Thank you for supporting us at NYC's Landmark Preservation Commission

Members of the Paul Rudolph Institute For Modern Architecture with Liz Waytkus, Executive Director of Docomomo US (2nd from right) following the public hearing in support of landmarking Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor Building

Thank you to everyone who attended in person, spoke via zoom, and submitted letters of support at yesterday’s public hearing of New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission.

There was broad support for designating our headquarters - Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor Building - as a New York City landmark. Once approved, the building will become the youngest landmark in New York City!

The proposal received 28 letters of support by the time of the hearing (and we’ve received more since!)

Several former Rudolph clients and current property owners were joined by organizations such as the Historic Districts Council, New York Landmarks Conservancy, DocomomoUS and its local New York/Tristate Chapter, Iconic Houses, the Neutra Institute for Survival Through Design, US Modernist, the NY Center For Architecture, the Museum of Modern Art and the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project in sending letters in support of the designation. Former Rudolph students, employees and fans from around the United States and the world also wrote the commission urging it to make Modulightor a landmark.

Thank you to everyone for your support in our effort to landmark our building! We are especially thankful for the people who mentioned the need to landmark the Rudolph-designed interior duplex apartment when it is eligible.

Ernst Wagner - representing Paul Rudolph’s Estate - was at the hearing in person and said later ‘Paul was looking down and is pleased.’

We’ve got a lot planned for the coming year, and thanks to everyone for making this year especially memorable!

NYC's Landmark Preservation Commission to vote on landmarking Rudolph's Modulightor Building

Following a unanimous vote to calendar Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor Building as a potential New York City landmark, the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission will hold a public hearing regarding the proposed designation of the Modulightor Building as a New York City individual landmark on Tuesday, November 28, 2023, at 9:30 A.M.

The public is invited to attend this hearing to present information or testimony relating to the proposed designation. The time allotted for each speaker is three minutes.

The public hearing will be held in the public hearing room at 1 Centre Street, 9th Floor, Borough of Manhattan.

Participation through the video conferencing application Zoom is also available. Please check the hearing page on LPC’s website (https://www.nyc.gov/site/lpc/hearings/hearings.page) for updated hearing information and guidance. Public notice of the hearing identifying the proposed individual landmark will appear in the City Record of November 13, 2023, until November 27, 2023. The public hearing agenda will also be posted on LPC’s website.

If you wish to provide testimony related to the proposed designation, you are encouraged to sign up on the hearings page in advance of the public hearing and you may provide written testimony by emailing testimony@lpc.nyc.gov.

Participation by videoconference may be available as well. Please check the hearing page on LPC’s website (https://www.nyc.gov/site/lpc/hearings/hearings.page) for updated hearing information.

The final order and estimated times for each application will be posted on the Landmarks Preservation Commission website the Friday before the hearing. Please note that the order and estimated times are subject to change. An overflow room is located outside of the primary doors of the public hearing room.

Members of the public not attending in person can observe the meeting on LPC’s YouTube channel at www.youtube.com/nyclpc and may testify on particular matters by joining the meeting using either the Zoom app or by calling in from any phone. Specific instructions on how to observe and testify, including the meeting ID and password, and the call-in number, will be posted on the agency’s website, on the Monday before the public hearing.

New York City's Landmark Preservation Commission to consider landmarking Rudolph's Modulightor Building

In 2019 The Paul Rudolph Estate and the Paul Rudolph Institute for Modern Architecture (PRIMA, then known as the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation) filed a Request For Evaluation of Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor building as a New York City landmark with the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission.

The Landmarks Preservation Commission is responsible for identifying and designating the special buildings and sites that represent the architectural, historical and cultural heritage of New York City. The Commission’s Research Department accepts suggestions from the public regarding potential historic resources throughout the five boroughs. If a property appears to rise to the level of significance necessary to be considered for Landmark designation, the agency may conduct additional research, and may recommend it for consideration by the Commission.

Following subsequent conversations with PRIMA about the Commission’s interest in considering the Modulightor Building as a potential New York City landmark, the Commission plans to move forward in the designation process by holding a vote on October 3rd, 2023 to decide whether to calendar the building for a future public hearing.

Calendaring is the first formal step in the process for considering a building for designation. If the site is calendared, a public hearing will be scheduled so that all interested parties, including property owners and their representatives, relevant community boards, elected officials, community groups and members of the public can testify or submit written testimony regarding the proposed designation.

“The Modulightor Building’s remarkable front and rear elevations are composed of intersecting and overlapping horizontal and vertical rectangles of varying projection and size. Painted white, the steel I-beams form jigsaw-like screens that recall the De Stijl movement, Russian Constructivism, and Mies van der Rohe, as well a Rudolph’s celebrated Milam Residence of 1959-1961.”

— "The Modulightor Building" brief prepared by the Research Department of the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

You can download a copy of the LPC calendar showing the Modulightor Building as item #2 on the agenda here.
 
Here’s how to attend the meeting:

WHEN
TUESDAY, October 3rd at 9:30 AM

WHERE
The public hearing room at 1 Centre Street, 9th Floor, in the Borough of Manhattan.

Participation by videoconference may be available as well. Please check the hearing page on LPC’s website (https://www.nyc.gov/site/lpc/hearings/hearings.page) for updated hearing information.

The final order and estimated times for each application will be posted on the Landmarks Preservation Commission website the Friday before the hearing. Please note that the order and estimated times are subject to change. An overflow room is located outside of the primary doors of the public hearing room.

Members of the public not attending in person can observe the meeting on LPC’s YouTube channel at www.youtube.com/nyclpc and may testify on particular matters by joining the meeting using either the Zoom app or by calling in from any phone. Specific instructions on how to observe and testify, including the meeting ID and password, and the call-in number, will be posted on the agency’s website, on the Monday before the public hearing.

Toying with Architecture: Rudolph, Lego, and Modularity

A FASCINATING IMAGE: Paul Rudolph, sitting on the floor and working—or playing (or both!)—with Legos. He looks to be creating what might be a high-rise residential structure that would express his ideas about how whole apartments could be manufactured and lifted-into-place (as what he called “the brick of the future.”) Around him are numerous boxes of Lego sets (at far left, a pair of them are sitting on a Mies Barcelona chair!), and in the foreground a large number of Lego blocks have already—through Rudolph’s hands—taken on architectonic form.

AND A REVEALING ONE: This photo is also interesting for what else one can detect about Rudolph’s working context. It was taken in one of Rudolph’s work spaces (his office at 54 West 57th Street) and, hung in the background, one can see models of two of Rudolph’s commissions. At the upper-right is a large model of his 1966 design for a resort community at Stafford Harbor, Virginia (and the form of that project’s clusters of housing resonate well with the Lego aesthetic.) Also at the top, just left of center, one can see a “Toio” floor lamp, designed by Achille Castiglioni (which is in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art.) While Italian lighting fixtures are now widely available in the US, when this early 1970’s photo was taken one was much less likely to encounter (and be able to purchase) examples of high-level imported industrial design. To the left of that is a Luxo lamp (which were then ubiquitous in architects’ offices as lighting for their drawing boards.) Image is from a photo print found within the archive of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation.

ARCHITECTS MAKE TOYS & TOYS MAKE ARCHITECTS

Architecture is usually a serious matter, as even the smallest construction projects entail large commitments of funds, time, and focus. Moreover, architects and builders must engage with issues of durability, fitness to purpose, the practical constraints of materials and available skills, and conformance with construction regulations that are meant to ensure safety. Anyone who has spent time on construction sites—particularly if it is during a site visit by an architect—quickly realizes that these are venues where frivolity is forbidden, and great tensions are at work.

But there’s also a long engagement between Modern architects and play—specifically: TOYS.

This Toy-Architect relationship operates in two directions:

• Architects that have designed toys—both literally, and in the sense that some of their work is toy-like.

• Toys that have designed architects—-in the sense that toys having a formative influence on them.

ARCHITECTS AS TOYMAKERS

Architects (and their close associates) have been surprisingly prolific in the creation of toys—and here are some better-known examples:

• Though the most famous building toys (A. C. Gilbert’s Erector Set and Frank Hornby’s Meccano) were not designed by architects, at least one of them—Gilbert’s—was inspired by his observation of actual steel girders used in large-scale construction.

  But the third most famous building toy—Lincoln Logs—invented in 1916, and still available today—was designed by an architect: John Lloyd Wright. (1892-1972.) He was Frank Lloyd Wright’s son, and—although he had a long and productive career designing a wide range of buildings—he’ll probably remain best known for the creation of this toy.

• The Bauhaus was also a source of toy designs, and the challenge of designing them was taken-up by some students.

  The most well-known example—and one which has continued to be in production—is a Building Blocks Set designed by Alma Siedhoff-Buscher (1899–1944) while she was a student at the Bauhaus. There were two versions: the first in 1923, with 32 blocks; and a larger set in the following year, with 39. The blocks, of various colors, shapes, and sizes, offer an almost infinite opportunity for creative compositions—figurative, architectural, and abstract—though it is best known with them assembled into the form of a sailboat (which was illustrated on the exterior of the set’s original packaging.)

  The flexibility of the Bauhaus style and approach (which allowed it to be applied to challenges as diverse in scale and purpose as architecture, city planning, furniture, textiles, lighting, typography, pottery—and toys!) has never stopped attracting designers—and an ever-widening audience of consumers. Thus, though the Bauhaus has past its centenary, its geometries, motifs, and overall “look” continue to be utilized for every type of design work—even for more recently designed objects of amusement. The growth and victory of this style, and indeed the identity “Bauhaus” itself, is deeply explored in Philipp Oswalt’s incisive book, “The Bauhaus Brand” published by Scheidegger and Spiess—a visually rich and penetrating study of how this “brand” has become omnipresent.

• It’s also worth nothing that the same playful. toy-creating spirit can be seen in another of the Bauhaus’s most notable productions: the Triadic Ballet, developed by Bauhaus teacher Oskar Schlemmer (1888–1943.)

  The ballet’s costume designs, by Schlemmer—which are more famous than the performance itself (some are shown here)—are perceivable as giant (human sized), moving toy creatures, many of which hew to the geometric Bauhaus aesthetic.

• Since models, of proposed buildings, are part of every architect’s practice, doll houses would seem to be a natural arena for their talents—and one of our earlier posts was about a very Modern Rudolphian version of a dollhouse.

  The ultimate example of an architect engaged in doll house design was the one created by the final master of the English Renaissance, Sir Edwin Lutyens (1869–1944). His Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House (completed in 1924 for Great Britain’s then reigning queen, and now to be seen at Windsor Castle) was an elaborate affair, and the Royal Collection Trust describes it as including “. . . .contributions from over 1,500 of the finest artists, craftsmen and manufacturers of the early twentieth century. From life below stairs to the high-society setting of the saloon and dining room, and from a library bursting with original works by the top literary names of the day, to a fully stocked wine cellar and a garden, created by Gertrude Jekyll, no detail was forgotten. The house even includes electricity, running hot and cold water and working lifts.”

