Artwashing: The Obscuring of Social Relations in the Brutalist Renaissance

Ruby Anderson

Using Robin Hood Gardens as my focal point, a former Brutalist housing estate in East London, this paper analyses the notion of “artwashing” and aesthetic fetishization in relation to social housing in the UK. Through this paper, I illustrate how contemporary architectural photography on both a professional and amateur level eclipses understanding about the social relations that produced the necessity for these buildings, and indeed which New Brutalism was trying to make better through its design. By idealising building facades through such imagery, the livelihoods of residents are marginalised, and the poor living conditions they are subjected to at the hands of government sanctioned managed decline relegated to the realm of the unseen. Relating this to Robin Hood Gardens, I assess English Heritage’s decision to not protect the building from demolition, despite the outcry of support for the building’s relevance in architectural history. I argue that this decision should be seen as potently political and rooted in class-based violence, privileging capital accumulation over community good. This paper culminates in an analysis of the V&A’s display of a salvaged section of Robin Hood Gardens at the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale, deeming this to be an act of “artwashing”. The display upheld the building as a significant example of Brutalism in Britain and presented it to an audience of middle-class spectators for its aesthetic prowess, while at the same time working-class families were being expelled from the same very flats being marvelled at. Overall, this paper aims to reveal how the perception of aesthetic appreciation as something neutral is in fact violent and exclusionary; to view Brutalism as solely an architectural style is to depoliticise it, making it palatable to the middle-classes, but in turn further marginalising communities that have been historically ignored.

 In the past decade, a previously unthinkable “avalanche of Brutalist kitsch” has erupted (Hatherley, 2017). As well as gaining traction in academic circles, one of the most distinct features of the so-called “Brutalist Renaissance” is the way it has infiltrated into popular discourse. Instagram feeds have become flooded with the outputs of amateur photographers, snapping photographs of Brutalist exemplars, and visually idealising the form of these sites. Brutalism in the UK has a particularly moralised discourse considering its frequent implementation in post-war social housing projects (Hatherley, 2017). Yet, as detailed by sociologist Nicholas Thoburn, the place of class has been largely expunged from the Brutalist Renaissance, the working class “cleansed” from the buildings that are now being idealised (2018, 613). Using Robin Hood Gardens as my focal point, a former Brutalist housing estate in East London, this essay will question at what point one should consider the social alongside the aesthetic when it comes to the built environment.

As an art history student, I have certainly only been presented with Brutalist buildings as exemplars of Modernist architectural prowess, taught to admire them for their ground-breaking structural and aesthetic novelty. However, one must acknowledge how such admiration only offers a single-dimensional perspective, one which many have dubbed “artwashing” or “fetishization”; the architecture is admired, but the social intent and ambition of these buildings to provide high-quality housing to working-class communities is marginalised, as are the residents (Pritchard, 2018; Slessor, 2017). I will argue that a solely aesthetic appreciation of buildings obscures the social relations that in fact produced the need for such constructions, as well as discrediting the post-war desire to tackle socio-economic inequality in housing; these housing structures not just manifestations of social inequality as they are now so often perceived, but were in fact attempts to rectify this. Therefore, I believe there is an irony to this aesthetic appreciation is that it is more often than not carried out and propagated by an educated middle-class, meaning discussions around the fate of buildings such as Robin Hood Gardens happen around those who actually inhabit them. It is exactly these critical debates that came to the fore in the V&A’s display at the Venice Biennale (2018). The V&A’s display consisted of a salvaged section of Robin Hood Gardens, which had been earmarked for demolition in 2012. This exhibit benefitted a middle-class audience while the rest of this housing complex was demolished, and hundreds of working-class families displaced.

New Brutalism: Social Ambition Meets Design

Robert and Alison Smithson defined their novel New Brutalism as an architectural style with a social awareness. Writing in the late 50s, the pair acknowledged that “up to now Brutalism has been discussed stylistically, whereas its essence is ethical” (Smithsons, 1957, 113). Robin Hood Gardens was the Smithson’s first and only housing estate, and came to be seen as exemplar for the New Brutalist style. The majority of the design features responded directly to requirements put in place by the London County Council (LCC). In 1961, there were 52,000 people on the LCC’s waiting list for housing (Powers, 2009, 67). The LCC, soon becoming the Greater London Council (GLC), required the Smithson’s design to accommodate for 136 people per acre (Powers, 2009, 28). Therefore, Robin Hood Gardens was vast in size, comprised of 214 flats in two dramatic high rise concrete blocks (Thoburn, 2018, 615). The GLC stressed the importance of an open space for residents, to which the Smithson’s responded through the creation of a large garden and artificial mound beneath the blocks (Thoburn, 2018, 615). Furthermore, additional outdoor space was created through the “streets in the sky”, decks running horizontally along the sides of the blocks serving as spaces for resident interaction (Thoburn, 2018, 615; Karp, 2015, 23). The GLC also required the apartments to be insulated from street noise (Powers, 2009, 28). The Smithson’s took great care to reduce noise pollution, constructing a ten-foot-high acoustic wall along the west side of the building’s façade (Karp, 2015, 23).

