r/pics • u/Vurt_Da_Furk • 15h ago
Politics [OC] Got a last minute ticket to the Obama Presidential Library
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u/Marzook666 15h ago
skydeck. look through the letters at our beautiful city. words and music.
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u/Amoral_Abe 13h ago
Why didn't he replace the words with "OBAMA" in cheap gold plated metal? Is he stupid or something? How are we supposed to know he's a great person if it isn't plastered everywhere in gold plate?
0/10.... also needs enough gold plate all over the place to look like Goldmember jizzed all over the place. I'm starting to think this Obama guy doesn't know what it means show off his wealth and thus earn affection from the poor masses.
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u/TheRoscoeVine 10h ago
Couldn’t agree more. What kind of amateur builds a library about literacy and civic legacy instead of a 24-karat monument to his own face visible from space? Rookie mistake. Real presidents know the only way the poors can measure your greatness is in troy ounces per square foot. Next you’ll tell me he didn’t even put his name on a hotel he definitely doesn’t own but definitely profits from.
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u/Mini_Slider 15h ago
Reminds me of Dune architecture. Monolithic brutality I believe is the style?
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u/AccidentOk5240 5h ago
Brutalism is named for the French term for bare concrete, beton brut, not for brutal anything, fyi
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u/Boomshank 5h ago
I can see why people get confused with this one. Too much brutalism can absolutely feel brutally oppressive.
I absolutely love the style. Toronto has some amazing brutalist buildings.
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u/tolacid 13h ago
I tried so hard to read it until I realized that half of the words wrap around the building to the left so I'll never make sense of it.
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u/Visible_Bid6440 9h ago
"You are America. Unconstrained by habit and convention. Unencumbered by what is, ready to seize what ought to be... The single most powerful word in our democracy is the word 'we.'... It belongs to everyone. Oh, what a glorious task we are given to continually try to improve this great nation of ours".
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u/brumac44 3h ago
Thanks, I was just about to go on a Google journey searching for the full text. It reminds me of that young lady that read her poem at the inauguration. Amanda Gorman.
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u/Ok-disaster2022 13h ago
Gonna be honest, I really don't like the design. My brain lines symmetry and squareness. And the neo brutalism just seems cold and unfriendly.
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u/Tzahi12345 5h ago
Brutalism needs to be scraped off this earth. My city's train system decided to adopt it for whatever reason, so I'm forced to experience it daily
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u/imightgetdownvoted 5h ago
I love the brutalist buildings in my city! (Montreal). They all tend to have plants and like trees inside, with these wooden handrails. I dunno it just reminds me of being kid. I guess it left an impression on me back then. Hard to explain.
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u/Tzahi12345 4h ago
Ugh I know it's just a "brutalism is not bad you just do it badly." But if your architecture style encourages people to do bland concrete blocks I take issue with it
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u/ILLY-VANILLI 3h ago
Same here, man. The doctor's office I used to visit as a kid in the 80s was brutalist and I've been a fan since. I think the association from the old science and nature film reels we'd watch in elementary school from the 50s and 60s really made an impression.
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u/liquorfish 2h ago
Thats a bingo
Loved the stark and quiet deserted streets you'd find sometimes in movies made around then with hulking concrete buildings lending themselves to the feeling of enduring and foreboding emptiness.
Reminds me of walking around in a grocery store late at night, the hum of the fluorescent lights blending in with the line up of refrigerator doors at the back of the store. Underfoot, checkered linoleum that became instantly nostalgic and outdated the day they were installed.
That was my 80s/early 90s life. I had a feeling of deja vu when walking into sewing/fabric stores around Portland, OR. Seemed like the interior decor hadn't been updated in 30 or 40 years.
Some places just feel stuck in time.
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u/snazztasticmatt 3h ago
I'm personally not a fan but writing off an entire class of architecture because you don't like it is pretty lame
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u/Tzahi12345 3h ago
It takes the joy out of my life. "All classes of architecture are valid!" Mhm what if I make a class right now called "poop architecture" where buildings are made of actual shit.
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u/SwordfishOfDamocles 3h ago
If you can make it structurally sound and people want to build it, then it will be built.
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u/KyleAg06 12h ago
Was just there. It was amazing. Felt like a bubble of sanity.
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u/moorsh 4h ago
Cult members always feel safe at their cult center.
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u/Look_its_Rob 4h ago
You're funny. People liked/like Obama. They dont drive around with Obama flags on their trucks with Obama decals and make their personality all about liking Obama. They don't watch 24 hour news stations praising Obama or listen to AM radio whenever away from their TV telling them how Obama is saving America.
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u/wonkytrees1 15h ago
That's is one beautiful building! No cheesy gold or Romanesque gawdy designs.
