FRANK GEHRY

- HIS IDEALOGIES AND HIS FAMOUS WORKS

SUBMITTED BY -
ANANYA MADHUSOODANAN
S6 B.ARCH
ROLL NO : 09
 ABOUT THE ARCHITECT
• Frank Owen Gehry is a Canadian-born American architect and designer. A number of his
buildings, including his private residence in Santa Monica, California, have become world-
renowned attractions.
• Arguably the most important architect of the contemporary era and certainly the most
famous living architect, Frank Gehry's unique style is hard to categorize. Although his
earlier work is rooted in modernism, his later designs have consciously rejected modernist
tropes.
• Experimenting with a range of materials from cheap mass-produced items to space-age
titanium, his buildings are entertaining and surprising, but also functional.
• Gehry has designed a number of iconic buildings including the Bilbao Guggenheim, the
Walt Disney Concert Hall, and the Biomuseo in Panama City and these have become world-
renowned attractions in their own right, often bringing tourists and money into an area.
• Gehry draws much of his inspiration from art, both contemporary and classical. He
treats each new commission as "a sculptural object" and he is particularly well-known
for his asymmetrical designs. The impact of Cubism, and the work of Pablo Picasso
and Giorgio Morandi, is also apparent in many of his geometric and deconstructed
works.
• All of Gehry's designs are united by their sense of movement, he embeds motion
directly into his architecture so that his projects, flow, curve, bend, and crumple in
novel and unexpected ways, subverting traditional building norms.
• While each of Frank Gehry buildings is unique, there are some defining features that
make his architecture instantly recognizable. His style is considered deconstructivist, a
movement in postmodern architecture where elements of the design appear to be
fragmented. His architecture is typically characterized by flowing lines, and surfaces.
 HIS PHILOSOPHY
• With the dawn of the modern era, when architecture saw the coming of minimalist principles, Frank O Gehry sought to break the
rules. Then the world witnessed the coming of buildings that were strong ‘Architectural expressions’.
• Architect Frank O Gehry, had creativity in his gene, as he calls it. With his art inspirations from his parents and time spent at his
grandparents’ hardware store, he was open to exploration & creation with the ‘everyday materials’. He started imagining miniature
cities with materials as basic and fragmented as wood scraps. These were the foundation of the construction of the deconstructivism
style that ‘didn’t follow the rules.
• His works signified motion. The dynamic outlook of the forms came from the play of rich material composition and the asymmetric
profile. Thus the building surface portrayed a different meaning from every point of view.
• Amidst the varied public perception, Frank O Gehry followed his own unique style of architecture that did not believe in ‘boring
buildings’ as the architect calls it. He instead believed in dynamism and energy in the forms that actively spoke a user-specific
language leaving strong impressions. His mixture of art and modernist material finishes gave a fresh unseen outlook that opened
doors to new parameters in architectural styles. This uniqueness gave birth to what came to be known as ‘Deconstructivism’.

Contrastingly, the The Guggenheim museum at Bilbao, that

architect’s works such as exhibits the unique art collections, is an art in
The Dancing House in itself. The profile of the building takes up a
Prague raised dynamic form with materials that were equally
controversies for its off- dynamic. The lustrous surface of the materials
style construction in the reflected sunlight and the fluidity of water
traditional architecture of from the nearby water body, which made the
Prague that involved entire surface signify motion. The form,
Baroque, Gothic, and Art- inspired by the profile of a ‘fish’ relates to the
Nouveau styles. Yet the ecosystem while the reflective metal surface
building stood as a unique relates to waves in the water. This dynamism
one, reflecting a style and upon the asymmetric profile further increased
language of its own. the probabilities in user perception.
 GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM BILBAO ,
• SPAIN
The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is a museum of modern art. It is in Abando, Bilbao, Spain. The museum was opened in 1997. It is one of
the several museums belonging to Solomon R. Guggenheim foundation. This museum was designed by the architect Frank Gehry. There
are no flat surfaces in this building. The structure of the building is made of glass, titanium, and limestone.
• It is situated on a plot of 32,500 square meters, of which 24,000 square meters are occupied by
building. 9,066 square meters are devoted to exhibition spaces.
• The museum is located 16 meters below the elevation of the city at the estuary of the Nervion.
El Puente de La Salve, one of the main entrances of the city, crosses through the building.
Concept
• Inspired by the shapes and textures of a fish, it can be considered a sculpture, a work of art in
itself.It consists of a series of interconnected volumes, some formed of orthogonal coated
stone and others from a titanium dkeleton covered by an organic skin. The connection between
volumes is created by the glass skin.
• The museum is integrated into the city both by it height and the materials used. Being below
the benchmark of the city, it does not surpass the rest of the buildings. The limestone, of a
sandy tone, was selected specially for this aim. Seen from the river, the form resembles a boat,
but seen from above it resembles a flower.
Spaces
• Under the chaotic appearance created by the opposition of fragmented regular forms with
covered stone, curved forms coated in titanium and large glass walls, the building is built
around a central axis; the hall, 50 meters high, a monumental empty space topped by a metal
dome. Around it, a system of curved bridges, glass elevators and stair towers connecting the 19
galleries spread over three floors, which combine classic rectangular space with other unique
forms and proportions, all lit by the dome zenith.
• Temporary exhibitions and large-format works have a place in a gallery of about 30 m. wide
and nearly 130 m. long, free of columns, located on the volume that passes under the La Salve
Bridge.
Structure
• Because of their mathematical complexity, the sinuous curves were designed using a three
dimensional design software called Catia, which allowed designs and calculations that,
years earlier, had not been possible.
• The building is built with load-bearing walls and ceilings, which have an internal structure of
metal rods that form grids with triangles. The shapes of the museum could not have
succeeded if it did not use load-bearing walls and ceilings. Catia determined the number of
bars required in each location, as well as the bars positions and orientations.
• In addition to this structure, the walls and ceilings have several insulating layers and an
outer coating of titanium. Each piece is unique and exclusive to the place, determined by
Catia.

