{{Short description|Estonian-American architect (1901–1974)}} {{for-multi|the American computer scientist|Louis B. Kahn|the French Jewish admiral|Louis Kahn (admiral)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=November 2021}} {{Infobox architect |name = Louis Kahn |image = LouisKahn.jpg |caption = Kahn in June 1969 |birth_name = Itze-Leib Schmuilowsky |birth_date = {{birth date|1901|2|20}} |birth_place = Kuressaare, Governorate of Livonia, Russian Empire (present-day Kuressaare, Estonia)<ref name=ekspress>{{cite journal| url=http://www.arhliit.ee/uudised/artiklid/4435/| publisher=Eesti Ekspress| language=et| title=Kus sündis Louis Kahn?| trans-title=Where was Louis Kahn born?| first1=Karin| last1=Paulus| first2=Olavi| last2=Pesti| date=November 23, 2006| journal=EAA Architecture News| archive-date=October 3, 2023| access-date=January 8, 2013| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231003233715/http://www.arhliit.ee/uudised/artiklid/4435/| url-status=dead}}</ref> |death_date = {{death date and age|1974|3|17|1901|2|20}} |death_place = New York City, U.S. |practice = |significant_buildings = Jatiya Sangsad Bhaban<br>Yale University Art Gallery<br>Salk Institute<br>Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad<br>Phillips Exeter Academy Library<br>Kimbell Art Museum |significant_projects = Center of Philadelphia, Urban and Traffic Study |awards = AIA Gold Medal<br>RIBA Gold Medal }}
'''Louis Isadore Kahn''' (born '''Itze-Leib Schmuilowsky'''; {{OldStyleDate|March 5|1901|February 20}} – March 17, 1974) was an Estonian-born American architect<ref>{{cite book |quote=The Estonian-born architect Kahn (1901–1974), who immigrated with his family to Philadelphia in 1906 |title=My Grandparents, My Parents and I: Jewish art and culture |last=Van Voolen |first=Edward |date=September 30, 2006 |publisher=Prestel |isbn= 978-3791333625 |page=138 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mqBPAAAAMAAJ&q=%22The+Estonian-born+architect+Kahn+(1901-1974),+who+immigrated+with+his+family+to+Philadelphia+in+1906%22 |access-date=July 23, 2019}}</ref> based in Philadelphia. After working in various capacities for several firms in Philadelphia, he founded his own atelier in 1935. While continuing his private practice, he served as a design critic and professor of architecture at Yale School of Architecture from 1947 to 1957. From 1957 until his death, he was a professor of architecture at the School of Design at the University of Pennsylvania.
Kahn created a style that was monumental and monolithic; his heavy buildings for the most part do not hide their weight, their materials, or the way they are assembled. He was awarded the AIA Gold Medal and the RIBA Gold Medal. At the time of his death, he was considered by some as "America's foremost living architect."<ref name=":0" />
==Biography==
===Early life=== thumb|Jesse Oser House, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania (1940) Louis Kahn, whose original name was Itze-Leib (Leiser-Itze) Schmuilowsky (Schmalowski), was born into a poor Jewish family in the Russian Empire (present-day Estonia). His exact birthplace is disputed, but it is widely regarded to be Kuressaare, Saaremaa,<ref>[http://ekspress.delfi.ee/areen/kus-sundis-louis-kahn?id=69018591 Kus sündis Louis Kahn?]</ref> although some sources mention Pärnu.<ref>[http://en.nai.nl/content/1286439/biography Kahn biography]</ref>
He spent his early childhood in Kuressaare on the Baltic Sea island of Saaremaa, then part of the Governorate of Livonia of the Russian Empire. At the age of three, he saw coals in the stove and was captivated by the light of the coal. He put the coal in his apron, which caught on fire and burned his face.<ref name="Scars">{{cite web| url=http://paber.ekspress.ee/viewdoc/48EBEEC2DFC8B555C22571F1003A8A93| title=Kus sündis Louis Kahn?| publisher=Eesti Ekspress| language=et| access-date=September 28, 2006}}</ref> He carried these scars for the rest of his life.<ref>Commstock, Paul. [http://calitreview.com/224 "An Interview with Louis Kahn Biographer Carter Wiseman,"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110725065117/http://calitreview.com/224 |date=July 25, 2011 }} ''California Literary Review''. June 15, 2007.</ref>
In 1906, his family emigrated to the United States, as they feared that his father would be recalled into the military during the Russo-Japanese War. His birth year may have been inaccurately recorded in the process of immigration. According to his son's 2003 documentary film, the family could not afford pencils. They made their own charcoal sticks from burnt twigs so that Louis could earn a little money from drawings.<ref name="sons">[http://www20.sbs.com.au/whatson/?date=2008-01-15&channelID=1 ''My Architect: A Son's Journey''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080102073830/http://www20.sbs.com.au/whatson/?date=2008-01-15&channelID=1 |date=January 2, 2008}}, SBS Hot Docs, January 15, 2008</ref> Later he earned money by playing piano to accompany silent movies in theaters. He became a naturalized citizen of the United States on May 15, 1914. His father changed their name to Kahn in 1915.<ref name="sons"/>
