We’re a country who loves the outback! We don’t need no opera house !”, I can almost imagine them say back in the 50s. They started complaining that their tax money was being spent unnecessarily to build an opera house that they didn’t need in the first place. Naturally, the people of Sydney reacted during the course of construction. What happened was it took 14 years to build, and about 102-million, which is about 1.2 billion today. Originally, the budget for the opera house was 7-millon and the timeframe for construction was 7-years. He moved his entire family to Australia and set up an architectural office there to oversee the construction of his work. Jorn Utzon, an unknown Danish architect, won 5000 dollars and the commission of the project. He picked it up, spread it out, and showed it to once again to the other judges – “This should be our winner PRECISELY because it is different!”. Luckily, there was one judge who came in late and saw the entry in the can. Majority of the judges said that it was too different and too bold to be the new face of Sydney. The entry of Jorn Utzon was already thrown in the trash can. It was a very prestigious and high-profile competition, as over 200 entries were submitted from all over the world. The visiting conductor probably hit an insecure nerve among the city politicians because after he left, they organized an international competition for the design of the Sydney Opera House. He was able to talk to the city officials and told them that if they wanted to be a serious metropolitan, they needed to have a place where culture can flourish they needed an opera house. The idea of having an opera house in Sydney formed in the 940s, when a world-class visiting conductor came to the city to do a performance. It moved e, causing me to just stop and gaze in awe. When I did, I didn’t realize that my jaw was dropped because the sight of the magnificent structure. Any architect you talk to knows what the Sydney Opera House is, so it would be a shame if I didn’t see it with my own eyes. I recently took a trip to Australia where I felt like I was on another architectural pilgrimage. As if the design of the structure wasn’t interesting enough, I found out that the history of the building’s construction was even more colourful. “Jorn Utzon, the architect of the Sydney Opera House, has never seen his masterpiece in the flesh since he left Australia in 1966.” said our animated tour guide. Text and Photos by Jason Buensalido, As seen in Urban Monologues, Business Mirror Newspaper (2007)
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