Putting the Art in Architecture
Frank Gehry is both architect and artist. His mastery of design, and technology — combined with the intricacies of planning and plumbing, clients and materials — make him a modern Leonardo. He has created a portfolio of distinctive buildings — some metallic and curved, others composed of street materials, but all built with respect for utility, emotion and freedom, on a grand, but fixed, budget.
At 88, he shows no signs of slowing down — several new Gehry buildings open around the world every year. He sat down in his Playa del Rey studio, littered with models for Gehry buildings past and future, for a conversation with Will Hearst about his career, his buildings and his methods.
WILL HEARST: When you were a kid, what attracted you to architecture? What made it interesting?
FRANK GEHRY: Well, I wasn’t interested when I was a kid. I was interested in jazz, and I was interested in physics, science, chemistry. Some literary stuff interested me. I was interested in flying. I was very interested in politics, I was very interested in religion and finding out that I wasn’t religious, finding out that I didn’t believe any of that.
I used to go to the architecture lectures at University of Toronto on Friday nights. My friends would never go because they were always out playing and dating, and stuff like that. It was something that held my interest, and I kept going, I kept going alone, and one night a gentleman who turned out to be [Finnish architect] Alvar Aalto gave a