===Education=== Kahn excelled in art from a young age, repeatedly winning the annual award for the best watercolor by a Philadelphia high school student. He was an unenthusiastic and undistinguished student at Philadelphia Central High School until he took a course in architecture in his senior year, which convinced him to become an architect. He turned down an offer to go to the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts to study art under a full scholarship, instead working at a variety of jobs to pay his own tuition for a degree in architecture at the University of Pennsylvania School of Fine Arts. There, he studied under Paul Philippe Cret in a version of the Beaux-Arts tradition, one that discouraged excessive ornamentation.<ref>{{cite book| last=Lesser| first=Wendy| title=You Say to Brick: The Life of Louis Kahn| date=March 14, 2017| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Fj7jDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA56| pages=56–60| publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux| isbn=978-0374713317}}</ref>
===Career=== After completing his Bachelor of Architecture in 1924, Kahn worked as senior draftsman in the office of the city architect, John Molitor. He worked on the designs for the 1926 Sesquicentennial Exposition.<ref name="pab">[http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm/21829 "Louis Isadore Kahn (1901–1974)"], Philadelphia Architects and Buildings</ref>
In 1928, Kahn made a European tour. He was interested particularly in the medieval walled city of Carcassonne, France, and the castles of Scotland, rather than any of the strongholds of classicism or modernism.<ref>Johnson, Eugene J. (1986). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/766911 "A Drawing of the Cathedral of Albi by Louis I. Kahn,"] ''Gesta,'' Vol. 25, No. 1, pp. 159–165.</ref> After returning to the United States in 1929, Kahn worked in the offices of Paul Philippe Cret, his former studio critic at the University of Pennsylvania, and then with Zantzinger, Borie and Medary in Philadelphia.<ref name="pab" />
In 1932, Kahn and Dominique Berninger founded the Architectural Research Group, whose members were interested in the populist social agenda and new aesthetics of the European avant-gardes. Among the projects Kahn worked on during this collaboration are schemes for public housing that he had presented to the Public Works Administration, which supported some similar projects during the Great Depression.<ref name="pab" /> They remained unbuilt. [[File:Salk Institute1.jpg|thumb|220px|Louis Kahn's Salk Institute]] Among the more important of Kahn's early collaborations was one with George Howe.<ref>[http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm/25206 Howe, George (1886–1955)], Philadelphia Architects and Buildings<!-- Bot generated title --></ref> Kahn worked with Howe in the late 1930s on projects for the Philadelphia Housing Authority and again in 1940, along with German-born architect Oscar Stonorov, for the design of housing developments in other parts of Pennsylvania.<ref>[http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm/21630 Stonorov, Oskar Gregory (1905–1970)], Philadelphia Architects and Buildings<!-- Bot generated title --></ref> A formal architectural office partnership between Kahn and Oscar Stonorov began in February 1942 and ended in March 1947, which produced fifty-four documented projects and buildings.<ref>{{cite web |title=The Pacific Coast Architecture Database |url=https://digital.lib.washington.edu/architect/ |publisher=The Pacific Coast Architecture Database |access-date=May 2, 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=List of Buildings and Projects by Stonorov & Kahn Associated Architects |url=http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display_projects.cfm/23842 |website=Philadelphia Architects and Buildings |access-date=May 2, 2014}}</ref>
Kahn did not arrive at his distinctive architectural style until he was in his fifties. Initially working in a fairly orthodox version of the International Style, he was strongly influenced by a stay as architect-in-residence at the American Academy in Rome during 1950, which marked a turning point in his career. After visiting the ruins of ancient buildings in Italy, Greece, and Egypt, he adopted a back-to-the-basics approach. He developed his own style, as influenced by earlier modern movements, but not limited by their sometimes-dogmatic ideologies. In the 1950s and 1960s, as a consultant architect for the Philadelphia City Planning Commission, Kahn developed several plans for the center of Philadelphia that were never executed.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Encyclopedia of the City|last=Caves|first=R. W.|publisher=Routledge|year=2004|isbn=9780415252256|pages=408}}</ref>
