Nine Commentaries on Frank Lloyd Wright (Architectural History Foundation Books) Book

An original view of Frank Lloyd Wright emerges from these nine essays by Edgar Kaufmann, jr., a leading authority on Wright. For more than 50 years Kaufmann has studied this famous American architect - as a member of the Taliesin Fellowship, as a participant in the building of Fallingwater (perhaps Wright's best known work it was inherited by the author), and as a writer, editor, and teacher. Collected here for the first time, Kaufmann's essays provide an in depth investigation of particular aspects of Wright's works and ideas. They are amply documented by texts and drawings, many of which have been unexamined until now. The essays begin with an unexpected view of Wright's Froebel kindergarten training, which he acknowledged as having awakened his delight in the play of color and design Kaufmann then takes up Wright's initial exposure to a great concept of architecture in Louis Sullivan's office. He examines the nature of Wright's break from the Prairie School, his attitude toward precedents in architecture, his responses to the machine and to idealistic modernism as conceived around the 1930s, the impact on Wright of the Great Depression, and Wright's evolution toward an architecture of space and of unique integral ornamentation - both crucial contributions to a humane architecture of the future. Edgar Kaufmann jr., is Professor Emeritus of History of Architecture at Columbia University. An Architectural History Foundation Book.Read More