Frank Gehry, Architect (Guggenheim Museum Publications)
(Since the 1997 completion of what many consider his great...)
Since the 1997 completion of what many consider his greatest achievementthe stunning Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, SpainFrank O. Gehry has soared to the forefront of contemporary American architecture. Long recognized by his peers for his innovative designs, Gehry now enjoys a new level of prominence in the popular imagination. This book, the catalogue of the first large-scale retrospective of Gehrys work in 15 years, examines the architects unique vision and provides the historical perspective with which to interpret his audacious accomplishments.
Essays by noted museum curators and architectural historians explore his iconoclastic spirit and trace his melding of unconventional materials and forms. Photographs, drawings, plans, and scale models communicate the breadth and complexity of Gehrys work and show how, in his view of architecture as sculptural space, Gehry has opened up a world of new possibilities for architecture.
Frank Owen Gehry is a Canadian-born American architect, residing in Los Angeles.
Background
Gehry was born Frank Owen Goldberg on February 28, 1929, in Toronto, Ontario, to parents Sadie Thelma (née Kaplanski/Caplan) and Irving Goldberg. His father was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Russian Jewish parents, and his mother was a Polish Jewish immigrant born in Łódź.
In 1947, his family immigrated to the United States settling in California.
Education
He studied at the University of Southern California from 1949 to 1951.
After receiving practical experience as a designer in a Los Angeles firm, he returned to USC to complete his Bachelor of Architecture degree in 1954.
Career
Gehry returned to Los Angeles to work for Victor Gruen Associates, to whom he had been apprenticed while at the USC School of Architecture. In 1957 he was given the chance to design his first private residence at the age of 28, with friend and old classmate Greg Walsh. Construction was done by another neighbor across the street from his wife's family, Charlie Sockler.
In 1961, he moved to Paris where he worked for architect Andre Remondet. In 1962, Gehry established a practice in Los Angeles which became Frank Gehry and Associates in 1967 and then Gehry Partners in 2001. Gehry's earliest commissions were all in Southern California, where he designed a number of innovative commercial structures such as Santa Monica Place (1980) and residential buildings such as the eccentric Norton House (1984) in Venice, California.
Among these works, however, Gehry's most notable design may be the renovation of his own Santa Monica residence. Originally built in 1920 and purchased by Gehry in 1977, the house features a metallic exterior wrapped around the original building that leaves many of the original details visible. Gehry still resides there.
Other completed buildings designed by Gehry during the 1980s include the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium (1981) in San Pedro and the California Aerospace Museum (1984) at the California Museum of Science and Industry in Los Angeles.
Though Gehry continued to design other notable buildings in California such as the Chiat/Day Building (1991) in Venice in collaboration with Claes Oldenburg, which is well known for its massive sculpture of binoculars, he also began to receive larger national and international commissions. These include Gehry's first European commission, the Vitra International Furniture Manufacturing Facility and Design Museum in Germany completed in 1989. This was soon followed by other major commissions including the Frederick Weisman Museum of Art (1993) in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the Cinémathèque Française (1994) in Paris, and the Dancing House (1996) in Prague.
In 1997, Gehry vaulted to a new level of international acclaim when the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao opened in Bilbao, Spain. Hailed by The New Yorker as a "masterpiece of the twentieth century" and legendary architect Philip Johnson as "the greatest building of our time", the museum became famous for its striking yet aesthetically pleasing design and the economic effect that it had on the city.
Since then, Gehry has regularly won major commissions and has further established himself as one of the world's most notable architects.
(Since the 1997 completion of what many consider his great...)
Other Work
"El Peix", fish sculpture located in front of the Port Olímpic, in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain (1992)
Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (2002)
BP Pedestrian Bridge, Millennium Park, Chicago (2004)
Hotel Marqués de Riscal in Elciego, Spain (2006)
Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles (2003)
The Museum of Pop Culture in Seattle (2000)
Gehry Tower in Hanover, Germany (2001)
Dancing House in Prague (1996)
Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York (2003)
Views
Gehry's idol was Frank Lloyd Wright, who created a number of homes in the Los Angeles area during the 1926.
Quotations:
Gehry stated once that "I approach each building as a sculptural object. "
Membership
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. He is a Senior Fellow of the Design Futures Council and serves on the steering committee of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture.
He is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Personality
Gehry is known for his choice of unusual materials as well as his architectural philosophy. His selection of materials such as corrugated metal lends some of Gehry's designs an unfinished or even crude aesthetic. This consistent aesthetic has made Gehry one of the most distinctive and easily recognizable designers of the recent past. Critics of Gehry’s work have charged, however, that his designs are not thoughtful of contextual concerns and frequently do not make the best use of valuable urban space.
Quotes from others about the person
The jury cited Gehry as "Always open to experimentation, he has as well a sureness and maturity that resists, in the same way that Picasso did, being bound either by critical acceptance or his successes. His buildings are juxtaposed collages of spaces and materials that make users appreciative of both the theatre and the back-stage, simultaneously revealed."
Interests
Sport & Clubs
Gehry is an avid fan of ice hockey. He began a hockey league in his office, FOG (which stands for Frank Owen Gehry), though he no longer plays with them. In 2004, he designed the trophy for the World Cup of Hockey.
Gehry is a member of the California Yacht Club in Marina Del Rey, California, and enjoys sailing with his fiberglass-hulled yacht, "Foggy".
Connections
He married Anita Snyder in 1952. Four years after marrying Anita, he changed his name to Frank O. Gehry in 1956. It was her suggestion, as he had faced anti-Semitism as a child and as undergraduate.
He moved to Cambridge in 1956 along with family, to study city planning at Harvard. However, he left the course in between, as he was disheartened.
After a divorce from Anita in 1966, he married his second and current wife, Berta Isabela Aguilera in 1975. He has two daughters from his first marriage and two sons from the second.