FRANK GEHRY

One of the Most Influential Conceptual Architects

Frank Gehry, born Frank Owen Goldberg, is one of the most influential conceptual architects of the last few decades.  His work is prominent throughout both North America and Europe, including several landmark buildings and tourist attractions.  Born in Toronto, Ontario in 1929, he took an interest in architectural shapes at a young age.  He played with scraps of wood and paper to shape interesting forms.  Today, he is a Canadian American Pritzker Prize-winning architect and his buildings, including his private residence, have become tourist attractions. His works are often cited as being among the most important works of contemporary architecture, and Gehry is considered to be one of the most influential and inspiring artists of his time.

In 1947, Gehry moved to California.  His work is based out of Los Angeles. His fascination with “everyday” materials is seen throughout his body of work; this inspiration came from working with such materials in his childhood.  His modern-day use of corrugated steel, chain link fencing, unpainted plywood and other utilitarian or "everyday" materials is a link to his art-infused early years.

He studied at Los Angeles City College, and eventually graduated from the University of Southern California's School of Architecture.  He also studied city planning at the Harvard Graduate School of Design for a year, leaving before fully completing the program.

Most of Gehry's work falls within the realm of Architectural Deconstructivism. Deconstructivism surfaced in the 1980’s and explores the deconstruction of shapes and forms.  Deconstructivists have an interest in manipulating an objects “skin” or “envelope” to push its boundaries into interesting dimensions.  The resulting buildings look abnormal and broken - as if the surface has been disturbed or morphed from its original intent.  Deconstructivist architecture is not focused on practicality of function - but more on illusion and visual interest.  Gehry's own Santa Monica residence, his most famous residential build, is a commonly cited example of deconstructivist architecture.  It was so drastically divorced from its original context and in such a manner as to subvert its original spatial intention.

Architectural Gehry’s style at times seems unfinished or even crude, but his work is consistent with the California ‘funk’ art movement in the 1960s and early 1970s, which featured the use of inexpensive found objects and non-traditional media such as clay to make serious art.

Reception of Gehry's work is not always positive. Art historian Hal Foster reads Gehry's architecture as, primarily, in the service of corporate branding. Criticism of his work includes complaints that the buildings waste structural resources by creating functionless forms, do not seem to belong in their surroundings and are apparently designed without accounting for the local climate.

Prominent works by Frank Gehry include:

The Guggenheim Museum in Spain

Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles

Gehry Residence in Santa Monica, California (his biggest claim to fame)

The Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis

Dancing House in Prague

Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto

EMP/SFM

Cinémathèque française in Paris

8 Spruce Street in New York City

MIT Stata Center in Massachusetts

Experience Music Project in Seattle

Vitra Design Museum and MARTa Museum in Germany

Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial

Career Achivements

Gehry was elected to the College of Fellows of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) in 1974, and he has received many national, regional, and local AIA awards, including AIA Los Angeles Chapter Gold Medal. He presently serves on the steering committee of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture. Gehry was awarded the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1989. The Pritzker Prize serves to honor a living architect whose built work demonstrates a combination of those qualities of talent, vision, and commitment, which has produced consistent and significant contributions to humanity and the built environment through the art of architecture. In 1999, he was awarded the AIA Gold Medal "in recognition of a significant body of work of lasting influence on the theory and practice of architecture." He accepted the 2007 The Henry C. Turner Prize for Innovation in Construction Technology from the National Building Museum on behalf of Gehry Partners and Gehry Technologies.

Gehry is a Distinguished Professor of Architecture at Columbia University and teaches advanced design studios at the Yale School of Architecture. He has received honorary doctoral degrees from Occidental College, Whittier College, the Southern California Institute of Architecture, the University of Toronto, the California College of Arts and Crafts, the Technical University of Nova Scotia, the Rhode Island School of Design, the California Institute of the Arts, and the Otis Art Institute at the Parsons School of Design. In 1982 and 1989, he held the Charlotte Davenport Professorship in Architecture at Yale University. In 1984, he held the Eliot Noyes Chair at Harvard University. In January 2011, he joined the University of Southern California (USC) faculty, as the Judge Widney Professor of Architecture.

Points of Interest:

Gehry once appeared as himself in The Simpsons in the episode "The Seven-Beer Snitch", where he parodied himself by intimating that his ideas are derived by looking at a crumpled paper ball.

In 2009, Gehry designed a hat for pop star Lady Gaga, reportedly by using his iPhone.

Gehry designed the trophy for the World Cup of Hockey in 2004.

 

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