BERTRAND GOLDBERG: Architecture of Invention
23/11/2011.
Exhibition. The Art Institute of Chicago [CHICAGO] USA Until, January 15/2012
metalocus, JOSÉ JUAN BARBA
metalocus, JOSÉ JUAN BARBA
The noise of the great exhibitions often overshadow other less mediatic but also very interesting as is the case, "BERTRAND GOLDBERG: Architecture of Invention" which is being held at the Art Institute of Chicago and will remain open until January 15, 2012.
Photograph: Clark-Maple Gasoline Service Station, Chicago, IL, 1938. Hedrich Blessing, courtesy of the Chicago History Museum.
Photograph: Exterior View of the Health Sciences Center, c. 1975. Gil Amiaga, courtesy of the Goldberg Family.
Bertrand Goldberg American, 1913-1997. Health Sciences Center, Stony Brook, NY, Axonometric View, c. 1974. Graphite and marker on tracing paper. The Archive of Bertrand Goldberg, gifted by his children through his estate, RX23664/134.2,390.
Bertrand Goldberg & Associates American, circa 1952-1997. Drawn by: Zbigniew Z. Ciancara American, 20th century Health Sciences Center, Stony Brook, NY, Early Perspective, 1971-1973. Marker on paper 43 x 76.6 cm. Gift of Bertrand Goldberg, 1982.640
Bertrand Goldberg American, 1913-1997. Northwestern University Institute of Psychiatry, Chicago, IL, Cutaway Isometric View, 1971-1972. Ink and zip-a-tone on tracing paper 106.7 x 76 cm. The Archive of Bertrand Goldberg, gifted by his children through his estate, RX23664/103.1
Exterior View of Prentice Women’s Hospital, c. 1975. Photograph @ Hedrich Blessing, courtesy of the Chicago History Museum.
Bertrand Goldberg American, 1913-1997. Prentice Women's Hospital, Chicago, IL, Early Perspective, c. 1970. Gouache on board 54 x 74 cm The Archive of Bertrand Goldberg, gifted by his children through his estate, RX23664/103.3
Bertrand Goldberg American, 1913-1997. Prentice Women's Hospital: Floor Plan, n.d. The Archive of Bertrand Goldberg, gifted by his children through his estate, RX23664/103.22.
Photograph: View of Marina City from across the Chicago River. c. 1965. Hedrich Blessing, courtesy of the Chicago History Museum.
Photograph: Marina City Balcony and Parking Garage Details. Cabanban.
Photograph: View of Marina City Restaurant and Marina by Night, n.d. Hedrich Blessing, courtesy of the Chicago History Museum.
View of Marina City Model Apartments, 1962. Photograph © Hedrich Blessing, courtesy of the Chicago History Museum.
Bertrand Goldberg American, 1913-1997 Marina City, Chicago, IL, East Elevation, 1960 Graphite on paper 55.9 x 86.4 cm The Archive of Bertrand Goldberg, gifted by his children through his estate, RX23664/75.55
Bertrand Goldberg American, 1913-1997 Marina City Detroit, Aerial Perspective, n.d. Blackline print on paper 36.1 x 57.2 cm The Archive of Bertrand Goldberg, gifted by his children through his estate, RX23664/35.1
Photograph: Night View of Astor Tower, c. 1963. Orlando R. Cabanban, courtesy of the Goldberg Family.
Bertrand Goldberg American, 1913-1997 Astor Tower, Chicago, IL, Floor Plan, c. 1960 Graphite on paper 56.4 x 86.3 cm Delineated by R.A.B. Job no. 657-261 The Archive of Bertrand Goldberg, gifted by his children through his estate, RX23664/7.212
Photograph: Portrait of Bertrand Goldberg, 1967. Don Bronstein, courtesy of the Goldberg Family.
Drawn from the museum’s Bertrand Goldberg collection and archives, the Harvard Art Museums, and several private collections, the exhibition features over 100 original architectural drawings, models, photographs, and little-known examples of his graphic and furniture design. The trajectory of this thematic exploration of Goldberg’s work mirrors the changing priorities of American culture at large: his early work with prefabrication and low-cost housing, his projects for middle class leisure culture in the 1950s, his expanded engagement with new cultural programs throughout the 1960s, and then finally his large-scale projects for hospitals and urban planning in his later practice.
Goldberg developed relationships with some of the most prominent modern architects in the United States including Buckminster Fuller, George Fred Keck, and his mentor, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. As his practice increased in scale, Goldberg’s alternative urban model for “the city within a city” found a strong following of international architects and critics including Reyner Banham, the Japanese Metabolists, and members of the British Archigram group. A fitting homage to one of Chicago’s great builders, this exhibition showcases Goldberg’s work at its most inventive and progressive, and resonates with the multidisciplinary practices of today’s architects and designers.
Photograph: North Pole Mobile Ice Cream Store, River Forest, IL, 1938. Hedrich Blessing, courtesy of the Chicago History Museum.The exhibition is designed by John Ronan Architects and graphic designers Studio Blue.
Catalogue
Bertrand Goldberg: Architecture of Invention is accompanied by a full-color, 192-page catalogue, distributed by Yale University Press, which represents the first scholarly exploration of the life and work of the internationally renowned Chicago architect. Essays by Zoë Ryan, Elizabeth Smith, Alison Fisher, and Sarah Whiting feature in-depth research on many important areas of Goldberg's practice including avant-garde housing, furniture design, hospitals, and urbanism and are richly illustrated with many previously unpublished drawings and projects. Designed by Cheryl Towler Weese of Studio Blue, this stunning catalogue is available for purchase through the Museum Shop or online.
Photograph: John Snyder House, Shelter Island, NY, 1952. J. Alex Langley, courtesy of the Goldberg Family.
Archive
Held by the Department of Architecture and Design and the Ryerson and Burnham Libraries, the Art Institute's Bertrand Goldberg Archive comprehensively chronicles Goldberg's diverse career as architect, engineer, urban planner, lecturer and businessman through photographs, drawings, correspondence, manuscripts, publications and audiovisual materials.
Photograph: Orangerie, Grayslake, IL, 1937. Courtesy of the Goldberg Family.
This exhibition and publication are made possible by the generous support of the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation, the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, the Albert Pick, Jr. Fund, the Architecture & Design Society at the Art Institute of Chicago, and anonymous donations. Additional support is provided by the Exhibitions Trust: Goldman Sachs, Kenneth and Anne Griffin, Thomas and Margot Pritzker, the Earl and Brenda Shapiro Foundation, Donna and Howard Stone, and Melinda and Paul Sullivan.
More information
Bertrand GOLDBERG
Bertrand Goldberg (1913) is an American architect settled in Chicago and active since 1937. He studied in Harvard in 1930. In 1932 he decided to go to Berlin to study in the Bauhaus until 1933, time he worked with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Homeward in the USA, he received his diploma in the Armour Intitute of Technology of Chicago in 1934.
In 1937, he opened his own studio. Goldberg in his beginnings was influenced by the Bauhaus’s rationalism and Mies van der Rohe, as it can be seen in his first prefabricated projects for the Federal Government in Suit (Maryland) and in Lafayette (Indiana), built from 1937 to 1944.
Bertrand Goldberg planned prefabricated bathrooms (Stanfad) with rounded shapes in 1945-1948 and coaches, for the Pressed Steel Car Company, built with plastic materials, which make a statement of his later projects of concrete towers.
He designed his most important work in 1959: Marina City, a mix use complex in Chicago River. The project was formed by two twin residence towers of 40 flats and a great podium of 20 flats that housed shops, parking, theatre and spaces for boats.