• German Expressionist architect Hermann Finsterlin (1887–1973) is primarily known through his drawings: dreamlike visions of buildings which are often so fantastical that one wonders if they were intended for humans habitation.

  Finsterlin also designed charming, colorful toys: some with intersecting geometric forms, and others that are more recognizably architectonic. The latter types were designed as assemblies of smaller parts, which could be disassembled and, presumably, creatively repositioned into new configurations.

  Putting “Hermann Finsterlin toys” in Google Images yields a large number of pictures of his visionary drawings, as well as of his equally otherworldly models—but one will also see a some of of his toys. A screen capture (from such an image search), with a number of those toys, can be seen at right.

• That most serious of the Modern movement’s master architects, Le Corbusier, did have a playful side, but he’s not generally known to have designed any toys.

  But one model—which he used to explain the offset layout of apartments in his Unité d'habitation—is definitely toy-like. Such explanatory aids might seem “cute”—but that quality could well be an architect’s strategic choice, as the interest and even friendliness which models evoke can be effective tools of persuasion. Even so, looking at this intriguing image today, what is also evoked is a Corbusian version of Jenga.

• Charles Eames (1907–1978) and Ray Eames (1912–1988), partners professionally and in life, had—and continue to hold—world-wide reputations for their inventive approach to meeting the widest range of design challenges. Working in architecture, exhibit design, cinema, graphics, and—most famously—furniture, their designs are known for what futurist John Naisbitt would call “high touch”: a sense of human, personal interaction (something needed ever more powerfully in the midst of a technological society.) So, even though Eames-designed products (like their celebrated series of chairs) were manufactured by industrial processes, those objects convey a human and often playful spirit—and that was further evident in their design of films and exhibitions.

  In 1945, as part of their research into molding plywood into three-dimensional curved shapes, they created a two-part, child-scaled elephant seat. The compound curvatures, entailed in making it, were particularly challenging, and it never went into mass-production during the Eames’ lifetime [but, since 2017, it has been made available by Vitra.]

  Also in the play mode is the “House of Cards” set, designed by the Eames and originating in 1952 (with variant and larger versions, issued in subsequent decades.) Enjoyed, and marketed for both adults and children, the cards show a rich assortment of photographs or patterns and objects, and are slotted to allow them to be constructed into a variety of configurations. The card sets continue to be produced, and are also in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art.

The Rudolph family, with young Paul Rudolph at far left. This would have been taken probably shortly before he made the house model.

• The archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation include a letter from Paul Rudolph’s mother, Eurie Stone Rudolph. Internal evidence indicates that it was probably written in the mid-1960s (she makes reference to having visited the New York World’s Fair (1964-1965). The memories of her son, shared in that letter, include young Rudolph creating a miniature house. It is probably mentioned as evidence of his early interest in architecture—but what he built was also something approaching a doll house in scale and detail (though Rudolph would likely eschew that term.).

  She writes: “After we moved to Franklin, Paul decided to make a Model house, out of cardboard. It was an ideal home with everything a home could have in it. He made the furniture of first one thing and another. Made lamp bases from marbles, made a Gov. Winthrop Bookcase and little tiny books to go in the case. Made shingles for the house, about one forth inch wide and half an inch long. Made windows, then a friend gave him a little set of electric light[s] for the house. He had it all wired and would turn the lights on to show through the windows. When we moved to Athens [Alabama} we moved that six foot house as Paul did not want to give it up. It had given him a lot of pleasure to show it to people as they always seemed so interested in that he had made everything.” [The full text of this fascinating letter can be found in the catalog of the Paul Rudolph centenary exhibit.]

One notable point about many of the above toys (and also the one we’ll discuss below) is that they’re systems. A toy model set that allows one to construct a single type of thing (for example, of the Space Shuttle) is a system: a kit of parts that makes a whole. But most of the toys above are what Christopher Alexander called a generating system: a kit of parts that allows one to make multiple wholes. Built-in to generating systems is flexibility of arrangement and the freedom to invent new configurations. When this quality is found in a toy, that’s perfect for encouraging an exploration of (and sensitivity to) the possibilities of design.

FROEBELIZATION — TOYS CREATING ARCHITECTS?

The most famous connection between toys and Modern architecture goes in the other direction: not architects making toys, but rather: toys making architects. We speak, of course, about the Froebel Blocks. Friedrich Wilhelm August Fröbel (or Froebel) (1782–1852) was a German educator, active in the first half of the 19th Century. He was one of the creators of the modern recognition that children have unique needs and capabilities, created the concept of the kindergarten (including creating the word), and designed a comprehensive set of educational toys known as “Froebel gifts”. They were primarily composed of a series of progressively more sophisticated sets of blocks. Frank Lloyd Wright was given a set, shortly before he turned ten years old, and in his autobiography wrote:

“For several years I sat at the little kindergarten table-top ruled by lines about four inches apart each way making four-inch squares; and, among other things, played upon these ‘unit-lines’ with the square (cube), the circle (sphere) and the triangle (tetrahedron or tripod)—these were smooth maple-wood blocks. All are in my fingers to this day.”  

—and—

“The virtue of all this lay in the awakening of the child-mind to rhythmic structures in Nature… I soon became susceptible to constructive pattern evolving in everything I saw.”

What could be constructed from the blocks—and what creativity might it induce in a child? Wright clearly thought they were influential on him—and the fact that Le Corbusier and Buckminster Fuller were also exposed to the Froebel system is suggestive of a fruitful connection between this type of education and the formal results emerging when (and if) the child becomes a professional designer. Ultimately, such cause-and-effect remains in the realm of speculation—but it has received the deep exploration in the late Jeanne S. Rubin’s book: “Intimate Triangle: Architecture of Crystals, Frank Lloyd Wright and the Froebel Kindergarten".

The other scholar of this topic—perhaps world’s greatest expert on architectural toys—is Norman Brosterman, an architect, curator, historian, and writer. His collection (including building sets like the Froebel system) was acquired by the CCA - the Canadian Centre for Architecture. Several exhibits have focused on toys from that collection, and several books on the topic, by Brosterman, have been published: “Potential Archicture,” “Building in Boxes,” and “Inventing Kindergarten.”

Architectural historians have made-the-case that it would not be a great leap to go from the compositional possibilities offered by the Froebel sets of blocks -to- the designs of Wright. Brosterman and others have offered some visual evidence—as in this paring of images from one of his books (shown here.)

RUDOLPH AND LEGO

Although it ceased regular publication two decades ago, and has faded from public consciousness, LIFE magazine had been—for nearly 2/3 of a century—one of the titans of US magazine publishing and was part of the consciousness of every American. With a circulation of millions of copies-a-week, the famous LIFE logo—bold sans-serif letters within a red rectangle—became synonymous with the best in photojournalism: LIFE’s photographers and reporters delved into every aspect of the human experience and nature—from the playful -to- the most somber, from peaceful creativity -to- the darkest tragedies of war. With its enormous circulation and respect, anything—or anybody—that got published in LIFE was lifted to national attention.

LIFE’s December 15, 1972 Special Double Issue on the Joys of Christmas looked at the holiday from a variety of viewpoints, utilizing the photo-essay format for which the magazine was celebrated. The issue included articles about Bethlehem, holiday preparations and celebration on an American farm, a timeline of historic events that have happened on Christmas day, ongoing acts of charity from around the country, and examples of artistic and ornamental Christmas baking.

Among this smorgasbord of holiday celebration is an article that—even if there wasn’t an explicit Christmas connection, certainly carries a mood of joy: “Masterminds At Play”. On the magazine’s Contents page, the editors expressed their intent in this way:

“Some ingenious grown-ups get a chance to see what they can do with children’s playthings.”

And, in the article’s introductory text, they further explain:

“As every child who has grown-up within grabbing distance knows, toys fascinate adults. With a sympathetic nod to the kids, therefor, LIFE asked four particularly inventive adults to indulge their impulses and have a good time with gadgets usually only get a chance to play with.”

Their choice of creative adults was stellar—each masters in their own field: custom car designer George Barris (whose most famous work was the 1960’s TV version of the Batmobile), artist Norman Laliberte (whose colorful banners suffused the Vatican Pavilion at the New York World’s Fair), writer Lonne Elder III (known for his script for the classic film, “Sounder”), cinematic master Federico Fellini—and Paul Rudolph.

While Fellini clowned with some children’s makeup, and Elder wrote a brief play for a pair of marionettes, Rudolph worked with LEGO blocks—many sets of them (we counted at least 8 boxes of Legos in one photo Rudolph at work with them.). As the article’s text mentions, he supplemented the blocks with plastic rods. [Rudolph associate Ernest Wagner tells us that Paul Rudolph liked to explore the industrial surplus and plastic supply stores which could then be found on downtown New York’s Canal Street—and such venues would likely have been them source of those rods.]

We’ve reproduced Rudolph’s page below—and, in case the texts are hard to read, we’ve transcribed them for you. The introduction on Rudolph’s page explains:

Mastermind with Building Blocks

Architect Paul Rudolph is former head of the Yale School of Architecture and a pioneer of the use of modules—the prefabricated, prewired units that can be shipped to a building site and assembled in any one of countless configurations. Given a dozen sets of Lego to start with with, Rudolph noted how the toy building blocs resemble modules—moreover could be put together to form a very satisfying kind of skyscraper. Using plastic rods for extra support, Rudolph quickly built three scale-model apartment buildings and observed that he would be happy to design more buildings this way if only the blocks were slightly longer and narrower. Real modules have to be shipped by road, and “Legos wouldn’t quite fit.”

And the caption reads:

Working in his studio above, Rudolph assembles he small Lego pieces, which connect with interlocking teeth, then put all the parts together to form the larges of this models (right). It contains 35 to 40 living units in each of 11 clusters grouped around a central service core, and stands four feet high.

WHY LEGOS?

Of course, with it’s brick-like construction system and pieces, it would be natural to associate Lego with architecture. Over the decades, there have been numerous examples and exhibits of architects and designers using Legos, either attempting to recreate well-known buildings, or to explore new architectural designs.

For about the last decade, the Lego company has proclaimed a connection between their system and iconic architecture by issuing sets of blocks which are constructible into some of the most famous Modern architectural works of the 20th Century, among them: the Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye, Utzon’s Sydney Opera House, SOM’s John Hancock Building, the United Nations headquarters—and even Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House.

Wright seems to be a favorite, in that he’s the only architect that they’ve chosen who has the honor by having several of his buildings done as Lego sets: the Robie House, the Imperial Hotel, the Guggenheim Museum, and Fallingwater—the last one of which seems to work especially well with the Lego system.

But why did LIFE magazine connect Rudolph and Legos? Were the editors already aware of Rudolph’s oeuvre, and noticed the visual resonance between some of his projects and the Lego system? Or did they approach Rudolph, telling him the premise of the article, and ask him what he’d like to “play” with?

RUDOLPH, MODULARITY, aND “THE BRICK OF THE FUTURE”

We’ve seen no records about how Paul Rudolph’s participation in the LIFE article came about—but its text does point to a topic which was of ongoing and intense interest to Rudolph: what he called “the brick of the future” (which he also sometimes called “the twentieth century brick.”)

