Dada or Doo-Doo?

Sorry, but Sutro’s all wet.

Dirk Sutro’s review of the Observatory House of Rene David and Christine Killory (“Designers Take Novel Approach to Library,” View, Oct. 12) was fawning, superficial and just plain wrong.

He calls the house Deconstructivist. Big deal. It’s still Dada, and, like most Dada, it’s doo-doo.

Sutro compares it with the Pig-With-a-Purple-Eyepatch house down the block. Wrong. That house is odd, but it’s whimsical and it has a strong sense of context. The David-Killory house is, instead, a self-conscious confrontation, a nasty little chunk of psychic violence.

He says the neighbors are warming up to this edifice. I don’t think so. A lot of us who have to pass by it every day have our own name for the bruised-looking, tower-crowned house. We call it The Sore Thumb.

And we say “Beetlejuice” three times, under our breath, every time we see it again. Hasn’t worked yet, but there’s always hope.

JOHN DIBELKA

San Diego