Yet, when considered in our contemporary moment, the social ambition that shaped every step of the design of Robin Hood Gardens has been lost. Visual reproductions of Brutalist housing estates expunge this humanity out of their facades, presenting them as mere architectural wonders. As delineated by photographer David Cowlard, it is characteristic of contemporary architectural photography to present an idealised vision of the built environment (2014, 207). Frequently devoid of human life, presenting buildings against bright blue sun lit skies, these photographs downplay the habitation and use that is integral to these buildings. While architectural photography intends to dazzle a viewer, this occurs at the expense of any broader understanding of the social relations that dictate the forms of architectural projects; while an aesthetic is celebrated, the purpose for these choices or indeed their consequences is voided. Fundamentally, the role of residents in shaping buildings is not considered.

Observe the work of Luke Hayes, an architectural photographer commissioned by Dezeen to photograph Robin Hood Gardens prior to its demolition (Fig.1). On Hayes’ website, he acknowledges the demolition of this building as something negative, commenting on how attempts were made to save the building as a site of “significant architectural importance” (Hayes, 2015). Hayes’ commentary does not, however, acknowledge the burden this demolition has placed on the past residents of this estate. His images certainly reflect this perspective. In Fig.2, for example, we are presented with a close up of two windows. There is a hint towards the individuality of each family occupying these flats, the curtains behind the window’s different colours and in different states of care. However, even with an extreme closeness to the building, the photographer one step away from being inside the flats of these residents, there is not a recognition in his blurb that their lives may be affected as a result of this building’s demolition.

Observe Fig.3, an image displaying the protruding satellites and undulating surface of the estate. This image represents an abject: we cannot tell which part of the façade this is, with the diagonal angle used by Hayes distorting its location. There are a few hands visible within this image, extending over balconies. However, I was only able to detect these upon a detailed second look. It is as if human life has interrupted this composition, rather than being acknowledged as part of this façade. All set against cloudless skies, this collection of images affirms Cowlard’s hypothesis: this idealisation serves to strip these housing estates from their status as homes, sites where life is carried out. As described by cultural critic Walter Benjamin, without occupants, a dwelling is a mere “shell” which comes to “bear the impression of its occupant” once it has been lived in (2003, 220). To exclude human life from these architectural images is, therefore, to relegate these housing

complexes to the “shells” they were when they were first constructed, appreciated only for their exterior but not for the roles the lives of the occupants have played in shaping them from within. This can be expanded upon when you consider the role of Instagram in creating this idealised vision of Brutalist social housing: when searching #robinhoodgardens on the app, the same sun lit skies and dramatic angles greet you (Fig.4). This idealisation is now not only occurring on the level of architectural publication, but on an amateur level also, meaning this idealised perception is becoming increasingly commonplace. As discussed by Susan Sontag, the “problem” with photography is “not that people remember through photographs, but that they remember only the photographs”, this in turn eclipsing any other “forms of understanding” about how that particular image came to be (2003, unpaginated).

Furthermore, this idealisation also denies the violent process of managed decline that many housing estates in London are condemned to. As stated by Stephen Pritchard, a community artist and researcher whose work focuses on fostering creativity in working-class communities, Robin Hood Gardens was subjected to many years of under-investment; it was purposefully run down, so the English Heritage’s decision to demolish it seemed justifiable (2017). For example, Margaret Hodge, Heritage Minister who ruled against listing Robin Hood Gardens, stated: “Anyone who wants to list that place should try living there. It is simply not fit for purpose, and I cannot believe that anyone is trying to list it” (Hodge cited in Thoburn, 2018, 619). As is so frequently the case, significant blame for the perceived failings of this building was placed in the hands of the residents, rather than in the hands of the government forces in charge of its management. Following the demolition of the estate, the land was given over to private capital, the site becoming part of the Blackwall Reach development project. Considering this, photographic commissions such as Hayes’ should be viewed as almost sardonic, apotheosizing a site that has already been condemned to destruction as a result of its uninhabitable nature, negating the potentially uncomfortable lived experiences of residents in UK council estates.

Concrete Hostility or Social Hostility?

