Frank Lloyd Wright
(1867 - 1959)
Frank Lloyd Wright is seen as a great innovator, a prophet. At twenty years did he worked in the studio of Ader Sullivan and entered the field right at the same time when Sullivan’s battle for American architecture to share equal dignity and respect with European seemed to be definitively lost. In 1893 Chicago Exhibition had, in fact, confirmed this sense of irreparable inferiority. F.L. Wright was able to succeed in giving America an architecture which was not comparable with that of Europe, but completely different. Architecture is indeed “pure creation”, it does not rest in history, but is its perfect antithesis.
Wright’s new vision found expression in the architectural creations of the “Larking Building” and the “Unity Temple” where the use of new materials and new technology, such as reinforced concrete, glass and steel, exalted the democratic ideal of liberty for the interior area which then also radiated out to the exterior. The right of each individual to define personally his own relationship with the world is recognised. A house must not be a given space rigidly partitioned, it must be a place in which each person can realise themselves.
From a formal point of view this means elimination of the spatial “box”, glorification of the dominant formal vertical and horizontal planes, a freely articulated plan, removal of separation between the inside and outside areas and perfect insertion of the building into the enviroment.
At this time his work in Japan occurred (he designed the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo) and a deep infatuation with the East. In Oriental culture Wright recognized the values of a profound and widespread understanding between man and nature (in regards to this the recovery to Oriental culture in the paintings of Klimt can be seen).
The investigation of Oriental art and philosophy inspired the artist to the particular design and teaching method of his “Taliesin” home school (founded in 1932); this was typified by an extremely familiar relationship between master and pupils , in direct contrast to that of the “Bauhaus”. We remember them this period the work od creation of the famous “Fallingwater” house and the Johnson Wax building. Meanwhile the interest for more modern technological procedures grew in the artist, which did not seem in opposition to nature but become held as a trascendental development of its laws.
From this sprang the philosophy of “Organic Architecture”. He entrusted the task of spreading his philosophy into a group of architects. Even today the “Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation” preserves and develops the work and principles by its famous founder.