Those are Rudolph’s terms for a future possibility for architecture and the construction industry: entire apartments would be made off-site in factories, and then transported to the construction site. The construction site would have structures to receive these modules, and the apartment units—like modular bricks—would be lifted into their final locations and connected to utilities.

Generally, Rudolph envisioned that “brick of the future” apartment houses would be in the shape of towers—sometimes quite tall—and that’s what his design in the LIFE article looks like (see enlargement from the article, at right). But Rudolph also had additional possible configurations in mind: mid-rise stepped assemblies, and low-rise (two or three stories) versions, where the units would spread across a landscape.

Rudolph’s liking for, and interest in modular (or modular-like) “brick”-unit forms can be seen across most of his 50-year career—it is one of his major architectural, technological, aesthetic, and policy commitments—of which he explicitly and repeatedly spoke, and tried to bring to fruition in numerous projects.

Sometimes this affinity comes out of aesthetic considerations. Rudolph, well-aware of all chapters in the history of Modern design and art, would have digested the artistic genome of overlapping and projecting rectilinear forms. This type of design was manifest in the architecture and sculpture of the early decades of the Modern movement—and superb examples can be seen in this pair of sculptures by De Stijl artist George Vantongerloo (1886-1965) shown here (and one can easily imagine them being constructed out of Legos!) Also, creating compositions like this was a standard exercise in Modern, Bauhaus-derived design education programs—and remains so in some schools today. Even more pertinent, it’s worth remembering that Rudolph was a student, at Harvard, of Walter Gropius—the former director of the Bauhaus.

One can see this artistic, sculptural approach, using module-like forms, in his 1960 project for O’Brien’s Motor Lodge (shown below), and in his 1963 design for the Orange County Government Center.

Of the O’Brien project, Rudolph himself later connected it to his modular concerns, saying:

“In a sense this is an earlier study of the formal architectural possibilities of the large scale, three-dimensional, pre-fabricated unit (Twentieth Century Brick), but constructed by traditional methods of brick and concrete.”

One can also see his idea to use modular, brick-like apartments used—not just as a form, but explicitly as a construction system—in a design from about the same time: his 1959 project for a Trailer Apartment Tower (see Rudolph’s sketch at right). He said of this proposal:

“For a number of years now I have felt that one way around the housing impasse would be to utilize either mobile houses or truck vans placed in such a way that the roof of one unit provides the terrace for the one above. Of course the essence of this is to utilize existing three dimensional prefabricated units of light construction originally intended as moving units but adapted to fixed situations and transformed into architecturally acceptable living units. One approach would be to utilize vertical hollow tubes, probably rectangular in section, 40 or 50 stories in height to accommodate stairs, elevators and mechanical services and to form a support for cantilever trusses at the top. These cantilever trusses would give a ‘sky hook’ from which the three dimensional unit could be hoisted into place and plugged into its vertical mechanical core.”

PAUL RUDOLPH’S MODULAR PORTFOLIO

Looking through Rudolph’s oeuvre, one can see that the modular, LEGO-like approach comes up repeatedly. In addition to the projects shown above, below we’ll look at 4 others which evidence his ongoing interest in this such a construction/design system.

1967 - GRAPHIC ARTS CENTER

Designed to be placed on the Western edge of Manhattan island (slightly north of the site of the World Trade Center), the Graphic Arts Center was a to be a large complex that would include housing (4,000 apartments!), offices, manufacturing, shops, schools, a marina, and other facilities. Rudolph describes his intent—including the use of a modular building approach:

“The proposals for the Graphic Arts Center are based on the concept of the megastructure, or the idea that many functions can be served in a single large building complex. In this case there are facilities for industry (lithography, legal and financial printers); office space; 4,000 apartments of varying kinds; elementary schools, kindergartens; play spaces at grade, as well as on platforms in the sky; community center; restaurants; commercial shopping; gardens and recreational space; and parking-trucking access incorporating portions of the West Side Highway. In other words, it is a city within a city. The idea of a megastructure is different from the idea of building an apartment house, industrial and office space, schools and restaurants. Rather, it is the intent to build all of these multiple functions in one complex.”

“The apartment houses are, perhaps, conceptually the most interesting, since they propose to utilize techniques developed by the mobile house industry (this industry now accounts for one out of five new housing starts in the United States and the graph is steadily going upward). These units would hang from trusses supported on masts which contain elevator and stair cores, plus vertical lines of utilities. By arranging the mobile house units in “log cabin” fashion, the roof for one becomes the terrace for the one above.”

A model of a one of the towers of the Graphic Arts Center. One can see the connection to Rudolph’s other modular-oriented designs, as well as the model he later made for the LIFE article.

A portion of Paul Rudolph’s large model of the proposed Graphic Arts Center (which was to be built in lower Manhattan) in which one can get an idea of the project’s immense scale.

1968 - ORIENTAL MASONIC GARDENS

Prefabrication was part of the architectural zeitgeist of the 1960’s, and the US government—through their “Operation Breakthrough”—sponsored a large number of experiments in an attempt to find out if industrialized housing was a viable approach for creating housing. That was the context for Oriental Masonic Gardens, a federally-aided project designed help solve housing shortages in New Haven. Rudolph’s design included 2-to-5 bedroom apartments, and consisted of 148 units on 12.5 acres. The housing was made of pre-fabricated units (a total of 333 modules), which were brought to the site and arranged in a two-level configuration (which gave each residence a private yard).

Bedeviled by issues of construction quality, this forward-thinking experiment was eventually demolished in 1981. Rudolph acknowledged the problems of the project, but continued to think that this approach—prefabrication—contained the possibility of positive solutions to creating housing that was economical, but which also allowing for formal and spatial variety.

Oriental Masonic Gardens’ modules, whose designs allowed for a variety of differently sized housing options, were manufactured off-site and then craned into place.

The homes were duplexes, and were placed in cruciform configurations. Even though they were contiguous, each home in these 4-unit clusters had their own separate yard.

1967 - LOMEX: THE LOWER MANHATTAN EXPRESSWAY

The Lower Manhattan Expressway (LOMEX) was a project to connect bridges (that were located on the opposite sides of Manhattan island) with a new throughway. The existing streetscape would not allow for high-speed movement between those two points, and so a new, borough-spanning solution was called for. Rather than this being just a matter of highway engineering, Paul Rudolph approached it comprehensively: his design embraced multiple modes of transportation, housing, offices and other facilities—-all within a dramatic megastructural vision that took on varying shapes and heights to accommodate different functions.

A key aspect of Rudolph’s design was the use of prefabrication for the high-rise housing. Vertical structures (which had, built-into them, elevators, stairs, and utilities like plumbing and electricity) would be erected; and then apartments—modular units manufactured off-site—would be trucked-in and slotted into place. Here again, this modular system could be flexible, with the units arranged in different configurations, and on structures of varying heights.

Paul Rudolph’s perspective rendering of LOMEX, which would have spanned all across Manhattan. In the distance (to be located at Manhattan island’s edges) can be seen high-rise residential towers that are part of the project—and they were to use the pre-manufactured “brick of the future” housing system that Rudolph envisioned.

Rudolph’s drawing, illustrating an aspect of the LOMEX project’s high rise housing system. Housing modules—the “brick of the future”—would be manufactured off-site, and delivered to the site by truck (see bottom of drawing.) They would then be craned upward, and set into permanent place on the building’s structural system.

1980 - THE COLONNADE

Rudolph intended these luxury condominiums, The Colonnade in Singapore, to be built using the modular, “brick of the future” approach that he’d been investigating and trying for decades. For reasons of timing and local economics, it ended up being built with more conventional construction methods—but one can see, both in Rudolph’s drawings and in the final result, that the form of the concept was retained. Rudolph’s original intent still may have potential for the construction of buildings like this.)

Shown is a portion of one of Rudolph’s drawing for The Colonnade: an isometric rendering, showing the exterior, with highly articulated volumes, grid-like horizontal and vertical structural elements, and a profusion of balconies. The modular intent is clearly manifest in this vision.

Apartments in The Colonnade are among the most sought after in Singapore. Even though it was ultimately built using conventional methods, its as-built presence still conveys Rudolph’s original concept of it being constructed with pre-fabricated units.

RUDOLPH’S FURTHER APPLICATIONS OF MODULARITY

Rudolph’s interest in, and attempts to apply the principle of flexible modularity, was not limited to building-scale projects. He also brought this approach to the design of construction systems, furniture, and lighting—and here are examples of each:

1960’s - RIBBED CONCRETE BLOCK SYSTEM

Rudolph’s most famous building is his Yale Art & Architecture Building, well-known for its ribbed concrete surfaces. To achieve that finish, the concrete was cast-in-place and then bush-hammered by hand. Rudolph liked the shadowed-/textured effect that the ribbing created, and used it in other buildings which he designed (i.e.: Endo Labs and the Boston Government Service Center). But that construction method proved too expensive to use in some projects, and Rudolph and his staff sought an alternative which would produce visually similar results.

For Crawford Manor, a 109 unit high-rise apartment building for elderly residents in The Bronx, NYC, they designed a set of concrete blocks with vertically ribbed surfaces. The system would still give the serrated effect that Rudolph wanted, but which would be significantly less expensive to construct. A variety of shapes. to accommodate different construction conditions, were designed—a Lego-like “generating system”. Construction began in 1964 and finished in 1966.

In addition to the cost savings. the ribbing visually “broke down” down the scale of concrete block (so as to avoid an unwanted monolithic look to the building), and it also prevented run-off stains: water is channeled into the interstices while the front of the block is exposed to cleaning. Rudolph’s modular ribbed concrete blocks were later used in several of his other buildings, such as the Chorley Elementary School and UMass Dartmouth.

A drawing, from Paul Rudolph’s office, showing precast and ribbed concrete blocks (as used at Crawford Manor). The version show (straight, with ribbing on both sides) would be only one of the set of shapes produced for this residential high-rise..

In this photo, one can see a variety of construction conditions (flat surfaces, curved surfaces, exterior and interior corners) for which different shapes of pre-cast ribbed concrete blocks were designed and manufactured.

1970’s - FURNITURE SYSTEM

Paul Rudolph designed his own Manhattan residence: his “Quadruplex” penthouse, near the United Nations. Rudolph often included built-in seating in his projects, and that’s very much part of this penthouse’s design. But he also wanted free-standing, movable furniture, and could not find any existing (to purchase) that met with his approval—so he created his own.

Rudolph came upon a system of connectors and metal tubes (“nodes and struts”) which was often used in retail settings to create display shelving. This was—like Lego—truly a “generating system.” Seeing the immense flexibility which the system offered, Rudolph proceeded to design (and have fabricated) a variety of furniture for his home. [Authorized editions of these designs continue to be offered, via the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation.]

Among the purposes, for which Rudolph utilized the connector and tube system, was to create a display stand for an original Louis Sullivan panel which he owned (and that he placed in the Quadruplex’s living room.)

In addition to a rolling dining chair (shown above), Rudolph also created a rolling lounge chair, and as well as side-tables. The chairs are now being made available through the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation.