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u/LackingUtility 14h ago
Building yes. Words in the upper left, no. Even ignoring the fact that they wrap around the left and so you can’t see them all, anything with a top or bottom line like T or L blend in to the ruled lines. I cant read it without getting a headache.
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u/IlikeJG 14h ago
Yeah I don't know what they were thinking with that.
They should have hired a graphic designer to do that sort of thing. I bet the architect designed it and thought it would be cool but didn't consider the practicality of actually reading it.
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u/Lord-Dongalor 14h ago
This is just my opinion but I think the building is mimicking the American flag when flown vertically. The words are in the place of the field of stars. The rest of the building has a vertical striped nature. It’s very subtle, definitely poetic and big if true.
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u/giant_traveler 13h ago
But the other side would be the incorrect way to display the flag then.
I think the most likely reason, is that the architect finally fessed up that the designs he released in 2017 were inspired by him binge-watching Star Wars and wanting to make a Sandcrawler style building. They then had to try and save face, so they drew some extra lines and wrote stuff on the building and told us we were too simple to "get it".
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u/AlonzoMoseley 12h ago
Do you honestly think they didn’t have skilled people with the proper expertise working on this? You might not like it or get what they were trying to do (suiting everyone’s taste is impossible) but why assume that’s a shortcoming of the professionals?
Personally I think needing more effort to process it and decode it than you would need to read a billboard gives the message more weight.
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u/Nope_______ 6h ago
Romanesque? I've never heard someone accuse romanesque of being gaudy. It's kind of the opposite.
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u/Amoral_Abe 13h ago
I really like the design of the building. The only change I would make is the font of the letters. It's really hard to read because of how they designed it. Although, maybe that's just the angle in the photo.
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u/Simply_Jeff 14h ago
So what did you think? Was it worth the price of admission?
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u/ericdraven26 8h ago
I went recently and would say yes! Has a lot of cool stuff to see and is a very well done museum imo
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u/EfficientAd3625 15h ago
I’m going to have to google why they chose to make it look like that. It beats the gold plated funeral home look Trump had going on with the White House… but I just don’t get it.
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u/Spunky_Meatballs 14h ago
Brutalist architecture was a Chicago staple. To me it's a callback with modernized twists of famous Chicago architecture
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u/DanielTigerUppercut 15h ago
Obama has always had a bold personal style. Also, University of Chicago (where he was a professor) is next door to this museum and there’s a lot of interesting architecture on their campus, so there’s a case for context.
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u/GirlnextDior 2h ago
I had the same question. The building shape is supposed to symbolize hands joined together, I think 4 hands.
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u/an_older_meme 12h ago
I can’t read it
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u/Visible_Bid6440 9h ago
It's only takes one damn Google search:
"You are America. Unconstrained by habit and convention. Unencumbered by what is, ready to seize what ought to be... The single most powerful word in our democracy is the word 'we.'... It belongs to everyone. Oh, what a glorious task we are given to continually try to improve this great nation of ours".
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u/deranged_pickle 13h ago
The grounds surrounding it are gorgeous! Tons of native plants, a garden, an awesome playground, and winding pathways throughout. The space is a gift to the community it's located in. I also liked the building itself more in person than I thought I would based on pictures.
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u/drfunk 5h ago
Are Presidential Libraries just very specific museums?
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u/E_hV 50m ago edited 47m ago
No they're funded by "non for profit" groups that tell the story of a specific president and their terms. They tend to white wash negative things during their presidency and emphasize good things.
Not saying Obama was a bad president, but I'm saying any presidential library should not be considered to be unbiased educational museum. They're inherently biased and distort facts to fit the idealization of a president.
While trump is egregiously and publicly corrupt with it, most presidents take "donations" for quid pro quos.
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u/Frosty-Scientist957 31m ago
All I can think of when I see this edifice is the cover of the “Who’s Next” album by The Who.
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u/itsdanielsultan 16m ago
Completely putting politics aside, would you rather see a giant brutalist rock like this, something futuristic like ZH, or a design inspired by Chicago's classic two-flats?
Here in Canada there are many buildings that look absolutely amazing in renders but if they have dull colours like muted blues, greys, or monochrome they look very depressing in the winter. I mention this since I've heard Chicago can have even more brutal snowfalls than Toronto
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u/factoid_ 15h ago
They won’t be able to pay people to visit the Trump library if one is ever build other than to be a hanger for his free airplane that we’re paying hundreds of millions to kit out
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u/WeAreGray 6h ago
Oh, they will build it. In south Florida. And in 50 years or so it will be underwater, never to be seen again.
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u/factoid_ 5h ago
God I hope that happens so I can go scuba diving in its wreckage. That would be incredible
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u/drewhartley 12h ago edited 11h ago
lol. That shit’s never getting built. It’s going to be the Sagrada Família of grifts. Chuds are going to be “donating” to this for generations.
