Frank O. Gehry. Bubbles Chaise Longue. 1987. Corrugated cardboard with fire-retardant coating, 27 3/4 x 29 x 76 3/8" (70.5 x 73.7 x 194 cm). Kenneth Walker Fund

“I was looking for a way to express movement.”

Frank O. Gehry

Frank Gehry is considered one of the most influential architects of the late 20th century. He completed his architecture studies at the University of Southern California in 1954, and enrolled at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design to study urban planning, but dropped out soon after and returned to Los Angeles. There he worked at Gruen Associates until 1962, when he established his own firm. During the early period of his independent practice he developed close associations with the artists of the Venice and Santa Monica art scene, particularly Edward Kienholz, Robert Irwin, and Ed Ruscha.

Gehry came to national attention with his Easy Edges furniture line, made of corrugated cardboard and fiberboard and including the Easy Edges Body Contour Rocker (1971) and the 1970 and 1972 editions of the Easy Edges Side Chair. But it was not until the rebuilding of his own house, an existing bungalow in Santa Monica (1978–88), that his reputation as an experimental avant-garde architect was established. Using common home-building materials such as corrugated aluminum, unfinished plywood, and chain-link fence, he was able to create rich, interlocking spaces. The additive and collaged character of his house, based on semi-independent timber-frame structures, became the signature language of his 1980s work, which was presented in MoMA’s 1988 Deconstructivist Architecture exhibition and in a retrospective of Gehry’s work at the Whitney Museum of American Art that same year. He received the Pritzker Architecture Prize, the most prestigious international award given in architecture, in 1989. At this time he completed the Vitra Design Museum, Germany, his first building in Europe, and the design for the Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles, which remained unbuilt until 2003. In these works, Gehry explored the sculptural form of architecture as a synthetic and unifying proposition.

In the 1990s, Gehry’s formal language saw a move toward complex curvilinear forms, of which his most remarkable design remains the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Spain (1997). He conceives these forms through a series of freestyle hand sketches that have progressively gained in complexity due, in part, to advances in computer software. This formal development in his architecture has become the signature of his later work.

Note: Opening quote is from Luscombe, Belinda. “How Frank Gehry Changed Buildings—and Cities—Forever.” Time, March 30, 2023. https://time.com/6265617/frank-gehry-interview-guggenheim/.

Patricio del Real, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Architecture and Design, 2016

Wikipedia entry
Introduction
Frank Owen Gehry ( GAIR-ee; né Goldberg; born February 28, 1929) is a Canadian-born American architect and designer. A number of his buildings, including his private residence in Santa Monica, California, have become attractions. His works are considered among the most important of contemporary architecture in the 2010 World Architecture Survey, leading Vanity Fair to call him "the most important architect of our age". He is also the designer of the National Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial. Gehry is known for his postmodern designs and use of bold, unconventional forms and materials. His most famous works include the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in Spain, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, and the Louis Vuitton Foundation in Paris. These buildings are characterized by their sculptural, often undulating exteriors and innovative use of materials such as titanium and stainless steel. Born in Toronto, Gehry moved to Los Angeles in 1947 and established his architectural practice there in 1962. He rose to prominence in the 1970s with his distinctive style that blended everyday materials with complex, dynamic structures. Gehry's approach to architecture has been described as deconstructivist, though he himself resists categorization. Throughout his career, Gehry has received numerous awards and honors, including the Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1989, considered the field's highest honor. He has also been awarded the National Medal of Arts and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in the United States. Gehry's influence extends beyond architecture; he has designed furniture, jewelry, and liquor bottles.
Wikidata
Q180374
Information from Wikipedia, made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License
Getty record
Introduction
American architect, exhibition designer, furniture and jewelry designer, and teacher. After working in various practices, he opened Frank O. Gehry and Associates, Inc. in 1962, where her remains as Design Principal. His early work, such as his own Gehry House (1979), shows a deconstructionist approach, taking an older building and re-assembling it with apparently casually placed low-cost corrugated metal panels, steel poles, and a canopy of wire mesh fencing. Since the 1980s, Gehry’s work has focused on the use of shiny metallic surfaces, emphasizing curving lines and the play of light and shade. The best examples are the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain (1997) and the Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles (2003). In design, his approach is similar to his architecture, where disposable materials such as cardboard are used to make chairs with undulating forms that suggest elements in nature.
Nationalities
American, Canadian
Gender
Male
Roles
Artist, Architect, Designer, Teacher, Furniture Designer, Sculptor
Names
Frank Gehry, Frank Owen Gehry, Frank Goldberg, Ephraim Owen Goldberg
Ulan
500010962
Information from Getty’s Union List of Artist Names ® (ULAN), made available under the ODC Attribution License

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14 works online

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