1970’s - LIGHTING SYSTEM

It’s fair to say that Rudolph was obsessed with light: both natural and artificial, and the effects that could be created with it. Through most of his career he designed custom lighting for his projects—and because he used standard electrical components (and sometimes industrial surplus), these inventive fixtures could also be inexpensive.

This interest in light fixture design evolved further. Architectural historian Timothy M. Rohan, in his monograph on Rudolph, writes:

Although he cared little for the everyday workings of business, Rudolph could be quite entrepreneurial. In 1976, Rudolph and[Ernst] Wagner founded Modulightor, a firm that sold lighting. . . .”

The system which Rudolph came up with used a limited number of parts and shapes—but, very much like Lego, this generating system of components could be arranged and assembled to create a vast range of light fixtures: sconces, art lighting, wall washers, chandeliers, task lights…. Rudolph not only designed the system, per se (which was simultaneously economical in approach, yet allowed for broad creativity), but he also designed a large line of fixtures which utilized the system. The Modulightor company continues to offer fixtures, using his approach.

Rudolph showed that, even with a limited set of shapes, an immense range of configurations are possible. This is manifest in abundance in the lighting system available from Modulightor—a firm he co-founded with Ernst Wagner. Shown are a few examples of the types and shapes of light fixtures that can be built from the generating system that Rudolph invented.

IMAGE CREDITS

Lincoln Logs: John Lloyd Wright, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons; Triadic Ballet: Fred Romero, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons; Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House: Rob Sangster, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons;  Le Corbusier Model: from Le Corbusier, Oeuvre complète (Zurich, 1950), vol 4, p 186, collection Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal; Eames Elephant: Sinikka Halme, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons;  Eames House of Cards: SebastianHelm, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons;  Rudolph Family: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Frobel Blocks Set: Kippelboy, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons;  Froebel Student Using Blocks: Maria Kraus-Boelte/John Kraus: The kindergarten guide: An illustrated hand-book. 1877, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons;  Vantongerloo Sculptures: http://sdrc.lib.uiowa.edu/dada/Classique_Baroque/pages/033.htm, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons;   O’Brian’s Motor Lodge: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Trailer Apartment Tower: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Graphic Arts Center Model in Rudolph Office: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Graphic Arts Center Model: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Oriental Masonic Gardens Construction Photo: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Oriental Masonic Gardens: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  LOMEX Perspective: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  LOMEX Construction Diagram: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Colonnade Drawing: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Crawford Manor Block Drawing: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Crawford Manor Photograph:  Photo by Kelvin Dickinson, © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Sullivan Panel: © The Estate of Paul Rudolph, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation;  Rolling Chair: Courtesy of Peter Aaron;  Modulightor Fixtures:  Courtesy of Modulightor

Rudolph And His Architectural Photographers — PART TWO

P. J. McDonnell’s photograph of the Burroughs Wellcome building, in its current state, shows how great architecture has the power to always maintain its dignity. Photograph courtesy of © PJ McDonnell, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation Archives

In the first part of this study, Paul Rudolph And His Architectural Photographers—PART ONE, we looked at some of the most important architectural photographers of the 20th Century—Stoller, Kidder Smith, Molitor…—ones whose work had included a focus on the architecture and interiors of Paul Rudolph.

PART TWO—this article—will look at architecture & interiors photographers of the current era (almost all of whom are now very active!) whose work has also focused upon Rudolph. While this is not an exhaustive review of every photographer who has taken on that fascinating subject, it does show that an impressive range of talents have turned their attentions to Rudolph.

Above: Paul Rudolph’s bedroom, within his penthouse apartment. Below: an interior of the Modulightor Building. Photographs © Peter Aaron / OTTO, Archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

PETER AARON

Peter Aaron writes of his work: “I have been shooting architecture and interiors for thirty-five years. I started my career as a cinematographer, but consistently found myself more attracted to still photography. After working for designers Ward Bennett and Joseph d’Urso as they developed their High Tech style, I began a transformational apprenticeship with the great architectural photographer Ezra Stoller. After two years I began working on my own, adopting Ezra’s strong compositional approach while developing an individual style through the use of dramatic camera angles, theatrical lighting, and cinematic techniques. Since that time I have photographed structures by many of the most influential and groundbreaking architects of the last thirty years, including Robert A.M. Stern, Rem Koolhaas, Charles Gwathmey, Michael Graves, Peter Eisenman, Robert Venturi, Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, and Raphael Vinoly. I have been a contributing photographer for Architectural Digest and my images frequently appear in other magazines and books.” You can see an extensive selection of his work here, and learn about his recent book here.

AARON AND PAUL RUDOLPH: In 2018, the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation created two exhibits to celebrate Rudolph’s centenary, and also published corresponding catalogs for each. In preparation for these exhibits, while researching within our archives, we came across a beautiful image of Rudolph’s own bedroom within his Beekman Place Quadruplex penthouse—and that photograph was by Peter Aaron. We contacted Mr. Aaron and he graciously gave us permission to use the photograph. This opened up a dialogue with him, the result of which is that he has gone on to make light-filled photographs of the interiors of Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor Building (which you can see on that building’s project page.) Mr. Aaron has written of his goals: “As a photographer, my mission is to provide an image that’s a sort of ‘Platonic ideal’ of each structure, to show the building as the architect originally envisioned it…” —and we believe that his photographs of the work of Paul Rudolph are superb examples of the achievement of that aim.

One of the spectacular interiors of Paul Rudolph’s Deane Residence. Photograph © John Dessarzin

JOHN DESSARZIN

Mr. Dessarzin is a professional photographer of many decades experience, whose work has hardly been restricted to architectural subjects. As his impressive portfolio shows, his photography has focused on the human form, nature, news events, the famous and the anonymous, the foreign and the domestic—as well as architecture. Of that subject, he says: “At times [he pictures] the ineffable splendor in modern architecture as a haunting, commercial phantom among the iconic, storied skyscrapers of profit. In other instances, he presents ancient stone singularities as a charismatic existence that amply forges, but also devours human character in shades of ambivalence suggesting confused or decadent aspects of civilization.” Clearly, this is a photographer who is using his visual work to reach beyond the tangible to the ineffable—a commendable goal for any artist. You can learn more about him, and see his artistry in light and color, here.

DESSARZIN AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Paul Rudolph’s Deane Residence—a design he commenced at the end of the 1960’s—is known for its empathic use of structure, with geometrically composed framework expressed on both the exterior and interior. We came across a suite of photos of this dramatic design—images of spectacular color and drama—and it was the work of John Dessazin. He has graciously allowed us to include them on the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation’s project page for this house.

ED CHAPPELL

Ed Chappell, based in Florida, is a photographer with a special eye for the splendor of color in shooting architecture, fashion, landscape, and other subjects. He says of his work “I capture images. Make visions visible. Bring concepts to light. . . .I’m faced with challenges of every description—each of which calls for a unique solution, and all of which present the same demand: make it work. . . .You have to know the rules to break the rules, which may be exactly what is required. Experimentation and thinking ahead always pays off.” His website, here, displays a great range of his work.

CHAPPELL AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Paul Rudolph’s home in New York City, his “Quadruplex” penthouse, has been photographed a number of times. Perhaps the best article (with the most complete set of pictures) that has ever been published on it—as it looked the way that Rudolph had occupied and furnished it—was in a 2007 issue of Florida Design Review (and it was the cover story.) Richard Geary, a great admirer of Rudolph, wrote the text; and Ed Chappell did the photographs. The article conveys the sensual-layered composition of the spaces which Paul Rudolph created and in which he lived. Unfortunately, the Florida Design Review is no longer published, but you can still get a copy of that issue here.

A view of the opening spread of an article in an issue of Architectural Digest, in which Rudolph’s Deane Residence is profiled—with photographs by Cervin Robinson.

CERVIN ROBINSON

(1928-) One of the most celebrated of the second generation of great architectural photographers, Mr. Robinson was born in Boston, and started photographing at the age of 12. He attended Harvard University and in the 1950’s worked as an assistant to one of America’s most distinguished photographers, Walker Evans. He has said that “pictures of buildings seem to me as satisfying as pictures of people were frustrating”—and architectural photography became the focus of his long, creative, and prolific career. He traveled widely and has worked in a freelance capacity as a photographer for architects and design magazines since 1958—as well as himself being the author and illustrator of several books. Robinson’s work has been shown in many gallery and museums, including the Brooklyn Museum, the Ammon Carter, and the Philadelphia Museum. His website can be found here.

ROBINSON AND PAUL RUDOLPH: In a career that created some of the most dramatic formal solutions in Modern architecture, Paul Rudolph’s Deane Residence is among the most striking that he designed—famous for its rhythm of polygonal structural frames. Cervin Robinson photographed it for an article in Architectural Digest (with text by the late architect, Frank Israel). This master photographer was able to capture the variety of experiences inherent in this the house’s multi-level organization of overlapping spaces, and complex exterior geometries.

ANNIE SCHLECHTER

Ms. Schlechter says of herself and her work that she is “. . . .a native New Yorker who has been working as a photographer since 2000. Her clients include House Beautiful, New York Magazine, Better Homes & Gardens, Veranda, CN Traveler, The World of Interiors. Her commercial work ranges from hotel groups such as The Bowery Hotel and The Greenwich Hotel Group to designers and architects such as Marianna Kennedy, Chiarastella Cattana, Joe Serrins Studio, Inc Architecture & Design among others.” You can see Annie Schlechter’s splendid work here.

SCHLECHTER AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Ms. Schlechter collaborated with well-known writer Polly Devlin to create a book on amazing interiors in New York City—but, being largely private, these were spaces which the public had rarely or never known about or seen. The result was a book rich in story and color, “New York: Behind Closed Doors". They approached Ernst Wagner, the owner of the Paul Rudolph-designed Modulightor Building, about including it in the book—to which he not only agreed, but he also worked with them to provide the full background story, including Paul Rudolph’s intent for building, as well as Wagner’s reflections on it. Ms. Schlechter has graciously allowed the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation to include her photographs of the building and its interiors on their project page for the Modulightor Building.

The Modulightor Building—as seen in the evening, within its urban context. Photograph © Joe Polowczuk, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation Archives

JOE POLOWCZUK

Among the younger generation of design-focused photographers, those who have a sensibility that makes for great architectural images, is Joe Polowczuk. We may say “younger,”, but to look at his portfolio—which is full of variation in subject and varieties of visual delight—is to see someone with great experience and an exceptional eye for the possibilities of light. You can learn more about Joe, and see a beautiful selection of his work here—and you can read our article about him here (in which you can also see some of the photos he took of the exterior and interiors of Rudolph’s Modulightor Building).

POLOWCZUK AND PAUL RUDOLPH: In 2019, in cooperation with the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation, Joe made some luminous photographs of Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor Building, as well as the Rolling Chair that was also designed by Rudolph for use in his own penthouse home.

