modest
" In my own work, I'd say I'm a classicist, but I look everywhere for my solutions. I don't study the toilet-living habits of my clients, although that's a popular approach. First, I think of every building in history that has been similar in purpose. Then I think of the functional program - that's a major part of the study. "
Philip Johnson
Think
Work
Purpose
" I get between nine and ten hours of sleep. Go to bed at 8:30 and get up at 6:00 or 6:30 if I oversleep. "
Philip Johnson
Up
Go
Get
" It is wonderful to be in the country in a glass house, because no matter what happens out there, you're nice and safe, you know, cuddled in your little bed, and there it is, raging storms, snowing - wonderful. "
Philip Johnson
House
Country
Know
" I used to think that each phase of life was the end. But now that my view on life is more or less fixed, I believe that change is a great thing. In fact, it's the only real absolute in the world. "
Philip Johnson
Think
World
Change
" Maybe, just maybe, we shall at last come to care for the most important, most challenging, surely the most satisfying of all architectural creations: building cities for people to live in. "
Philip Johnson
Building
Care
Important
" I guess I can't be a great architect. Great architects have a recognizable style. But if every building I did were the same, it would be pretty boring. "
Philip Johnson
Boring
Building
Great
" There's no worse feeling than seeing my buildings and realizing the mistakes. "
Philip Johnson
Mistakes
Feeling
Buildings
" To me, the drive for monumentality is as inbred as the desire for food and sex, regardless of how we denigrate it. Monuments differ in different periods. Each age has its own. "
Philip Johnson
Sex
Drive
Desire
" Doing a house is so much harder than doing a skyscraper. "
Philip Johnson
Than
Doing
House
" Purpose is not necessary to make a building beautiful. "
Philip Johnson
Purpose
Beautiful
Building
" I wouldn't build a building if it wasn't of interest to me as a potential work of art. Why should I? "
Philip Johnson
Me
Art
Why
" There's no such thing as old age. I'm no different now than I was 50 years ago. I'm just having more fun. "
Philip Johnson
Age
Old Age
Old
" Glibness will get your anywhere. "
Philip Johnson
Get
Anywhere
Your
" You're going to change the world? Well, go ahead and try. You'll give it up at a certain point and change yourself instead. "
Philip Johnson
Yourself
You
Change
" How does an artist know when the line that he just painted is good or not good? That's the catch. De Kooning was the greatest of my contemporaries in art, and he knew when he'd done a good line. When he didn't, he threw it away. I wish I'd thrown away some of mine. "
Philip Johnson
Wish
Know
Good