In 1961, he received a grant from the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts to study traffic movement in Philadelphia and to create a proposal for a viaduct system.<ref>[http://www.design.upenn.edu/archives/majorcollections/kahn/likpcpmark.html Philadelphia City Planning: Market Street East Project Page<!-- Bot generated title -->] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110928000646/http://www.design.upenn.edu/archives/majorcollections/kahn/likpcpmark.html |date=September 28, 2011 }}</ref><ref>[http://www.moma.org/collection/browse_results.php?criteria=O%3AAD%3AE%3A2964&page_number=1&template_id=1&sort_order=1 MoMA.org | The Collection | Louis I. Kahn. Traffic Study, project, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Plan of proposed traffic-movement pattern. 1952]</ref>
He described this proposal at a lecture given in 1962 at the International Design Conference in Aspen, Colorado:
<blockquote>In the center of town the streets should become buildings. This should be interplayed with a sense of movement which does not tax local streets for non-local traffic. There should be a system of viaducts which encase an area which can reclaim the local streets for their own use, and it should be made so this viaduct has a ground floor of shops and usable area. A model which I did for the Graham Foundation recently, and which I presented to Mr. Entenza, showed the scheme.<ref name="Kahn 2003">{{cite book |last =Kahn |first =Louis I. |editor=Robert C. Twombly |title=Louis Kahn: Essential Texts |year=2003 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UEZo6XU324MC&q=louis+kahn+graham+foundation&pg=PA158 |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |isbn=978-0393731132 |page=158}}</ref></blockquote>
Kahn's teaching career began at Yale University in 1947. He eventually was named as the ''Albert F. Bemis Professor'' of Architecture and Planning at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1956. Kahn then returned to Philadelphia to teach at the University of Pennsylvania from 1957 until his death, becoming the ''Paul Philippe Cret Professor of Architecture''. He also was a visiting lecturer at Princeton University School of Architecture from 1961 to 1967.
In 1974, Kahn died of a heart attack<ref name=":0">{{cite news |last=Goldberger |first=Paul |title= Louis I. Kahn Dies; Architect was 73 |url= https://www.nytimes.com/1974/03/20/archives/louis-i-kahn-dies-architect-was-73-louis-i-kahn-architect-dead-at.html |access-date=May 2, 2018 |newspaper=The New York Times |date=March 20, 1974}}</ref> soon after a work trip to India.<ref name=":0" />
==Awards and honors== Kahn was elected a Fellow in the American Institute of Architects (AIA) in 1953. He was made a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1964, the year he was awarded the Frank P. Brown Medal. In 1965, he was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Associate Academician, and received an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts from Yale University.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Honorary Degrees Since 1702 {{!}} Office of the Secretary and Vice President for University Life |url=https://secretary.yale.edu/programs-services/honorary-degrees/since-1702?page=12 |access-date=2024-06-05 |website=secretary.yale.edu}}</ref> He was made a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1968 and awarded the AIA Gold Medal, the highest award given by the AIA, in 1971, and the Royal Gold Medal by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), in 1972.<ref>{{cite web| title=Gold Medal Recipients: Louis Isadore Kahn, FAIA| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070716151006/http://www.aia150.org/aw_gm_1971.php| url=https://www.aia.org/awards/7046-gold-medal| website=American Institute of Architects| archive-date=July 16, 2007| access-date=July 23, 2019}}</ref><ref name=rbia>{{cite web |title=List of Royal Gold Medal winners 1848–2008 |url=http://www.architecture.com/Files/RIBATrust/Awards/RoyalGoldMedal/Royal%20Gold%20Medallists%201848%20-%202008.pdf |publisher=RIBA |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140202101307/http://www.architecture.com/Files/RIBATrust/Awards/RoyalGoldMedal/Royal%20Gold%20Medallists%201848%20-%202008.pdf |archive-date=February 2, 2014}}</ref> In 1971, he received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.<ref>{{cite web|title= Golden Plate Awardees of the American Academy of Achievement |website=www.achievement.org|publisher=American Academy of Achievement|url= https://achievement.org/our-history/golden-plate-awards/}}</ref>
==Personal life== Kahn had three children with three women. With his wife Esther he had a daughter, Sue Ann.<ref name=":0" /> With Anne Tyng, who began her working collaboration and personal relationship with Kahn in 1945, he also had a daughter, Alexandra. When Tyng became pregnant in 1953, to mitigate the scandal, she went to Rome for the birth of their daughter.<ref>{{cite news |last=Saffron |first=Inga |title=Anne Tyng, 91, groundbreaking architect |newspaper=The Philadelphia Inquirer |date=January 7, 2012 |url= https://www.inquirer.com/philly/obituaries/20120107_Anne_Tyng__91__groundbreaking_architect.html |access-date=July 23, 2019}}</ref> With Harriet Pattison, he had a son, Nathaniel Kahn. Anne Tyng was an architect and teacher, while Harriet Pattison was a pioneering landscape architect.<ref>{{cite journal| url=https://www.curbed.com/2016/4/20/11472750/harriet-pattison-landscape-architect| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160422065913/http://www.curbed.com/2016/4/20/11472750/harriet-pattison-landscape-architect| url-status=dead| archive-date=April 22, 2016| title=Pioneering Landscape Architect Harriet Pattison Finally Gets Her Due| last=Sisson| first=Patrick| date=April 20, 2016| journal=Curbed| access-date=July 23, 2019}}</ref> Kahn's obituary in ''The New York Times'', written by Paul Goldberger, mentions only Esther and his daughter by her as survivors.<ref name=":0" />