Ms. Broder captured the sense of deep space and spreading light, within one of the upper floors of the Modulightor Building. Photograph © Anne Broder, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation Archives

ANN BRODER

Anne Broder is a photographer who works both in the professional world, making photographs of interiors with an unerring eye for composition and color, and also uses photography to create moving artistic images of architecture, sculpture, and abstract forms. Of her work, she says “Today, I freelance as a real estate photographer and work the camera for architects, interior designers, retail shops, portraiture and for my own joy of photography.” You can see her beautiful work here.

BRODER AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Ann. Broder had become aware of the light-filled and varied spaces of Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor Building in New York City—a project that Rudolph had commenced in 1988. She approached us about photographing the building, and we were delighted to have Ms. Broder bring her eye and skills for recording this amazing building (especially, but not limited to, the recently finished uppermost floors of the building.)

An interior of Paul Rudolph’s penthouse apartment, in its current state. Photograph © Francis Dzikowski / OTTO, Archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

FRANCIS DZIKOWSKI

Mr. Dzikowski writes of his himself and his work that he “. . . .attended Virginia Polytechnic Institute’s foundation program in architecture and studied photography at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia Pennsylvania. He spent a decade living and traveling abroad photographing historical restoration projects and archaeological excavations. While photographing in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings for the Theban Mapping Project, Francis also taught photography at the American University in Cairo. He currently lives in Brooklyn, New York working as an architectural and interiors photographer. In 2009 he completed publication of a book titled, Public Art New York. . . .” You can see his work here, and learn more abut his book here.

DZIKOWSKI AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Paul Rudolph’s own home in New York City, his “Quadruplex”, has been photographed at various times over the decades. But it has been relatively inaccessible in recent years—so it was a great delight when the building’s current owners allowed the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation to visit it at the beginning of 2020. Francis Dzikowkski was present during that visit, creating a vivid portfolio of images to document the current state of that fascinating set of spaces.

A middle-distant view of a side elevation of the Burroughs Wellcome building, stately sitting within North Carolina’s landscape. Photograph © PJ McDonnell, The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation Archives

P. J. McDONNELL

Mr. McDonnell, who is based in North Carolina, says of himself: “I am a photographer, originally from New Jersey. I came across the Burroughs Wellcome building while browsing maps of the Research Triangle. Learning about the building is what sparked my interest and appreciation for Paul Rudolph's work.” You can see more of his photography—which certainly displays his strong interest in architecture, but which also embraces other visually fascinating subjects—on his Instagram page, here.

McDONNELL AND PAUL RUDOLPH: We came to really appreciate the work of P. J. McDonnell during our current campaign to save the Burroughs Wellcome building in North Carolina. The building had been the US headquarters and research center of the pharmaceutical giant, but it is now under threat of demolition. While the most familiar and frequently published published images of the building show it pristine and new, P. J. McDonnell’s photographs—made much more recently—show it in its current state. These powerful images share with us a building which, while needing work, also shows that great architecture can always maintain its power and dignity. McDonnell states “Like all of his work, the Burroughs Wellcome building is otherworldly, awe inspiring, and a one-of-a-kind building that could never be replaced.”

Rudolph And His Architectural Photographers — PART ONE

A compelling photo by G. E. Kidder Smith of Paul Rudolph’s Burroughs Wellcome US headquarters and research center, shown near the time of the building’s completion. Here, the photographer gives us an image which simultaneously captures the architecture’s play of volumes, structural and geometric adventurousness, aspects of its siting, and scale. Photo courtesy of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

PHOTOGRAPHIC POWER

What’s more important: a great building -or- a great photograph of it?

It’s an impossible question to answer—not because of its difficulty, but rather: because the question itself attempts to compare such different entities. The “actuality” of architecture—the way one would come to know a building, in-person, by entering and moving through it and experiencing the spaces sequentially (truly a four-dimensional phenomenon), and also through other senses (sound and touch)—is wholly different from the way that one takes-in the information embodied in a two-dimensional photograph.

Then how are architectural photographs important?

The answer: in their potential for influence.

ENDURING AND WIDESPREAD INFLUENCE

No matter how many people see a building in-person, an uncalculable greater number can see it in photographs—-and those viewings continue onward, even if the building ceases to exist.

Probably the most famous case is Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona Pavilion. It was built for a 1929 international exposition, and—from the time of its inauguration-to- its demolition—it only existed for less than a year. Since then, it has been known from a handful of photographs and its plan.

Mies’ Barcelona Pavilion, was built in 1929 and demolished within the following year. Of the handful of photographs recording what it looked like when extant, this is probably the most famous image.

Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona Pavilion of 1929 was built for an international exposition. It is preponderantly known only through a handful of photographs and two drawings (the plan, above, and a detail of a typical column.) Yet on the strength of this small group of images, it gained—and retains!—world-class status as one of the ultimate icons of architectural Modernism.

Of that small group of photographs, the most famous image is probably the one shown above. Those photos, combined with the plan drawing, have been included in countless books, articles, lectures, curricula—-and, even more important: they’ve become integrated into the thinking of every Modern architect. [We’ve written here about Rudolph’s own interest in the Barcelona Pavilion, and also here about his relationship to Mies’ work.] Now, coming-up on a century since it’s demolition, this iconic building continues to resonate through architectural education, scholarship, and practice— mainly because of photographs.

Further: try as we may to visit the great, iconic examples of architecture, they are just too dispersed. So even a devoted architectural traveler could spend decades just trying to see most of them. So, practically speaking, we have to experience and learn about most of of the world’s architecture from photographs.

THE GREAT PHOTOGRAPHERS OF MODERN ARCHIECTURE—CREATING THE ICONS WE REMEMBER

The 20th and early 21st centuries have been graced with architectural photographers that can be considered “artists-in-their-own-right”. That’s because they’ve not only been able to capture the formal essence of architectural works, but—like visual alchemists—they have also created images which (through their choices of point-of-view, lighting, focus, and composition) have virtually created the vital identities of those buildings.

Prime examples would be the powerful photo that Ezra Stoller took of Paul Rudolph’s Yale Art & Architecture Building—it’s the image we “have in our head” when we think of the building; Yukio Futagawa’s chroma-rich capturing of the interior of Rudolph’s Tuskegee Chapel; and Balthazar Korab’s photos of the soaring wings of Saarinen’s TWA “Flight Center” terminal at Kennedy Airport. To many of us, those images are the building.

Ezra Stoller’s photograph of the exterior of Paul Rudolph’s Yale Art & Architecture Building became the iconic image of it—and it’s included on the cover of his book on that famous building.

Each issue of Futagawa’s journal, GA (Global Architecture) focused on one or two buildings. This one is on Rudolph’s Tuskegee Chapel and Boston Govt. Service Center—and Tuskegee is on the cover.

Balthazar Korab photographed a number of designs by Eero Saarinen, including the TWA terminal for Kennedy airport. His photographic work on that project ranged from recording the Saarinen office’s working models, to construction photos (like the one above), to the finished building. Even in its construction stage, when it was only raw concrete, Korab was able to capture the drama of the building. Photo courtesy of the Balthazar Korab Photographic Archive, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

RUDOLPH AND HIS PHOTOGRAPHERS

Paul Rudolph worked with some of the century’s greatest architectural photographers—the ones who are celebrated for working with the leading figures in the world of architectural Modernism. While Rudolph might have been directly involved with some photographers—commissioning them, or requesting that they focus on certain aspects of a building—in other cases, even without Rudolph’s involvement, great photographers have been engaged (by others) to shoot his work; or have done so just out of their own interest in his oeuvre.

While not exhaustive, we’ll review a round-up of many of the photographers who have been focused on the work of Paul Rudolph—and we’ll do this in two parts:

• PART ONE (this article) looks at the great architectural photographers of the early-to-late 20th Century, who have worked on Rudolph’s oeuvre.

• PART TWO will look at photographers—most still very active—who have more recently focused on Rudolph’s work.

EZRA STOLLER

(1915-2004) When one thinks of architectural photography in America, the name—or rather: the images—of Ezra Stoller are what probably first come to mind. For decades, he photographed many of the 20th Century’s most significant new buildings in the US (by the country’s premier architects), thereby creating an archive of the achievements of Modern American Architecture. More than that, Stoller’s views are some of the most iconic images of that era.

STOLLER AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Of the several photographers that Rudolph worked with, Ezra Stoller is probably the one with which he had the most involvement and lasting relationship. Stoller photographed much of his residential work in Florida—including some of Rudolph’s greatest and most innovative houses like the Milam Residence (as seen on the over of Domin and King’s book on the Florida phase of Rudolph’s career—see image at right), the Walker Guest House, the Umbrella House, and the Healy “Cocoon” House—the Yale Art & Architecture Building in New Haven, Sarasota Senior High School, the Temple Street Parking Garage in New Haven, Endo Labs, the UMass Dartmouth campus, Tuskegee Chapel in Alabama, the Hirsch (later: “Halston”) townhouse in New York City , the Wallace House, Riverview High School in Florida, the Sanderling Beach Club in Florida, and numerous others—including the Burroughs Wellcome US headquarters and research center in North Carolina’s Research Triangle Park. One can access the extensive and fascinating archive of Ezra Stoller’s work (including the Rudolph projects that he photographed) here—and an extensive selection from throughout Stoller’s career (including numerous images of Rudolph’s work) can be viewed in the book “Ezra Stoller, Photographer” (see cover at right).

The first monograph on Rudolph which featured extensive color photography, all of which was done by Futagawa.

YUKIO FUTAGAWA

(1932-2015) The dean of architectural photography in Japan, and with a world-wide reputation, for over six decades Futagawa made magnificent and memorable photos of important buildings (new and traditional) around the world. Interestingly, he created his own “platform” to publish his work: he founded GA (“Global Architecture”), GH (“Global Houses”), and published other series and individual books. Those contained not only of photography, but also architectural drawings and full project documentation of distinguished works of architecture.

FUTAGAWA AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Futagawa traveled the US to make the photographs for the monograph, “Paul Rudolph” (part of the Library of Contemporary Architects series published by Simon and Schuster)—and the archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation posseses a note by Rudolph, testifying to his appreciation of Futagawa’s work. In the GA series, he published one on the Tuskegee Chapel and the Boston Government Service Center. Futagawa extensively photographed the work of Frank Lloyd Wright and, as part of the GA series, he asked Rudolph to contribute the introductory essay to the issue on Wright’s Fallingwater. He also published the large monograph on Rudolph’s graphic works (copiously including his famous perspective drawings): Paul Rudolph: Architectural Drawings.

Kidder Smith’s two-volume “A Pictorial History of Architecture in America,” published in 1976, includes Rudolph’s work. Below: one of his photographs of the Niagara Falls Central Library, taken near the time of its completion. Photo courtesy of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

G. E. KIDDER SMITH

(1913-1997) Along with the other ultra-prominent names we’ve been mentioning, in the world of architectural photography, we must include G. E. (George Everard) Kidder Smith. Trained as an architect, Kidder Smith was not only a photographer of architecture, but also an historian-writer, exhibit designer, and preservationist (helping to save/preserve the Robie House and the Villa Savoye.) His numerous books are still important resources for anyone doing research on the architecture of America and Europe His series of “Build” books (“Brazil Builds” “Italy Builds” “Switzerland Builds” “Sweden Builds”) provide abundant images and information about the rise of Modern architecture in each of those countries.