Materials
• Built of limestone, glass and titanium, the museum used 33,000 pieces of titanium half a
millimeter thick, each with a unique form suited to its location. As these pieces are so thin,
a perfect fit to the curves is necessary. The glass has a special treatment to let in the sun’s
light, but not its heat.

The Impact of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao on the City of Bilbao and its Economy -
• The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is widely credited with contributing to the "Bilbao
effect," which refers to the city's revitalization and economic growth following the
museum's construction. The museum attracted millions of visitors and helped to
transform Bilbao from an industrial city into a cultural and tourism hub.
• The building's success also inspired other cities to invest in cultural institutions as a
means of urban revitalization.
 THE DANCING
HOUSE
• Construction of the Dancing House, whose official name is the Nationale-Nederlanden Building, began in 1994 and finished in 1996.
• Not only did it stand out stylistically, it was also asymmetrical and, for many, clearly out of place in a more traditional environment.
Amongst its detractors it was known as the Drunk House.
Location
• The building is found on Resslova Street, on the right bank of the Moldaba river and close the
Karlovo Námestí metro station, in the centre of Prague, Czech Republic.
• During the Second World War, an American bomb destroyed the house which was originally
where the Dancing House now stands. The land was bought by the insurance firm, Nationale-
Nederlanden.
Concept
• The general concept of the building is the contrast between a dynamic figure (the ying) and a static
• one (the yang), each one represented by one of the buildings.
• Frank Gehry named them Ginger and Fred, in honor of the film couple formed by Ginger Rogers, the
dynamic figure, and Fred Astaire, the static one.
 Ginger Building (the ying)
The Ginger building is represented by the glass tower, which stands on a series of curved columns that give
a graceful air to the figure of the building which, as we can see, contracts in the central area to project back
outwards at the top.
This tower is covered by two layers of curtain wall, both of which are made of glass, with the exterior being
attached to the building by means of a steel structure.
 Fred Building (the yang)
For its part, the building that would represent Fred Astaire is supported by three pillars and its façade, full of
undulating lines, has 99 prefabricated concrete panels.
The curved lines of the mouldings on this façade are striking, contributing, together with the curved shape of
the building and the protruding window frames, to distorting the perspective and making it even more curved.
Finally, the building is crowned by a striking sculpture of metal tubes covered by a stainless steel mesh.
Structure
• The glass tower has a concrete structure with a conical shape which is supported atop a series of inclined columns which rise from
ground level, creating a portico and continuing to the end of the building.
• The tower is closed by a double curtain wall: an interior one of retracted glass and the second an exterior skin, also glass, supported on a
steel frame which separates it from the main body of the building. The supports of the steel structure are fixed to the structure of the
building. The vertical profiles are T-sections connected to each other by hollow profile sections.
• The building which faces the river rises as a solid cylindrical concrete volume on the corner, where it joins with the steel and glass
structure followed by a larger façade which faces the river and is constructed on a base of 99 prefabricated concrete panels and
numerous windows.
Materials
• The buildings, with a surface of 5842m², were constructed in steel, glass and prefabricated
concrete panels, finished with plaster characteristic of the local architecture.
• For the building parallel to the river, they used concrete panels in 99 different shapes and
dimensions. At the inauguration, a sculpture, Medusa, was placed on top, made of metal tubes
and covered with stainless steel wire mesh.
• The architects, Gehry and Milunic, decided not to paint the exposed materials, but to display their
natural colours: the glass is green, the concrete grey and the steel structure silver.

Comparison of Dancing House site in

At night 1945 and 2010