==Documentary== In 2003, Nathaniel Kahn released a documentary about his father, ''My Architect: A Son's Journey.'' The Oscar-nominated film provides views and insights into Kahn's architecture while exploring him personally through his family, friends and colleagues.<ref name=NYT-my-architect>{{cite news |title=Son of a Celebrated Father Traces His Elusive Past |first=Stephen |last=Holden |newspaper=The New York Times |date=March 29, 2003 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/29/movies/film-festival-review-son-of-a-celebrated-father-traces-his-elusive-past.html}}</ref>
==Designs== [[File:Kimbell Art Museum.jpg|thumb|220px|Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas (1966–1972)]] [[File:Sangshad inside.jpg|thumb|upright|Play of light inside Jatiyo Sangshad Bhaban]] * Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut (1951–1953), the first significant commission of Louis Kahn. The ceilings, which are three feet (0.9 meters) thick, consist of a grid of triangular openings that draw the eye upward into dimly-lit, three-sided pyramidal spaces. These exposed spaces provide the means for channeling the heating, cooling, and electrical services throughout the galleries.<ref>{{cite book |title=Louis I. Kahn |last=McCarter |first=Robert |year=2005 |publisher=Phaidon Press |location=London |isbn=978-0714849713 |page=68}}</ref> * Richards Medical Research Laboratories, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (1957–1965), a breakthrough in Kahn's career that helped set new directions for modern architecture with its clear expression of served and servant spaces and its evocation of the architecture of the past. * The Salk Institute, La Jolla, California (1959–1965) was to be a campus composed of three main clusters: meeting and conference areas, living quarters, and laboratories. Only the laboratory cluster, consisting of two parallel blocks enclosing a water garden, was built. The two laboratory blocks frame a long view of the Pacific Ocean, accentuated by a thin linear fountain that seems to reach for the horizon. It has been named "arguably the defining work" of Kahn.<ref>{{cite journal| first=Marvin| last=Trachtenberg| date=September 1, 2016| url=http://www.architecturalrecord.com/articles/11881-records-top-125-buildings-51-75| title=RECORD's Top 125 Buildings: 51–75: Salk Institute| journal=Architectural Record}}</ref> * First Unitarian Church, Rochester, New York (1959–1969), named as one of the greatest religious structures of the twentieth century by Paul Goldberger, the Pulitzer Prize-winning architectural critic.<ref>{{cite news| last=Goldberger| first=Paul| title=Housing for the Spirit| newspaper=The New York Times| date=December 26, 1982| url=https://www.nytimes.com/1982/12/26/books/housing-for-the-spirit.html}}</ref> Tall, narrow window recesses create an irregular rhythm of shadows on the exterior while four light towers flood the sanctuary walls with indirect, natural light. * Shaheed Suhrawardy Medical College and Hospital, Dhaka, East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) * Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, in Ahmedabad, India (1961) * Eleanor Donnelly Erdman Hall, Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania (1960–1965), designed as a modern Scottish castle.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.brynmawr.edu/residentiallife/floorplans/erdman.shtml |title=Erdman Hall |access-date=October 23, 2017 |url-status=dead |website=Bryn Mawr College |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171023064013/http://www.brynmawr.edu/residentiallife/floorplans/erdman.shtml |archive-date=October 23, 2017 }}</ref> * Phillips Exeter Academy Library, Exeter, New Hampshire (1965–1972), awarded the Twenty-five Year Award by the American Institute of Architects in 1997. Its dramatic atrium features enormous circular openings into the book stacks. * Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas (1967–1972), features repeated bays of cycloid-shaped barrel vaults with light slits along the apex, which bathe the artwork on display in an ever-changing diffuse light. * Arts United Center, Fort Wayne, Indiana (1973), The only building realized of a ten-building Arts Campus vision, Kahn's only theatre and building in the Midwest * Hurva Synagogue, Jerusalem, Israel, (1968–1974), unbuilt * Yale Center for British Art, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut (1969–1974) * Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park, Roosevelt Island, New York (1972–1974), construction completed 2012 * Jatiyo Sangshad Bhaban (National Assembly Building) in Dhaka, East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) was Kahn's last project, developed 1962 to 1974. Kahn got the design contract with the help of Muzharul Islam, one of his students at Yale University, who worked with him on the project. The Bangladeshi Parliament building is the centerpiece of the national capital complex designed by Kahn, which includes hostels, dining halls, and a hospital. According to Robert McCarter, author of ''Louis I. Kahn'', "it is one of the twentieth century's greatest architectural monuments, and is without question Kahn's magnum opus."<ref name="mccarter">{{cite book |title=Louis I. Kahn |last=McCarter |first=Robert |year=2005 |publisher=Phaidon Press |location=London |isbn=978-0714849713 |page=258,270}}</ref>