KIDDER SMITH AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Kidder Smith’s “A Pictorial History of Architecture in America” is a 2-volume work that was published in 1976, and—utilizing the photographs that Kidder Smith had made—it covers all eras of American architectural history, region-by-region. Kidder Smith must have admired Paul Rudolph’s work, for it shows up throughout this major, encyclopedic work, and includes: Rudolph’s Boston Government Service Center, Tuskegee Chapel, Niagara Falls Central Library, UMass Dartmouth, the Orange County Government Center—and Burroughs Wellcome (whose double-page spread image is the photographic climax at the end of Volume One.). This set of buildings are of particular poignance and and meaning to us, as they include a major Rudolph building that has been altered/disfigured (Orange County); and three which are currently threatened (Boston, Niagara Falls, and Burroughs Wellcome.)—and we are using Kidder Smith’s images to help fight for their preservation.

This monograph from 1984 shows work from the several generations of photographers who have worked for Hedrich-Blessing, and the book includes an image of Paul Rudolph’s Christian Science Student Center. An even larger monograph of Hedrich-Blessing’s work was published in 2000, which also included that photo of Rudolph’s building.

HEDRICH-BLESSING

(1929-Present) The other photographers of Rudolph’s work, mentioned in this article, were primarily based on or towards the US’ East Coast. But for the middle of the country, the kings of architectural photography were Hedrich-Blessing. The firm was founded in 1929 by Ken Hedrich and Henry Blessing and—though based in Chicago and famous for photographs of buildings in that region—they have done work all over. Among the distinguished architects, whose work they photographed, were: Wright, Mies, Raymond Hood, Keck and Keck, Albert Kahn, Adler & Sullivan, SOM, Harry Weese, Breuer, Saarinen, Gunnar Birkets, Yamasaki, and Alden Dow. Since its founding, the firm has employed several generations of photographers, and is still very much active today.

HEDRICH-BLESSING AND PAUL RUDOLPH: To our present knowledge, Hedrich-Blessing did not photograph many of Paul Rudolph’s buildings. [Perhaps because Rudolph did not build much in their part of the country. That may have been different had Rudolph become dean of IIT’s School of Architecture in Chicago—an offer he briefly considered.] We do know of at least one superb photo Hedrich-Blessing took of his Christian Science Student Center. This building, which Rudolph designed in 1962 near the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana, was unfortunately demolished in the mid-1980’s. So it is important that we have Hedrich-Blessing’s photograph, which was taken by their staff photographer Bill Engdahl in 1966: it shows the building at night: dramatically shadowed on the outside, but enticingly glowing from within.

Above: Shulman’s extensive oeuvre is documented in a three-volume monograph published by Taschen. Below: One of Shulman’s photographs of Rudolph’s Temple Street Parking Garage. © J. Paul Getty Trust. Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles (2004.R.10)

JULIUS SHULMAN

(1910-2009) Shulman was an almost exact contemporary of some of the other legendary architectural photographers on this list (i.e.: Stoller and Kidder Smith), and his professional career extended over 7 decades—from the 1930’s into the 2000’s. The body of work for which he is most well known is the large set of photographs he took of Modern architecture in California—centered in Los Angeles, but extending to cover buildings in other parts of the state. His clients included some of the most famous makers of Modern architecture: Pierre Koenig (for whom he took a night time photo of the Stalh House which became the iconic emblem of modern living in Southern California,) Neutra, Wright, Soriano, the Eames, and John Lautner. Christopher Hawthorne, of the Los Angeles Times, said of his work: “His famous black-and-white photographs. . . .were not just, as [Thomas] Hines noted, marked by clarity and high contrast. They were also carried aloft by a certain airiness of spirit, a lively confidence that announced that Los Angeles was the place where architecture was being sharpened and throwing off sparks from its daily contact with the cutting edge.” Shulman also had commissions in other parts of the country, as in: his photographs of Lever House in New York, a house by Paolo Soleri in Arizona, and work by Mies in Chicago—and he worked internationally, for example: photographing a residence by Lautner in Mexico. He authored 7 books, participated in 10 others, and his extensive archive is in the Getty Research Institute.

SHULMAN AND PAUL RUDOLPH: While Julius Shulman is identified with the photography of key examples of architectural Modernism in California, he also took assignments for other locations, and his images of Paul Rudolph’s works in New Haven are strong examples of Shulman’s image making. Several can be seen on the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation’s project pages for the Temple Street Parking Garage, and the Yale Married Students Housing. The photographs of the garage are intense with visual drama, highlighting its scale and sculptural qualities.

Above: Molitor’s photo of UMass Dartmouth. Below: Niagara Falls Central Library. Images courtesy of Columbia University, Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Joseph W. Molitor Photograph Collection

JOSEPH W. MOLITOR

(1907-1996)  We are fortunate that the the Joseph W. Molitor Photograph Collection is now part of the Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, where it is made available to scholars, researchers, writers, and students. The Avery Library describes Molitor and his career: “Joseph Molitor, recognized as a peer of such leading 20th-century American architectural photographers as Hedrich-Blessing, Balthazar Korab, Julius Shulman, and Ezra Stoller, documented the work of regional and national architects for fifty years. Trained as an architect, he practiced for twelve years before briefly working in advertising. Molitor turned exclusively to architectural photography in the late 1940s, maintaining his studio in suburban Westchester County, New York. Working primarily in black and white, Molitor's images appeared in Architectural Record, The New York Times, House & Home, and other national and international publications.”

MOLITOR AND PAUL RUDOLPH: Avery’s text also mentions “His iconic photograph of a walkway at architect Paul Rudolph’s high school in Sarasota, Florida, won first place in the black and white section of the American Institute of Architects’ architectural photography awards in 1960.” You can find Joseph Molitor’s photographs on several of the project pages within the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation’s website, including the pages devoted to the Milam Residence in Florida, and the Niagara Falls Central Library—and his book, Architectural Photography, published in 1976, features an abundance of images of Rudolph’s work. Recently, the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation has been focused upon Molitor’s work because of the endlessly intriguing set of photographs he made of the Burroughs Wellcome building—showing them with a crispness and sense of drama that few other photographers have approached.

Above and Below: two of Henry L. Kamphoefner’s photographs of interiors within the Burroughs Wellcome building in North Carolina—both images displaying the striking geometries which Rudolph used in the design.

HENRY L. KAMPHOEFNER

(1907-1990) Unlike the above figures, Henry Leveke Kamphoefner is not primarily known as an architectural photographer—but he was well-known in the South as a champion of Modern architecture, especially in North Carolina. Graduating from the Univ. of Illinois with a BS degree in architecture in 1930, in the following years he received a MS in architecture from Columbia and a Certificate of Architecture from the Beaux Arts Institute of Design in New York. From 1932 until 1936, he practiced architecture privately, and one of his most well-known works is a municipal bandshell Sioux City (which was selected by the Royal Institute of British Architects as one of "America's Outstanding Buildings of the Post-War Period.") In 1936 and 1937, he worked as an associate architect for the Rural Resettlement Administration, and during summers after that he was was employed as an architect for the US Navy. He had an ongoing and significant involvement with architectural education: in 1937 he became a professor at the Univ. of Oklahoma and during 1947 was also a visiting professor at the Univ. of Michigan. In 1948 Kamphoefner became the first dean of the North Carolina State College School of Design, creating strict admissions policies and instituting a distinguished visitors program which brought in architects such as Frank Lloyd Wright. He remained dean until 1973, but continued teaching until 1979. From 1979 to 1981 he served as a distinguished visiting professor at Meredith College. Kamphoefner’s importance has been highlighted in a new book, Triangle Modern Architecture, by Victoria Ballard Bell.

KAMPHOEFNER AND PAUL RUDOLPH: The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation has included several of Kamphoefner’s photographs of the Burroughs Wellcome US headquarters and research center on its project page for that building. It is natural that, as a resident of North Carolina, and as an advocate for Modern architecture, that he would be focused on that building. His photographs of the interiors highlight the striking diagonal geometries that Paul Rudolph incorporated into the project. We have included his images of Burroughs Wellcome in several of our blog articles, as part of our fight to preserve this great work of architecture.

COMING SOON: PART TWO

Be sure to look for PART TWO of this study of Paul Rudolph And His Architectural Photographers. It which will look the more recently active photographers, each of whom have focused on the work of Paul Rudolph.

1968: AN AMAZING YEAR (INCLUDING FOR RUDOLPH)

“Earthrise”—probably the most famous photograph to come out of the space program. The photo was taken in 1968 during the Apollo 8 mission—the first time a manned ship had gone to the moon-and-back. Photo by US astronaut William Anders

THE BIG CHURN

1968 was an amazing year for the US—and the world. A year of firsts, a year of adventure, turbulence, war, creativity, and great sadness. A few examples of what it encompassed:

• Apollo 8: first manned trip to the moon-and-back

• First successful heart transplant

• My Lai massacre in Vietnam

• Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia

• Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy both assassinated.

• Big Mac goes on sale nationwide

• Founding of Intel corporation

• Premiers of films Bonnie and Clyde, Rosemary’s Baby, and Planet of the Apes

• North Vietnam launches Tet Offensive

• 911 emergency phone service is initiated

• Talking Barbie doll introduced

• Massive student protests on campuses in the US and worldwide

• London Bridge is sold to the US

• Installation of first ATM machine in America

• Chicago Democratic Convention protesters are met with violent police response—which is broadcast nationwide

• Boeing introduces first jumbo jet

• the musical Hair opens

 The cultural & domestic scenes were churning as well—wildly!—with pervasive questioning of the establishment in every domain, and extensive exploration of alternatives in lifestyle choices, religion, relationships, health, child-rearing, career, and education.

 The arts—painting, sculpture, dance, film, writing, curation—were especially affected. Nor did design escape, as fashion, display, advertising, graphics, architecture, and interiors saw their share of colorful and untamed experimentation.

MAINSTREAMING THE FAR-OUT

 While the mainstream architecture magazines kept publishing conventional work—plenty of International Style boxes filled their pages, and would do so for years to come!—the magazines also began to do articles on novel ideas and departures in design.

Cover of Progressive Architecture’s October 1968 issue, which dealt with the new adventures in interiors. Image: Courtesy of USModernist Library

The October 1968 issue of Progressive Architecture was entirely devoted to looking at this strange new phenomena (as manifest in interiors)—and is a perfect example of the professional journals attempting to grapple with the wild things that were happening in design. The issue was titled:

THE REVOLUTION IN INTERIOR DESIGN: THE BOLD NEW POLY-EXPANDED MEGA DECORATION

 But, as though the editors couldn’t quite believe their eyes (or the sincere intent of the what they called “deviationist” designers), they kicked-off the issue with a meditative editorial asking:

“Is the work presented in this issue “serious”?

