فيليب جونسون/
Philip Johnson, a major figure in the world of 20th century architecture and design, died Tuesday January 25 at his residence in New Canaan, Connecticut. He was 98.
Architect, architectural historian, museum curator and art collector, Johnson was the first winner of the Pritzker Prize and received the Gold Medal of the American Institute of Architects in 1978.
Johnson was the founder and director of the Department of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, which he headed from 1930 to 1936, and again from 1946 to 1954.
In 1932 he organized an exhibition with architectural historian Henry-Russell Hitchcock, entitled The International Style, which introduced American audiences to European Modernists like Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, and Le Corbusier. The sleek glass and steel structures, stripped of ornamental decorations, greatly influenced the course of American architecture.
Their book The International Style, published in 1932, gave a name to the movement that dominated world architecture for the next 50 years.
The book was reissued in paperback in 1997 with a new foreword by Philip Johnson. Available at amazon.com
After resigning his position at the museum, because of architectural work, Johnson continued to curate shows. His 1988 show Deconstructivist Architecture featuring eight architects, including Frank Gehry, Peter Eisenman, Zaha Hadid, Rem Koolhaas and Daniel Libeskind, demonstrated his continuing interest in new architectural ideas and movements.
As a tribute to Johnson the museum's Department of Architecture and Design named its exhibition space the Philip Johnson Gallery in 1984.
Johnson did not study architecture until the age of 34 when he enrolled in the Harvard Graduate School of Design. As his senior thesis he built a Miesian modernist house that still stands on Ash Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
“After having worked for some years at the Museum of Modern Art on architecture, I decided what the hell, I may as well be one.”
New York Times Interview
February 28, 1992
Among the number of buildings Johnson designed during his long career the 1949 Glass House he built for himself in New Canaan, inspired by Mies's earlier design for the Farnsworth House, is the most famous. Johnson has added buildings to the property over the years, representing each phase of his career. He donated the house to the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 1986.
Photo: Michael Moran
The house is documented in a privately printed book, of only 2,000 copies, by photographer Michael Moran. The book is edited by Toshio Nakamura.
The Glass House
Pavilions in the Landscape
In the late 1950s Johnson designed the steel and glass expansions of the Museum of Modern Art that have now been restored and integrated with the new MoMA designed by Yoshio Taniguchi.
The first work on a very large scale was the bronze Seagram Building, completed in 1958, which he designed with Mies. Johnson designed the building’s Four Seasons Restaurant where he lunched daily at a special table in the corner of the Grill Room.
After collaborating with Mies Johnson experienced with elements of classical architecture. During his partnership with John Burgee he designed the former AT&T skyscraper, now Sony Plaza, completed in 1978. Dubbed the Chippendale Skyscraper, because of the broken-pediment top, the design introduced the postmodern era of skyscrapers.
Photo: arcspace
Other well known projects with John Burgee are the Pennzoil Place in downtown Houston, completed in 1976, and the Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, completed in 1980. More about Garden Grove in arcspace kk Letter.
Photo: arcspace
Johnson is survived by his 102 year old sister, Jeannette Dempsey, and his companion of 45 years, David Whitney