As delineated by Thoburn, Brutalist buildings are either deemed to be “concrete monstrosities,” or “modernist masterpieces” by the middle-class audiences that critically assess them (2018, 613). The former was used as an argument not to list Robin Hood Gardens as a site of architectural relevance. However, as Thoburn continues, this decision was startlingly at odds with broader architectural opinion about this building (2018, 620). When the announcement of Robin Hood Gardens’ demolition was made in 2008, “one of the largest ever campaigns in architectural preservation” began (V&A, 2018). World renowned architects such as Zaha Hadid and Richard Rogers spoke out about the importance of this site (V&A, 2018), with Rogers describing it as post-war Britain’s “most important” social housing development (Rogers cited in Frearson, 2015). The decision to demolish, therefore, should be seen as potently political, as opposed to a disregard for architectural history. It is not the concrete substance that is hostile, but rather the “social form and visibility of the working-class estate” that is the “real object of hostility”, Thoburn continues (2018, 619). One must consider that, if the building had a different, more palatable function, it may still stand as an architectural “masterpiece” today.

The political motivation behind this building’s demolition is made clearer still through the V&A’s display. This institution salvaged a three-storey section of Robin Hood Gardens, or a single maisonette, and displayed this at the Venice Biennale “as a significant example of the Brutalist movement in architecture” (V&A, 2018) (Fig.6 and Fig.7). Despite the previous image of “concrete monstrosity” used to justify the site’s demolition, here “modernist masterpiece” took a last-minute role (Thoburn, 2018, 620). This is where the ethical question of Brutalism becomes operative: for many, this “aesthetic appreciation,” carried out solely by the middle-class audience of the Venice Biennale, was “artwashing” (Pritchard, 2018). Pritchard defines artwashing as a process by which aesthetics are used to “gloss over social cleansing and gentrification” (2017), creating a veneer of social responsibility which in fact further disguises the oppression of marginalised members of the community (2018). Pritchard applied the term to the V&A’s actions: for while the middle-classes were gaining pleasure from the viewership of an important architectural site, working-class families were being expelled from it (2018). One must consider at what point the knowledge gained from aesthetic appreciation is not worth the pain that is inflicted by this class-based violence, a reflection of a financialised mode of reason that explicitly privileges capital accumulation over community good (Scanlan, 2004). A useful adjunct to this debate is the example of Ernő Goldfinger’s Balfron Tower, another Brutalist Housing Estate in Tower Hamlets. In a familiar tale, despite having been left to decline, the architectural value of this tower was recognised, and the building’s “heritage” value deemed it “too good” to be social housing. The tower was therefore decanted and handed over to developers to refurbish as a high-end residential tower, housing young-professionals and creatives. As described by David Roberts, who conducted research with residents of Goldfinger’s tower, there was a “misconception” at the heart the proposed refurbishments of Balfron, this misconception being a “fundamental distinction between heritage that pays tribute to these egalitarian principles and heritage that enacts these principles”; Roberts argues that the latter did not come to fruition during the refurbishment process (Roberts, 2017, 143). Whether demolished or refurbished, these case studies side by side testify to working class marginalisation, the livelihoods of residents not considered as a factor when a building was deemed unliveable, despite these buildings being praised for serving this social function when first erected.

While those who live in social housing are those most affected by regeneration projects, not only vilified but literally displaced from their homes, the debates around an estate’s demolition and indeed about the potential architectural importance it may hold are largely conducted by members of the middle-class. This is not to say residents do not care about the regeneration of their buildings. As explained by Insa Koch, whose ethnographic research is centred around Britain’s council estates, a lack of participation from residents of UK estates does not indicate political apathy (2016, 282). Rather, it signifies a disenchantment with a political system that has made them feel excluded. Koch describes how a “vernacular politics” occurs as an alternative to mainstream politics, which residents consider to be a distant political system (2016, 282). Artist Jessie Brennan conducted a collaborative project with current and former residents of Robin Hood Gardens, creating a publication of visual representations and ethnographic case studies prior to its demolition (2015) (Fig.5). For Brennan, it was “nonsense to believe that residents do not care about the regeneration of Robin Hood Gardens – they deeply do, and they question whom it’s all really for” (2016, 116). Brennan cites former resident Adbul Kalam in her ethnography: “when mates sit down, what they say is, ‘they’re basically driving the poor people out’” (Kalam cited in Brennan, 2015, 65). Similarly, 13-year-old Sadia Aziza explained that “it’s like they’re driving us away to replace us with more wealthy people” (Aziza cited in Brennan, 2015, 61). These quotations clearly demonstrate the concern residents of the estate had regarding the demolition of their homes. To exhibit the one flat that was not demolished at a world-renowned architecture showcase, while the hundreds of others that were destroyed left families displaced, demonstrates how this concern was completely disregarded.