What followed were a series of article (each accompanied by a rich selection of designs) with provocative titles like:

• Chaos As A System

• Fun-House Architecture

• The Synthetic Environment

• Hard-Edge Interiors

• Soft-Edge Exteriors

And, in a possible tribute to Tom Wolfe, one titled:

• The Kinetic Electric Environment

RUDOLPH IN THE LATE 60’s

The year of that issue’s publication, 1968 (and the years bracketing it) was an exciting time for Paul Rudolph. They included some of his most interesting projects: Endo Labs, Tracey Towers, the Graphic Arts Center and LOMEX projects in NYC, the Green Residence, a stadium project for Saudi Arabia, Oriental Masonic Gardens (where he attempted to utilize prefabrication for housing units), the Burroughs Wellcome headquarters, the Brydges Library in Buffalo---and he also received the NY AIA’s Medal of Honor.

Paul Rudolph was referenced several times in that issue of Progressive Architecture. Ever the innovator, examples of Rudolph’s own designs were included—specifically in the last article, which was focused on light.

Even the title of that section of the magazine—via its unconventional (for the time) loose hand-lettering) reflected the adventurous nature of the content.

Here are the portions of the issue which showed Rudolph’s work:

Image courtesy of USModernist Library

Image courtesy of USModernist Library

Image courtesy of USModernist Library

In this work, as always, we see Rudolph-the-inventor: experimenting and exploring—and very much a part of that late 60’s hyper-creative era of design. Rudolph’s fascination with light (and light fixtures) would continue, and about a half-decade later he would go on to found a lighting company—Modulightor—in collaboration with Ernst Wagner.

RUDOLPH: THE VIEW FROM AMSTERDAM (AND VICE-VERSA!)

The cover of Volkskrant Magazine—the magazine section of a popular newspaper in the Netherlands. This issue, from 20 April, 2019, included an article about the Modulightor Building in New York

De Volkskrant (Dutch for The People’s Paper) is the third-largest newspaper in the Netherlands, with an approximate circulation of a quarter-million. It is headquartered in Amsterdam, and this year is the centennial of its founding. We are pleased that they recently sent a photographer to do a story about the Modulightor Building, designed by Paul Rudolph. Like many newspapers, it has a magazine section, Volkskrant Magazine, and the story appeared in the magazine’s culture section.

The contents page of Volkskrant Magazine’s culture section featured a photo of the 58th Street front of the Modulightor Building, taken as the day was approaching dusk, and wonderfully lit from within.

The story—a four page spread—focused on the interiors of the beautiful Paul Rudolph-designed residential Duplex, which is situated within the Modulightor Building, on the 3rd & 4th floors.

The superb photography was by Els Zweerink, and the text was by Rijk van den Broek. Here are some views of those spreads.

If you’d like to read the article on Volkskrant’s website (in Dutch)—and get a better view of these wonderful photographs—you can see the full article here:

https://www.volkskrant.nl/de-gids/planten-en-plexiglas-brengen-een-oase-van-rust-in-het-midden-van-de-stad~b3864e92/

You might say that’s Amsterdam’s view of Rudolph’s work—or at least one of his projects. But our readers might also be interested in Rudolph’s view of Amsterdam!

As far as we can tell, Rudolph didn’t keep a sketchbook: he doesn’t seem to have organized his drawings in such a way. When asked about this, one of his former staff members said when Rudolph wanted to explain something with a drawing, he’d just grab any piece of paper that was at-hand. From what we’ve seen in the archives, that’s very true: he’d use a great range of paper types, formats, and sizes,—from large vellum sheets to scraps. We even just ran across a standard oaktag file folder, filled with business papers---on which he’d drawn a tiny, intriguing sketch of a floor plan.

But, Rudolph did, at least for a while, use a system of tall, slender notepads—the type sized to be convenient for slipping into a suit jacket’s inside pocket.

In our files, we were pleased to discover across several such pads as that—one one of them had some marvelous observations on Amsterdam, written by Rudolph during a trip to Europe in the mid-1980s.

We are glad to share them below.

[Note: The titles, capitalization, underling and spelling follow the way that Rudolph marked-down his notes.]

AMSTERDAM

LIGHT    

The most striking thing about Amsterdam is its light. It starts with the most precious of all reflected light from Amsterdam’s relationship to the sea & the introduction of canals into the city itself. Reflected light softens the shadows by illuminating them with a glorious diffusion of light. This is more apparent in Amsterdam than in most cities because the canals permeate the entire city as if light reflecting shafts (the canals) were there not only to serve transportation needs but to illuminate the shadows of the whole city.

Light in Dutch paintings has always been a preoccupation. Rembrandt’s handling of light relates him to Holland, but of course, he also transcends it. Sensitivity to light can be seen on the Princes Highway when traveling south to Rotterdam. The highway is covered with a structure to accommodate the Amsterdam highway. The transition from light to dark is accommodated by a series of vertical side louvers (also used to shield car lights from the opposite direction, but most uniquely by the use of overhead horizontal louvers to ease the transition.

GEOMETRY

This soft light of Amsterdam has to lead an emphasis on geometry in the buildings themselves, but also to the series of concentric rings which constitute the city plan. Of course, the plan of Amsterdam was developed for reasons of security, to obtain landfill, and to recognize its great port. The man-made, geometrical quality of Amsterdam emphasizes the fact that it was made by man.

The concentric rings of Amsterdam’s canals give it a picturesque character since the concentric rings of water constantly lead one’s eye around the curve to disappearing canals. There is no ax[i]s as in Paris where buildings are focal points for relatively short street vistas, the outcome of Haussmann’s great efforts.

It is a characteristic of Amsterdam that its buildings invariably face the canals directly, almost never recognizing their concentric relationship to each other. Neither do they recognize the vista down the canals. Those vistas, most apparent from the bridges crossing the canals, are a great source of Amsterdam’s immense environment[al] pleasure. Party walls, fire laws, and the use of load-bearing construction explain much of the concentration of buildings facing the canals and ignoring vistas, but it does not completely explain the phenomenon. It is noteworthy that the canals do not vary in width very much. Therefore important buildings do not gain importance from the development of canals, but a church, for instance, merely faces the canal with no forecourt or additional space allotted to it.

Of course, every possible use is made of the site since the land us at a great premium, & civic outdoor space is at a premium in Amsterdam. It does occur at governmental buildings, at the palace, and at the cathedral, but at this expense of the benign effects of the water. It is as if the presence of the water is resented by the occupants of Amsterdam. One cannot help but speculate that one day the canals will be filled in to accommodate parking and the entire character of Amsterdam will be changed.

The geometry of Amsterdam extends to its individual buildings, with great emphasis on the rectangular. One cannot help Mondrian, the De Stijl group and Rietveld came to their unique art in a very natural way. They abstracted what was around them, and in this sense, their work could have only come from Amsterdam.

It was astounding to see immediately outside this “American Hotel” a simple wood structure supporting a sign in relationship to a pier at the canal. It could have been a Rietveld since everything was reduced to a series of rectangles. Most surprising of all was the clarity of the structure, made clear to all by the extension of the framing members at the various joints. It was, of course, merely a vernacular utilitarian structure, but it could have been done by Rietveld.

A ROOM FULL OF RUDOLPH: ARCHITECTURE STUDENTS DISCOVER PAUL RUDOLPH’S MODULIGHTOR BUILDING (AND SO MUCH MORE!)

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Five sophomore design studios - nearly 70 students in all - at the City College of New York’s School of Architecture, all utilized Paul Rudolph’s MODULIGHTOR BUILDING as a focus for their design studies during the Spring 2019 semester. The drawing, shown here, is but one example of the very many exciting investigations conducted by the students. The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation facilitated the students’ work, and were also invited as jurors for their final presentations. Photo of drawing: by Kelvin Dickinson, for the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation. Photo of Modulightor Building : copyright by Annie Schlechter, from the archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation.

CAN RUDOLPH BE “TAUGHT”?

Johann Sebastian Bach was a composer greatly loved by Paul Rudolph (and Bach was the composer most frequently played by Rudolph, a life-long pianist.) As the culmination of the Baroque period, it has been said that “All roads lead to Bach—but none lead from him.” That seems true of Bach: towering genius that he was, the Baroque seems to terminate with him, and “followers” - if any - are but footnotes. Similar things have been said - indeed accused - of a variety of architects: those who have a special style, or a unique way of problem-solving, or virtuoso skills - but for whom it seems that no authentic “school” could follow and be nourished by the model architect’s oeuvre. Such a charge has been brought against Sullivan, Gaudi, Wright and, yes, even Paul Rudolph.

Yet Rudolph was a well-known educator: as Chair of Yale’s School of Architecture from 1958 to 1965, he truly re-molded the school, via his mark on the curriculum, selection of faculty, and personal presence. As a teacher, he had - at least according to their own testimony - a decisive effect on his students. Rudolph explicitly claimed that in his own work he was expressing strongly held opinions and prejudices - but when it came to guiding students, he sought to not impose his formal vocabulary, but rather to impart general principles and help the student clarify their own ideas. Since his students seem to have gone in the most diverse directions - not becoming “little Rudolphs” - that seems evidence for his non-directional claim.

Paul Rudolph with architecture students in the Yale Art & Architecture Building, giving a “desk crit” in 1963. Photo: copyright Ezra Stoller

But can anything useful to students - something more than even the most timeless principles of architecture & place making - be distilled from Rudolph’s work? And can that be applied to architectural education today?

A RUDOLPHIAN ADVENTURE IN EDUCATION

Students at the City College of New York’s School of Architecture answer: YES!

The students - all five sophomore studios, comprising nearly 70 students - spent the Spring semester on a set of projects which focused on (and were inspired by) Paul Rudolph’s Modulightor Building. The term’s work comprised 4 investigations and sets of interrelated results:

• Near the beginning of the term, all students visited the building (sometimes several times!) exploring it, recording it via measured drawings and photography, and studying documents about the building’s construction and evolution (both its as-built incarnation, as well as versions Rudolph envisioned for its development.) This information was distilled into drawings and models.

• They were also introduced to Rudolph’s chair (which they got to see - and sit on! - during their visit). This they each documented in carefully drafted drawings, analyzed in different ways - and then transformed into an individual concept which they presented as a model.

• Analyzing the Modulightor Building was the student’s next focus. Some chose the façade, while others chose aspects of the interior organization, or Rudolph’s handling of light, or the geometric rigor of his planning, or the richness of his sectional compositions, or some other aspect.

• Finally, they were to take an aspect of Rudolph’s work - particularly from the Modulightor Building, but also looking at his overall oeuvre - and use that to design an ice cream stand. They were not to just copy a part of the building, nor were they instructed to directly emulate Rudolph’s style. Rather, they were to find in Rudolph’s work “generative devices” which would inspire and nourish their projects. An ice cream stand may seem a rather pedestrian program, but it’s important to remember that early in his career, Rudolph proposed more-than-one design for such buildings. That’s something we featured in a previous blog which you can read here. Moreover, Rudolph never exhibited any snobbery about the types of projects he’d take on (something we quite admire.)

