Josep Lluís Sert

Josep Lluís Sert i López ( born July 1, 1902 in Barcelona, Spain, † March 15, 1983 ) was a Spanish architect and urban planner.

Life

Born in 1902 in Barcelona, the Catalan Sert interested early for the work of Gaudí as well as for painting his uncle Josep Maria Sert. He studied at the School of Architecture of Barcelona.

After graduating from the Escuela Superior de Architectura, where he had studied from 1921 to 1928, he worked in Paris with Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret together. With them and with other like-minded people, he founded the GATEPAC (Spanish Grupo de Artistas y Técnicos Españoles para la Arquitectura Contemporánea, " group of Spanish artists and technicians for modern architecture ").

Sert designed the Spanish Pavilion for the World Expo 1937. 1939 he moved to America and worked on urban development projects, including in Bogota and Havana.

In 1952, Sert a one-year visiting professorship at Yale University. The following year, he succeeded Walter Gropius's dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Design, where he remained until 1969.

During his time at Harvard Sert founded in 1955 with a number of partners an architectural firm and worked on projects in the United States, including office buildings, public buildings, purchase and residential buildings. In the neighborhood of Harvard University Sert created some of his most famous buildings.

Between 1947 and 1956, Josep Lluis Sert was President of the Congrès International d' Architecture Moderne, its development is closely connected with the history of this group.

His work combines the concerns of urban planning with an architecture that has its roots in the Mediterranean area. He stepped into the architecture for an intense relationship to art. He had especially during his years in Paris contact with Pablo Picasso, Fernand Léger, Joan Miró and Alexander Calder.

Works

His most famous buildings are the pavilion for the Spanish Republic at the Paris World Exhibition of 1937, he created together with Luis Lacasa, 1956 the workshop for Joan Miró in Cala Major, a suburb of Palma de Mallorca, the Harvard dormitory blocks with their troubled contours ( 1962-64 ) the U.S. embassy in Baghdad and the Fondation Maeght in Saint -Paul -de- Vence in Nice France ( 1959-64 ) and the Finca houses on Ibiza, such as Casa Sert ( 1968-1971 ).

The Fondation Maeght ingeniously combines nature and architecture. The building of concrete and glass, which rests on a rock base, enclosing a courtyard, which is open to one side. The interiors with white walls and large openings through which one can see the landscape, are illuminated by the light reflected from the roof of natural light. A similar construction, the study center of contemporary art, the Fundació Joan Miró, to Barcelona. It was built in 1975 by Sert.

Buildings (selection)

• Dispensario Antituberculoso, Barcelona
• Edificio de la calle Anuncios Muntaner, Barcelona
• Escuela del Segell per infância, Arenys de Mar
• Pavilion of la República, Barcelona
• Spanish Pavilion, 1937 World's Fair, Paris
• Fundació Joan Miró, Barcelona
• Fundació Pilar i Joan Miró a Mallorca, Palma
• Fondation Maeght, Saint -Paul -de- Vence
• Science Centre, Harvard University, Boston
• Apartment building at Harvard University, Boston
• Holyoke Centre, Boston
• Embassy of the United States, Baghdad
• Carmel de la Paix à Mazille, Saône -et -Loire, 1971