Word: pei
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Rensselaer Polytechnic institute I.M. Pei, D.F. A., architect...
...show that a modern building could embody the ceremonial gravity of "official" architecture while refusing to compromise its own inventiveness. On June 1 that structure opens to the public. It is, of course, the East Building of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., designed by Architect I.M. Pei at a cost of $94.4 million furnished by Paul Mellon, his late sister and the Mellon Foundation (TIME...
...other building in recent memory ?and especially no other museum building?has been greeted with such a flood of superlatives. Ordinarily this would be cause for suspicion; yet, one cannot tour the East Building without sensing that the volume of praise is justified. I.M. Pei has produced, in the fullest sense of that hackneyed but unavoidable word, a masterpiece?a structure born of sustained and highly analytical thought, exquisitely attuned to its site and architectural surroundings, conveying a sense of grand occasion without the slightest trace of pomposity. It restores the sense of craftsmanship, as distinct from routine fabrication...
...cannot call Pei's design backward-looking; but the East Building is certainly a conservative, and in many respects a classical, structure, whose visual meaning turns on the idea of established excellence. It is less a "proposition" than a calm, final statement. In that respect, it is unlike the only comparable museum (in terms of cost, elaboration and civic importance) to have been built in recent years, the Pompidou Center in the Beaubourg section of Paris. "Le Pompidoglio," as the French sardonically call it, turned out to be one of those populist-utopian fantasies of the '60s that have...
...however, is inside: the East Building's central court, which rises through a complex series of levels, bridges, stairways, escalators and ramps to its culmination in the tetrahedronal space frame-skylight. This court is the "rhyme" to the West Building's cupola, but is utterly different in feeling. Here Pei has produced a ceremonial space fit to rank with the main foyer of the Paris Opera or the grandest of the 19th century's glass-and-iron railroad terminals. It projects an encompassing sense of airiness and ebullience, washed by light. From the concourse 80 ft. below, the skylight...