The sophomore year’s choice to engage with the Modulightor Building is a consequence of the work of Eduardo Andres Alfonso. Prof. Alfonso was the coordinator-curator for the two exhibits that the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation mounted in 2018 for Rudolph’s centenary - and so he was well-familiar with the building. His proposal for using this fascinating and complex Rudolph building - one that was also geographically accessible to the students - was accepted by his co-instructors, and the PRHF was very willing to give the school access to our facilities and historical documentation.

But what was the result of all this work - these students’ design investigations and creations?

ENTER THE JURY

On Thursday, May 9th , 2019, the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation was invited to participate in the end- of-semester jury of the students’ work. Kelvin Dickinson, the Foundation’s president, and Seth Joseph Weine, head of research, trekked up to the City College of New York’s Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture building on Manhattan’s 135th Street. Upon entering we were directed to a large atrium at the center of the building: the site of that day’s jury. It is a spacious, light-filled room, several stories tall, and dramatically crossed—at its upper reaches—by suspended catwalks.

City College’s School of Architecture building’s central atrium: a view from above, Showing the students work being set up (just prior to the beginning of the end-of-semester jury.) Photo: Kelvin Dickinson for the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

In this space we were met with an exciting clamor: dozens of students were putting up drawings and placing models on the four sides of the atrium (with the drawings sometimes reaching up nearly a dozen feet) and the various design studio teachers were trying to put all this into a presentable order.

The final stages of getting the students’ work ready for the jury to see. Photo: Kelvin Dickinson for the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

When things had settled a bit, the jurors - there were several for each studio - were invited to view the building models, meet their authors, and learn about what tactic each had taken. For ourselves, so thoroughly infused with the Modulightor Building in which we have our offices, this display of various approached the students had taken was like seeing the building with fresh eyes.

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Several examples of the models which were on display at the beginning of the session. Each team took a different approach to making their model of the Modulightor Building - and to highlighting a fresh aspect of its design. Photos: Kelvin Dickinson for the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

Each student team (they worked in pairs on the models) had seen & analyzed the building in a different way: via geometry, or with different materials, or by cutting a section on a different line, or by highlighting a diversity of aspects of Rudolph’s vision. It felt like a Modulightor Building design banquet.

One team’s model, used by them to analyze the building. In this example, the student team constructed the model so that the front façade could be removed. Photo: Kelvin Dickinson for the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

THE JURY JUDGES

Jurors were asked to gather in front to the student work of the particular studio which had invited them. Then each student made a presentation and the jurors responded.

With drawings reaching way up the walls, that added to the drama of the graphic aspect of the student’s presentations.
Photo: Kelvin Dickinson for the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

It’s important to remember that, in architecture school juries, the juror is not there to determine the student’s grade [that’s the responsibility of their studio teacher - their design “crit”]. Instead, the job of each juror is to look (and listen) very carefully to what the student is presenting, and to offer reactions. The offered responses might be additional layers of interpretation to their work, or bringing up questions that the student could further consider, or references to buildings or writings they would profit by examining, or pointing out things about their design the student hadn’t even noticed they were doing - or outlining where the project could productively go (or didn’t).

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The quality of the students’ work - the commitment they express - can often be discerned from the involvement of the jurors. Our experience, of the over-a-dozen students we juried that day, was one of intense focus.

Photo:  Kelvin Dickinson, for the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation

It’s an old question:

The jurors speak. The jurors make deep, discerning, poetic, philosophical, pedagogical, and practical suggestions and observations. But in the face of these opinions, how can one evaluate how well each student did?

A key thing to look for is engagement:  Did the student’s work draw the jury in, provoking discussion, generating questions, and opening up new paths of investigation?

To judge by what we saw - and vigorously participated in - these students did very well indeed: the jury seemed so engaged in each project that it was hard to apply the brakes. Again-and-again, the teacher had to urge us jurors to stop and go on to the next student’s work (so that the jury’s time was fairly divided and each student would get a good  share of their attention.)

We were delighted with the work shown: the student’s intense focus on the Modulightor Building’s many layers, their intelligent analysis, and the creative paths they took as a result of their immersion in Rudolph.

Below is a selection of images of student work, presented on that exciting day. Congratulations to everyone on such fine work!

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A LUMINOUS PHOTOGRAPHER: JOE POLOWCZUK

The Modulightor Building, on 58th street in New York City, designed by Paul Rudolph. Joe Polowczuk’s photograph, taken as evening was coming on—what he poetically calls “the blue hour”—shows the building glowing from within.

Architecture and photography have had a long relationship—maybe the longest: the three prime candidates for the world’s first photograph are a streetscape (in which buildings are sharply prominent); a roofscape; or a still-life which includes architectural fragments or castings of ornament.

Of course, photography and Modern architecture are even more intimate: from the very beginnings of Modernism, its advocates have used dramatically composed photographs to spread the gospel, publicize, and persuade. Indeed, a number of architectural photographers have themselves become legendary (at least within the architectural community). Some of the most prominent examples would be: Ezra Stoller, G. E. Kidder Smith, Julius Shulman, and Yukio Fukazawa. Also, a number of distinguished Modern architects and designers have shown a personal passion for photography, getting behind the camera themselves - and that would include Frank Lloyd Wright, Charles Eames, László Moholy-Nagy, and Le Corbusier.

Joe Polowczuk is in that great tradition: A trained architect, who has been working in New York for the past 20 years, he explains that he

“… naturally gravitated towards documenting the built environment for my own projects and other design peers. I strive to provide the finest images for my clients using a keen eye for composition, and the most up to date technical methods available with digital imaging.”

He won a distinguished award in 2012: the New York City Landmarks Conservancy, Lucy G. Moses Preservation Award, for his work on the Banner Building (in New York’s NoHo Historic District.)

His design-oriented photography includes work that includes both architecture and interiors (offices, residential, hospitality, and retail). He has also caught the most beautiful images of moving water and of surfing (his main non-architectural pleasure, he admits!)

The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation was so impressed with Joe Polowczuk’s work that we commissioned him photograph our headquarters building - the Modulightor Building - and also make photographs of the Paul Rudolph-designed chair [which the Foundation is now reproducing, using Rudolph’s original dimensions & details, and offering to interested collectors - see: https://www.paulrudolphheritagefoundation.org/shop/paul-rudolph-rolling-armchair

To see works from Joe Polowczuk’s luminous portfolio, you can visit his website:

https://www.joepolowczuk.com/

and his Instagram page:

https://www.instagram.com/jpolowczuk_photography/

But, for this moment, you might enjoy these works of Joe’s:

Paul Rudolph's Picasso

Photo: Seth Weine, Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation Archives

An Intriguing Object

Many visitors to the Modulightor Building are intrigued by the Picasso sculpture that’s on display within it—or rather, the several Picasso sculptures.

The origin of the artwork, and how they got here, is an interesting story…

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A Very Public Artist

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) is widely considered to be the most famous artist of the 20th Century. He worked in a plenitude of mediums: painting, drawing, ceramics, printmaking, stage design, and sculpture.

But his art is not found only in museums and private collections—for his sculptural work includes several commissions of monumental scale, to be used in public settings. The “Chicago Picasso,” a 50 foot high sculpture in Chicago’s Daley Plaza, is probably the most well-known example:

Picasso sculpture in Daley Plaza, Chicago, Illinois, US. Photo: J. Crocker, marked as public domain from Wikipedia

New York City also proudly has one of Picasso’s large public works: the concrete “Bust of Sylvette”, situated in the plaza of “University Village” (a complex of three apartment towers designed by I. M. Pei):

NYC - Greenwich Village: Picasso's Bust of Sylvette. Photo: Wally Gobetz

A Commission for both Architecture and Art

In the late 1960’s-early 70’s the University of South Florida wanted to build a visitors & arts center for their Tampa-area campus. The building design was by Paul Rudolph, and Picasso was approached to provide a sculpture that would be the centerpiece of the center’s exterior plaza. It was to be over 100 feet high, and - had it been built - would have been the largest Picasso in the world.

Rendering of Paul Rudolph’s building with Picasso’s sculpture. Image: USF Special Collection Library.

An OK from Picasso

As a famous artist - indeed, a world-wide celebrity - one can imagine that Picasso was continually besieged about all kinds of projects. Carl Nesjar (a Norwegian sculptor—and also Picasso’s trusted collaborator, who fabricated his some of his large, public works) spoke to Picasso about the Florida project, and got an approval.

Nesjar said: “He liked the whole idea very much….  He liked the architectural part of it, and the layout, and so forth. That was not the only reason, but it was one of the reasons that he said yes. Because it happens, you come to him with a project, and he will say oui ou non … he reacts like a shotgun.” [Recently, a tape of Carl Nesjar speaking about the project has been found—a fascinating document of art history.]

Picasso’s Proposal

Picasso supplied a “maquette” of the sculpture—the term usually used for models of proposed sculptures. His title for this artwork was “Bust of a Woman.”

Picasso’s model. Photo: USF Special Collection Library.

The model was about 30” high, and made of wood with a white painted finish. Picasso gave the original to the University, and it is currently in the collection of the University of South Florida’s library.

“Bust of a Woman” sculpture with the audio reel of Carl Nesjar’s interview. Photo: Kamila Oles

The sculpture was to be towering—more than twice as high as his work in Chicago—and, at that time, would have been the biggest concrete sculpture in the world. Carl Nesjar made a photomontage of the intended sculpture, which gives an idea of its dramatic presence.

Carl Nesjar’s photomontage showing how “Bust of a Woman” would appear on the University of Southern Florida’s campus. Image: USF Special Collection Library

Not To Be

But, for a variety of reasons—cultural, political, and financial—the project never moved into construction: the university didn’t build the Picasso sculpture, nor Paul Rudolph’s building. That sad aspect of the story is covered in this fine article.

A Sculpture Greatly Admired by Rudolph

Although the project didn’t proceed, Paul Rudolph liked the sculpture so much that he requested (and received) official permission from Picasso to make copies of the maquette. Several faithful copies were made: the ones that are on view in the Modulightor Building.

Photo: Kelvin Dickinson, Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation Archives

A Virtual Life?

But this might not be quite the end for that Picasso sculpture, nor for Rudolph’s building design for that campus: they now have an existence - at least in the virtual world.

Kamila Oles (an art historian) & Lukasz Banaszek (a landscape archaeologist), working with the USF’s Center for Virtualization and Applied Spatial Technologies (CVAST) have created virtual models of what the building and sculpture would have looked like. You can also see a video of their process here.

Exciting visions - but ones that dramatically show an architectural & artistic lost opportunity.

NOTE:  Several authorized copies were made - one of which will always be on permanent display in the Rudolph-designed residential duplex within his Modulightor Building. But the other authorized copies are available for sale to benefit the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation. Please contact the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation for further information.

Center for Architecture students visit the Foundation

Students attending the Center for Architecture’s pre-college program visit the Modulightor Building and sketch some interior and exterior views. Continuing Paul Rudolph’s tradition of gathering students to experience, discuss and sketch this unique work.

Thank you Tim Hayduk of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation for the great photos!

Foundation welcomes Center for Architecture high school students

Students from the Center for Architecture. Photo: Tim Hayduk

Center for Architecture high school studio class visits the Modulightor Building.