Frank Gehry

Frank Owen Gehry, CC [ fɹæŋk oʊən ɡɛəɹi ] ( born February 28, 1929 in Toronto, Ontario; actually Ephraim Goldberg ) is a Canadian- American architect and designer living in California since 1947. For his deconstructivist architecture him the 1989 Pritzker Prize. The New York Times described him as the most acclaimed American architect since Frank Lloyd Wright ( 1867-1959 ).

Life

Gehry is the son of Irving and Thelma Goldberg, whose parents in turn were Jewish immigrants from Poland. His father ran up to the government ban on the sale of gaming machines at the bars around Timmins in eastern Ontario, which was a gold mining town at the time. From waste of Grandfather hardware and household goods store he built as a boy together his first houses and cities. At the University of Southern California (USC ) in Los Angeles Gehry studied architecture until 1954, the study he financed with driving of truck transports. His first wife Anita was unhappy with his last name, and she struck him therefore before with her mother in 1954, Goldberg to change in the less obviously Jewish name Gehry, which he did immediately. Then he took on a second degree in Urban Design at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Since 1962 he runs his own architecture firm in Los Angeles under the name of Gehry Partners, LLP. During the first marriage (which ended in divorce in 1968 ) got the couple two daughters.

Since 1975, Gehry is married Berta Isabel Aguilera Panamanian. He has two sons (* 1976) and (* 1979). After the birth of her first son, the family moved to a bigger house from the 1920s. His wife encouraged him to their house in Santa Monica ( where they still live today ( 20xx ) ) boldly according to his ideas to remodel and expand. In 1980 the building was honored by the American Institute of Architects ( AIA).

Architecture

At the beginning of his career, Gehry built conventionally. In the late 1970s he changed his architectural language by starting, supposedly " poor " materials such as plywood, corrugated iron and even use corrugated cardboard in furniture. Characteristic of Gehry's architectural style have since angled planes, tilting rooms, reverse forms and a broken geometry. His buildings have, as typical deconstructivist building, a collage-like character constructed by divergent components are linked, which should realize a merging of the rooms. He also designed numerous interiors and furniture designs.

Buildings and designs

In planning

• Design for new Guggenheim Museum in New York City and Abu Dhabi
• Design for the new Facebook campus
• Design for the Hines Tower at Alexanderplatz in Berlin

Furniture

1969-1972 Gehry designed the cardboard furniture series "Easy Edges". Since 1990, his chairs made ​​of curved, six-to neunlagig glued white maple are manufactured by the U.S. company Knoll International. The series also includes the Cross Check Chair.

Awards (selection)

Literature (selection )

• Mathewson, Casey: Frank O. Gehry: 1969 - today. Feierabend Verlag, Berlin 2006, 600 pp., 700 color illustrations, ISBN 3-89985-270-2.
• Ragheb, J. Fiona and Others: Frank Gehry. Architect. Hatje Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern 2001, 392 pp., 408 fig, ISBN 3-7757-1048-5. (English)

Filmography

• Frank Gehry made ​​a guest appearance, in which he spoke himself, in the television series The Simpsons in the episode Homer the rat.
• 2005 turned U.S. director Sydney Pollack documentary " Sketches of Frank Gehry ".