==Timeline of works== [[File:National Assembly of Bangladesh, Jatiyo Sangsad Bhaban, 2008, 5.JPG|thumb|Jatiyo Sangshad Bhaban, Dhaka; considered as Kahn's ''magnum opus'']] [[File:Exeter library interior.jpg|thumb|upright|Interior of Phillips Exeter Academy Library, Exeter, New Hampshire (1965–1972)]] All dates refer to the year project commenced * 1935 – Jersey Homesteads Cooperative Development, Hightstown, New Jersey * 1940 – Jesse Oser House, 628 Stetson Road, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania * 1944 – Carver Court, Foundry Street, Coatsville, Pennsylvania * 1947 – Phillip Q. Roche House, 2101 Harts Lane, Conshohocken, Pennsylvania * 1950 – Morton and Lenore Weiss House, 2935 Whitehall Rd, East Norriton Township, Pennsylvania<ref>{{cite journal| url=https://montco.today/2019/02/kahn-designed-weiss-house-in-east-norriton-on-the-states-at-risk-list/| title=Kahn-designed Weiss House in East Norriton on the state's 'At-Risk' list| date=February 11, 2019| journal=Montco Today}}</ref> * 1951 – Yale University Art Gallery, 1111 Chapel Street, New Haven, Connecticut * 1952 – City Tower Project, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (unbuilt) * 1954 – Jewish Community Center (including Trenton Bath House), 999 Lower Ferry Road, Ewing, New Jersey * 1954 – Jewish Community Center, New Haven, Connecticut, now Holcombe Green Hall, Yale School of Art. Remodeled in 2000 by Deborah Berke Partners.<ref>{{Cite web| title = Holcombe T. Green Hall (Yale School of Art): Building Details| access-date = 2026-02-02| url = https://nhba.yale.edu/building?id=417}}</ref> * 1956 – Wharton Esherick Workshop at what is now the Wharton Esherick Museum,1520 Horseshoe Trail, Malvern, Pennsylvania (designed with Wharton Esherick and Anne Tyng) * 1957 – Richards Medical Research Laboratories, University of Pennsylvania, 3700 Hamilton Walk, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania * 1957 – Fred E. and Elaine Cox Clever House, 417 Sherry Way, Cherry Hill, New Jersey * 1959 – Margaret Esherick House, 204 Sunrise Lane, Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania<ref>[https://www.flickr.com/photos/jpmm/258737493/ Margaret Esherick House] from Flickr.</ref> * 1958 – Tribune Review Publishing Company Building, 622 Cabin Hill Drive, Greensburg, Pennsylvania * 1959 – Salk Institute for Biological Studies, 10 North Torrey Pines Road, La Jolla, California * 1959 – First Unitarian Church, 220 South Winton Road, Rochester, New York * 1960 – Erdman Hall Dormitories, Bryn Mawr College, Morris Avenue, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania * 1960 – Norman Fisher House, 197 East Mill Road, Hatboro, Pennsylvania * 1961 – ''Point Counterpoint'', a converted barge performance venue used by the American Wind Symphony Orchestra * 1961 – Philadelphia's Mikveh Israel, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (unbuilt) * 1961 – Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, India * 1962 – Jatiyo Sangshad Bhaban, the National Assembly Building of Bangladesh, Dhaka, Bangladesh * 1963 – President's Estate, Islamabad, Pakistan (unbuilt) * 1965 – Phillips Exeter Academy Library, Front Street, Exeter, New Hampshire * 1965 – Phillips Exeter Academy Dining Hall, Elm Street, Exeter, New Hampshire * 1966 – Kimbell Art Museum, 3333 Camp Bowie Boulevard, Fort Worth, Texas * 1966 – Olivetti-Underwood Factory, Valley Road, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania * 1966 – Temple Beth El of Northern Westchester, Chappaqua, New York * 1968 – Hurva Synagogue, Jerusalem, Israel (unbuilt) * 1969 – Yale Center for British Art, Yale University, 1080 Chapel Street, New Haven, Connecticut * 1971 – Steven Korman House, Sheaff Lane, Fort Washington, Pennsylvania * 1973 – Arts United Center (Formerly known as the Fine Arts Foundation Civic Center), Fort Wayne, Indiana<ref>{{cite web| url=http://www.artsunited.org/the-arts-campus/au-center/| title=Arts United Center| website=Arts United| access-date=September 27, 2012| archive-date=October 22, 2013| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131022104759/http://www.artsunited.org/the-arts-campus/au-center/| url-status=dead}}</ref> * 1974 – Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park, Roosevelt Island, New York City, completed 2012.<ref>{{cite news| last=Foderaro| first=Lisa W.| title=Dedicating Park to Roosevelt and His View of Freedom| url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/18/nyregion/roosevelt-four-freedoms-park-is-dedicated.html| access-date=November 14, 2012| newspaper=The New York Times| date=October 17, 2012}} The work was commissioned in 1972, and Kahn was carrying his designs for the project when he died.