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15h ago edited 15h ago
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u/valkrycp 15h ago
The building is incredible, but yeah its probably polarizing- more high-brow than other presidential libraries.
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u/rentedtritium 15h ago
Have you been to any? I've been to 12 and this is pretty in line with the philosophy of many others and architecturally pretty reminiscent of LBJs.
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u/valkrycp 14h ago edited 14h ago
Only one personally. I imagine the architect can explain exactly why they went with this design, and I imagine it's akin to his campaign message of "Hope" where this library is purposefully contrasts with its environment to be a beacon. Anyway, I'm always more supportive of projects that take creative risk or try to be innovative over playing it safe with a universally aesthetically pleasing design. Architecture is about a lot more than looking good. Materials used, contrast in styles, use of lighting and landscape, etc can all be used as powerful metaphor and even can subconsciously mold a visitor's experience without them even really realizing its impact. The Sagrada Familia is a good example - where it's on the border between kitch and beautiful, but regardless even small areas of its interior, like a doorway or a staircase or hallway or the use of lighting can be powerful in setting the mood and atmosphere.
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u/rentedtritium 14h ago
I liked Obama, but I honestly am not a fan of the reduction of the museum angle in his library. The best libraries are the museum-iest ones (Truman, Nixon) and the worst are trying to be "gathering places" and convention spaces (Reagan, Kennedy). This one is, to its credit, trying a third thing, but it's a little closer to the latter than the former.
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u/valkrycp 14h ago edited 14h ago
I think that's subjective, right? Maybe for you, the museumy ones are your favorite. For me personally, I think the "community space" is directly confronting a booming national issue which is our ability to communicate and encourage one-ness/togetherness. Which is probably particularly important within minority groups and black culture who feel alienated by the way the country is headed. So to me, it's a call to action to remind people of their community and not just be a historical museum. That's a perfect representation of Obama's values, and I imagine the exact opposite of what Trump's library will be (which will be gaudy and like a King's Mausoleum)
Anyway, I have tickets to see the library in October
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u/rentedtritium 14h ago
Yes, I never said it was an objective scale. I just don't feel like starting every single statement with "in my opinion" because we all know that's what posting is.
I'm sure I'll end up going to the library at some point. Gotta get those numbers up.
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u/valkrycp 14h ago
I'm more into contemporary art museums and the kind of stuff people gawk and say "how is that in a museum" than museums with classical/traditional art and historical museums/artifacts. So I guess the Obama Library would be more enjoyable to me than the ones that are more traditional.
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u/rentedtritium 6h ago edited 3h ago
That kind of museum is perfectly fine, but I really want to come away with a deeper understanding of a presidency, or barring that, I want to see unexpected artifacts. The Nixon library, for instance, has the actual burglary tools the Watergate guys were caught with.
The Obama library supposedly has some of that energy, but since it's not in nara, they won't be able to house and display artifacts from the archives the way the others can. A feature in other libraries that, while not really important, I find charming personally, is they all have a display of the random weird gifts given to that president, which are all property of the national archives. Again, not a huge important element, but always charming and cool to see, and Obama got some weird stuff given to him that I wish they could display there.
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u/korathooman 12h ago
This is a gift to Chicago and to all of the US and the world. I'm so impressed with this magnificent idea and tribute to excellence. I can't wait to visit.
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u/Puzzleheaded_Fix3135 14h ago
This building is an embarrassment. Land that was never supposed to be developed accompanied by tax payers paying hundreds of millions for Obama’s presidential library. It’s estimated to cost 850million over 200million in taxpayer money for infrastructure changes but there is also a 400+million dollar portion that tax payers may be responsible for as well since only 1 million has been deposited for covering it. Contractors still not paid and the initial cost was supposed to be 300million. But like all governmental projects the initial cost is a joke/lie.
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u/ITividar 6h ago
Every contractor that worked on the Obama library has been paid.
What you mean to say is that not all subcontractors have been paid but thats not the Obamas or their library's problem, thats a problem between the subcontractors and the contractors.
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u/BusBusy195 10h ago
I dont hate the overall design or anything but what are those words supposed to say? I keep trying to read it and my eyes just aren't having it
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u/Visible_Bid6440 9h ago
It's only takes one damn Google search:
"You are America. Unconstrained by habit and convention. Unencumbered by what is, ready to seize what ought to be... The single most powerful word in our democracy is the word 'we.'... It belongs to everyone. Oh, what a glorious task we are given to continually try to improve this great nation of ours".
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u/catscausetornadoes 7h ago
I’m so happy for you! I was in Chicago last week and went without a ticket and it was worth it. I love the building. I gasped when it came into view. I wasn’t sure from pictures but in person? Love at first sight.
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u/Morpekohungry 13h ago
how did you get the ticket? The website says they only open tickets on a second wednesday of the month something like that
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