Modern Architecture

Question 1

Answer 1

Frank Lloyd Wright, Frederick C. Robie House, 1906-1909 (Chicago)

most important American Modernist architect

“prairie style”- low, horizontal houses w/ flat roofs, heavy overhangs- echoed flat plains of midwest; not interest in machine aesthetic, natural surroundings, trees, taken into account; roof dramatically cantilevers outwards, hiding entrances

interior inspired by Japanese archtecture; no dividing walls, warm wood, organic; interior furniture inspired by Art Deco geometric designs

Question 2

Answer 2

Le Corbusier, Villa Savoye, 1929-1930

practised “Purism”- establish univeral aesthetic to unite European continent after WWI, timeless, classical harmony, interplay of geometic forms, no ornament, redutive abstract design; “a machine for living in”

neo-Platonic- unchanging eternal reality masked by constant flux of world perceived by senses

Domino construction system: 6 steel supports placed in concrete slabs in same locations; curtain walls- non load bearing

interior= modern, open plan

Question 3

Answer 3

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Philip Johnson, Seagram Building, 1956-58 (NYC)

steel-frame construction popularized in 1950s

avoid urban crowding by building the “high-rise”

interior floor space gained by height, austere design, “less is more,” form follows function

denies historicist references- “it is what it is made of”- steel, concrete, glass

denial of ornamentation, decoration, minimalist- like AbEx- does not reference outside self