The irony to these middle-class discussions was noted by crowds outside of the V&A who gathered to protest the exhibition. Video footage of the event captured protestors condemning this institution, stating: “we consider this a violent and arrogant act”, and that “[council estates are not] objects of contemplation for the audience of Venice” (Rainbow Collective, 2018). Crucially, as one protestor said to the camera, these debates “should not be discussed in Venice, [they] should be discussed in London” (Rainbow Collective, 2018). One should acknowledge that the association of Brutalist architecture with social housing is something particularly unique to the United Kingdom. In the United States, for example, Brutalism is characteristic of government buildings and university campuses (Hatherley, 2017). Therefore, to exhibit this politically charged building away from its original location is to divorce it from this particularly moralised context, and imply that the social issues that come coupled with its materiality can simply be brushed to one side and ignored on the international stage.

The V&A’s director, Tristram Hunt, refuted all allegations of artwashing, responding directly to his critics in an Art Newspaper article (2018). Hunt claimed that the V&A’s pavilion “form[ed] part of a broader engagement with the question of social housing” (2018). Hunt’s retort continues: “more interesting is the accusations of some critics (not current or former members of Robin Hood Gardens) that acquiring and exhibiting a section of the estate validates the so-called ‘social cleansing’ taking place in East London” (2018). The tone of Hunt’s statement is insipid. His bracketed observation, seeking to undermine those who criticise him, actually makes more pertinent the accusations against him: he is literally acknowledging the fact that residents are not consulted in these life-altering decisions, and indeed attempting to use this fact in his favour. “[S]o-called ‘social cleansing’” suggests that Hunt does not believe this process is occurring in London’s boroughs, or perhaps that it is not detrimental; he negates the issue, mocking those who have attempted to highlight its consequences. It seems unlikely to me that the V&A’s pavilion formed a genuine “engagement with the question of social housing” therefore, when its director does not seem to believe that regeneration projects have a moralised complication.

Aesthetic appreciation is frequently made out to be a neutral undertaking. Hunt perpetuates this idea in his retort, arguing that museums which display art objects and architecture can be neutral sites: “I see the role of the museum not as a political force, but as a civic exchange” (2018). He expressed resentment towards those who want the V&A to be a “vehicle for social justice”, again sardonically (2018). This conception of neutrality is something criticised by Alice Proctor, whose “Uncomfortable Art Tours” overtly politicise museum collections while guiding people through them. Proctor argues that everything in a museum is political, no matter how aesthetically intriguing it is, for every object in existence has been shaped by the politics that made it (2020, 16). For Proctor, a museum’s pursuit of “neutrality” is really an ardent upholding of the “status quo”, wherein the middle-class audiences of these particular institutions maintain the power they already hold (2020, 16). It seems to me that an aesthetic appreciation of architecture should be subject to this critique even more obviously than an art object – they are sites literally lived in by residents, their lives shaped by and indeed shaping these sites. Housing estates are certainly not sites that can be stripped of their political dimension considering the turbulent neo-liberal history that has dictated their upkeep and decline. Indeed, it is a privilege to believe this can be voided.

Conclusion

As described by Victor Buchli, a professor of material culture, architecture is an “empirical and durable expression” of the more “abstracted forms of ‘social structure’” (2002, 208). To appreciate a building’s aesthetics, and lament its demolition only from the perspective of a lost architectural wonder, is to deny how its relevance has been shaped by the residents that occupy it, that quite literally give a building life, a purpose for being. Thoburn argues that Brutalist architecture in social housing ceases to be itself architecturally when it is separated from the social relations which necessitated its construction, and indeed shape sites for the years of their existence (2018, 616). Indeed, it is these relations that made the Brutalist style a radical one (Thoburn, 2018, 616). To view Brutalism as “mere style” is at once to depoliticise it, making it functional to “middle-class appropriation” (Thoburn, 2018, 616). Therefore, a cross over between an art historical and anthropological analysis can reveal how the perceived neutrality of aesthetic appreciation can in fact be a violent, exclusionary act. In fact, to situate these buildings within an architectural history, as the V&A’s exhibition of Robin Hood Gardens did, but to concurrently deny the painful social history that comes wound up within their very design, is to entirely avoid accountability. The middle-classes who display and consume Brutalist social housing as if it were mere art object ignore the hand that the middle-classes have in the managed decline of buildings, or indeed that they are the ones to benefit from this system of regeneration.

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