</ref> * 1976 – ''Point Counterpoint II'', an improved concert venue for the American Wind Symphony Orchestra, is debuted posthumously * 1979 – Flora Lamson Hewlett Library of the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California<ref>{{cite web |url=http://library.gtu.edu/library/information/library-history |title=Library History |access-date=October 30, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120305051139/http://library.gtu.edu/library/information/library-history |archive-date=March 5, 2012 |website=Graduate Theological Union |last=Glenn| first=Lucinda| date=November 2001}}</ref>
==Legacy== {{Wide image|Salk_Institute_Panorama.jpg|500px|360° panorama in the courtyard of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California (1959–1965)|500px|right}} {{Wide image|Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, panorama.jpg|500px|Panorama of the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India |500px|right}} [[Image:Louis Kahn Memorial Park.jpg|thumb|Louis Kahn Memorial Park, S. 11th and Pine Streets, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]] Louis Kahn's work infused the International style with a fastidious, highly personal taste. Isamu Noguchi called him "a philosopher among architects." He was concerned with creating strong formal distinctions between ''served'' spaces and ''servant'' spaces. What he meant by ''servant'' spaces was not spaces for servants, but rather spaces that serve other spaces, such as stairwells, corridors, restrooms, or any other back-of-house function such as storage space or mechanical rooms. His palette of materials tended toward heavily textured brick and bare concrete, the textures often reinforced by juxtaposition to highly refined surfaces such as travertine marble. Kahn argued that brick can be more than the basic building material:
<blockquote>If you think of Brick, you say to Brick, 'What do you want, Brick?' And Brick says to you, 'I like an Arch.' And if you say to Brick, 'Look, arches are expensive, and I can use a concrete lintel over you. What do you think of that, Brick?' Brick says, 'I like an Arch.' And it's important, you see, that you honor the material that you use. ... You can only do it if you honor the brick and glorify the brick instead of shortchanging it.<ref name="Kahn 2003"/></blockquote>
In addition to the influence Kahn's better-known work has on contemporary architects (such as Muzharul Islam, Tadao Ando), some of his work (especially the unbuilt City Tower Project) became very influential among the high-tech architects of the late twentieth century (such as Renzo Piano, who worked in Kahn's office, Richard Rogers, and Norman Foster).<ref name="Piano Takes on Kahn at Kimbell Museum Expansion ">{{cite press release| url=https://www.archdaily.com/451259/piano-takes-on-kahn-at-kimbell-museum-expansion| title=Piano Takes on Kahn at Kimbell Museum Expansion, Kimbell Museum| publisher=Archdaily| date=November 22, 2013 }}</ref> His prominent apprentices include Muzharul Islam, Moshe Safdie, Robert Venturi, Jack Diamond, and Charles Dagit.
Many years after his death, Kahn continues to provoke controversy. Before his Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park at the southern tip of Roosevelt Island was built,<ref name="autogenerated2">{{cite press release| url=http://www.feri.org/news/news_detail.cfm?QID=3332| title=The Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial, Four Freedoms Park| publisher=Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute| date=September 26, 2016| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071206075857/http://www.feri.org/news/news_detail.cfm?QID=3332|archive-date=December 6, 2007}}</ref> the editors of ''The New York Times'' opined:
<blockquote>There's a magic to the project. That the task is daunting makes it worthy of the man it honors, who guided the nation through the Depression, the New Deal and a world war. As for Mr. Kahn, he died in 1974, as he passed alone through New York City's Penn Station. In his briefcase were renderings of the memorial, his last completed plan.<ref>{{cite news| title=A Roosevelt for Roosevelt Island| url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/05/opinion/05mon4.html| newspaper=The New York Times.| date=November 5, 2007}}</ref></blockquote>
The editorial describes Kahn's plan as:
<blockquote>... simple and elegant. Drawing inspiration from Roosevelt's defense of the Four Freedoms—of speech and religion, and from want and fear—he designed an open 'room and a garden' at the bottom of the island. Trees on either side form a 'V' defining a green space, and leading to a two-walled stone room at the water's edge that frames the United Nations and the rest of the skyline.</blockquote>
A group spearheaded by William J. vanden Heuvel raised over $50 million in public and private funds between 2005 and 2012 to establish the memorial. Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park officially opened to the public on October 24, 2012.
==In popular culture== Kahn was the subject of the 2003 Oscar-nominated documentary film ''My Architect: A Son's Journey'', presented by Nathaniel Kahn, his son.<ref name=NYT-my-architect/> Kahn's complicated family life inspired the "Undaunted Mettle" episode of ''Law & Order: Criminal Intent''.
In the 1993 film ''Indecent Proposal'', character David Murphy (played by Woody Harrelson), referenced Kahn during a lecture to architecture students, attributing the quote "Even a brick wants to be something" to Kahn.
Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Lewis Spratlan, with collaborators Jenny Kallick and John Downey (Amherst College, class of 2003), composed the chamber opera ''Architect'' as a character study of Kahn. The premiere recording was due to be released in 2012 by Navona Records.
==Gallery== <gallery mode="nolines" heights="200" widths="200"> File:Yale University Art Gallery entrance.jpg|Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut (1951–1953) File:Triangle-ceiling.jpg|Coffered ceiling in Yale University Art Gallery (1951–1953) File:YUAG stairwell.jpg|Stairwell in Yale University Art Gallery (1951–1953) File:T bath house 3.JPG|Trenton Bath House and Day Camp (1954) File:Wharton Esherick House & Studio, 1520 Horsehoe Trail, Malvern (Chester County, Pennsylvania).jpg|Wharton Esherick Studio, 1520 Horseshoe Trail, Malvern, Pennsylvania (1956). Designed with Wharton Esherick File:WTP2 Mike Reali 01d.jpg|Richards Medical Research Laboratories, University of Pennsylvania, 3700 Hamilton Walk, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (1957–1965) File:Kahn - Rochester Sanctuary.jpeg|Interior of First Unitarian Church, Rochester, New York (1959) File:Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, panorama 2006.jpg|Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, India (1961) File:Kimbell Art Museum Fort Worth galleries 1.jpg|Interior of Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas (1966) File:Yale Center for British Art.jpg|Yale Center for British Art, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut (1969–1974) File:National Assembly of Bangladesh (07).jpg|Parliament of Bangladesh (1961-1982) File:Sangshad Assembly Hall.jpg|National Assembly of Bangladesh assembly hall File:Arts united center exterior (2889449210).jpg|Arts United Center in Fort Wayne, Indiana </gallery>
==References== ===Notes=== {{Reflist}}
===Cited sources=== * {{cite book |first=Christian |last=Norberg-Schulz| author-link=Christian Norberg-Schulz|title=Louis Kahn. Idea e Immagine|publisher=Officina Edizioni|location=Rome, ITA |date=1980|isbn=84-85434-14-5}} * {{cite book| last=Curtis| first=William| title=Modern Architecture Since 1900| year=1987| edition=2nd| publisher=Prentice-Hall| isbn=978-0714833569| pages=309–316| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jBSecUE48D0C&q=louis+kahn}} * {{cite book | last=Dagit | first=Charles E. Jr. |author-link=Charles E. Dagit Jr. | title=Louis I. Kahn – Architect: Remembering the Man and Those Who Surrounded Him |year=2013 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kCExDwAAQBAJ |publisher=Transaction Publishers |location=New Brunswick, NJ |isbn=978-1-4128-5179-4}} * {{cite book |last=Ronner |first=Heinz |author2=Sharad Jhaveri |author3=Alessandro Vasella |title=Louis I.Kahn: Complete Works 1935–1974 |year=1977 |edition=first |publisher=Westview Press |location=Boulder |isbn=978-0891586487 |page=456}} * {{cite book |author1-link=Thomas Leslie (architect) | last=Leslie| first=Thomas| title=Louis I.Kahn: Building Art, Building Science| year=2005| publisher=George Braziller| location=New York| isbn=978-0807615409}} * {{cite book| last=Lesser| first=Wendy| author-link=Wendy Lesser| title=You Say to Brick: The Life of Louis Kahn| date=March 14, 2017| url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Fj7jDAAAQBAJ| publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux| location=New York| isbn=978-0374279974}} * {{cite book| last=McCarter| first=Robert| title=Louis I. Kahn| date=July 16, 2005| publisher= Phaidon Press Ltd| isbn=978-0714849713| page=512| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IRfqAAAAMAAJ&q=Louis%20I.Kahn}} * {{cite book| last=Wiseman| first=Carter| title=Louis I. Kahn: Beyond Time and Style: A Life in Architecture| year=2007| edition=1st| publisher= W. W. Norton| location=New York| isbn=978-0-393-73165-1}} * {{cite book| last=Larson| first=Kent| title=Louis I. Kahn: Unbuilt Masterworks| year=2000| publisher=Monacelli Press| location=New York| isbn=978-1580930147| page=232}} * {{cite book| last=Rosa| first=Joseph| editor=Peter Gossel| title=Louis I. Kahn: Enlightened space| year=2006| publisher=Taschen GmbH| location=Cologne| isbn=978-3836543842| page=96}} * {{cite book| last=Merrill| first=Michael| title=Louis Kahn: Drawing to Find Out| year=2010| publisher=Lars Mueller Publishers| location=Baden| isbn=978-3-03778-221-7| page=240}} * {{cite book| last=Merrill| first=Michael| title=Louis Kahn: On the Thoughtful Making of Spaces| year=2010| publisher=Lars Mueller Publishers| location=Baden| isbn=978-3-03778-220-0| page=240}} * {{cite book| last=Vassella| first=Alessandro| title =Louis Kahn: Silence and Light| year=2013| publisher=Park Books| location=Zurich| isbn=978-3-906027-18-0| pages=168, 1 Audio–CD}} * {{cite book |first=Susan |last=Solomon |title=Louis I. Kahn's Jewish Architectur, Brandeis Series in American Jewish History, Culture, and Life |publisher=Brandeis |date=August 31, 2009 |isbn=978-1584657880}}
==Further reading== * {{cite book |last1=Brownlee |first1=Robert |last2=De Long |first2=David G. |title=Louis I. Kahn: in the realm of architecture |date=October 15, 1991 |publisher=Rizzoli |location=New York |isbn=978-0847813230}} * Goldhagen, Sarah Williams, Louis Kahn's Situated Modernism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001), ISBN 0300077866. * Kahn, Louis. [http://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail.aspx?ID=9704 ''Louis Kahn: Essential Texts''], edited by Robert Twombly. London & New York: WW Norton & Company, 2003. * {{cite book |title=You Say to Brick: The Life of Louis Kahn |last=Lesser |first=Wendy |author-link=Wendy Lesser|year=2017|publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux |location=New York |isbn=9780374279974 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=qb8NDgAAQBAJ}} * Mowla, Qazi Azizul 2007 Kahn's Creation in Dhaka – Re Evaluated, Jahangirnagar Planning Review,(Journal: issn=1728-4198).Vol.5, June 2007, Dhaka, pp. 85–96. * {{cite journal |last1=Kohane |first1=Peter |title=Louis Kahn's Theory of 'Inspired Ritual' and Architectural Space |journal=Architectural Theory Review |date=2001 |volume=6 |issue=1 |pages=87–95 |doi=10.1080/13264820109478418 |s2cid=144340999 }} * Choudhury, Bayezid Ismail 2014. PhD dissertation at the University of Sydney 'The genesis of Jatio Sangsad Bhaban at Sher-e-Bangla Nagar, Dhaka' * {{cite journal |last1=Sully |first1=Nicole |title=Architecture from the Ouija Board: Louis Kahn's Roosevelt Memorials and the Posthumous Monuments of Modernism |journal=Fabrications: The Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand |date=2019 |volume=29 |issue=1 |pages=60–85 |doi=10.1080/10331867.2018.1540083 |s2cid=191998111 }} * {{cite book |editor-last1=Wurman |editor-first1=Richard Saul |title=What will be has always been: the words of Louis I. Kahn |date=1986 | publisher=Rizzoli International Publications |location=New York |isbn=0847806065}} * Harriet Pattison: ''Our days are like full years : a memoir with letters from Louis Kahn'', New Haven : Yale University Press, [2020], {{ISBN|978-0-300-22312-5}} * Luigi Monzo (Review): ''Michael Merrill: Louis Kahn. The Importance of a Drawing (2021)'', in: Journal für Kunstgeschichte, 27.2023/3, pp. 244–256.
==External links== * {{Commons category-inline}} * [http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm/21829 Louis I. Kahn – Philadelphia Architects and Buildings Project] * [http://www.arthistory.upenn.edu/themakingofaroom/ Exhibition at the University of Pennsylvania on Louis I. Kahn Interiors] * [https://www.sdmart.org/exhibition/louis-kahn-the-power-of-architecture/ Louis Kahn: The Power of Architecture] 2016 retrospective at the San Diego Museum of Art; [https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/la-et-cm-louis-kahn-review-20161124-htmlstory.html A vast Louis Kahn retrospective lands at the San Diego Museum of Art] Los Angeles Times review
{{Louis Kahn}} {{Olivetti}} {{Authority control}}
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