About a month ago i took a small stack of books published in the late 40″s/50′ and was struck by the classic beauty of these designs. Timeless and still contemporary. From Left to right:
Sandberg, Sandberg, Sandebrg and Aldo van Eyck
All titles are now available at www.ftn-books.com
Born in 1927 in Magelang and passing away on January 1st, 1975 in Amsterdam, Kho Liang le was the child of Chinese parents and a Dutch industrial designer. He is renowned for his design of the interior of Schiphol Airport. After arriving in the Netherlands in approximately 1949, he was educated at the Rietveld Academy, where he studied interior design and design. In 1958, he was appointed as Artifort’s aesthetic advisor and designer, shifting the company’s focus towards the top of the international market due to his contributions. Kho Liang le attracted foreign designers such as Pierre Paulin and Geoffrey Harcourt. His influence is still evident to this day. As an interior designer, Kho Liang le gained recognition for his work on the Schiphol Airport design in the 1960s. His creations exude purity, warmth, and a sense of liberty.
www.ftn-books.com has some Kho Liang Ie items available.
Arne Jacobsen (February 11, 1902 – March 24, 1971) was a Danish architect and designer. Despite his early aspirations of becoming a painter, his father encouraged him to pursue a career in architecture. Jacobsen would go on to become one of the greatest Scandinavian architects and industrial designers of the 20th century. His “less is more” approach places him among the same echelon of great architects of the time, such as Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, and Gunnar Asplund. What set Arne Jacobsen apart from these icons was his design’s position at the forefront of the Scandinavian design movement, pushing boundaries and defying conventions.
Among the highlights of his impressive career are two notable achievements: his introduction of flatware for Georg Jensen in 1957 and his design of the SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen the following year. Arne Jacobsen’s flatware was revolutionary, setting itself apart with its use of simple yet bold lines, a departure from Georg Jensen’s previous styles. It made a lasting impression on the world of design. His functionalist approach continued to dominate the design world for years to come. The premiere of the SAS Royal Hotel in Copenhagen in 1958 garnered global attention. Arne Jacobsen designed both the structure and interior of this hotel, creating a stunning and rare fusion of exterior and interior design. Many of the designs found within this hotel have become iconic pieces, such as the candleholder that bears his name and the iconic “Egg” and “Swan” chairs for Fritz Hansen.
www.ftn-books.com has several Jacobsen titles available.
Herman Hertzberger is renowned as one of the most influential figures in international architecture over the past fifty years. He champions a contemporary, humane style of architecture that remains rooted in place and history, while also embracing innovative forms. Hertzberger is widely recognized as the foremost designer of schools, a genre for which his designs have single-handedly redefined. His groundbreaking designs for offices and workspaces often serve as the most compelling modern reinterpretation of this genre.
In this monograph, acclaimed architecture critic Robert McCarter delves into Hertzberger’s most significant works through a detailed analysis of the design process and underlying principles, particularly where they reflect Hertzberger’s integration of modern tradition, architectural history, and urban space experience.
Robert McCarter is an experienced architect, writer, and professor of architecture at Washington University in St. Louis. His monographs on Louis I. Kahn and Frank Lloyd Wright were both shortlisted for the 2006 International Book Awards of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA).
WWW.FTN-BOOKS.COM HAS NOW THE NAI PUBLICATION ” NOTATIONS” AVAILABLE.
In his response to the excessive proliferation of images that bombard us daily and fabricate a simulated reality (as seen in the CNN coverage of the Gulf War), Edwin Zwakman crafts a carefully constructed, fictional scenario that nonetheless appears undeniably real. He employs clever tricks and fabricates falsehoods to reveal uncomfortable truths, in sharp contrast to the overt lies perpetuated by those in positions of power. Though power and authority are hinted at rather than explicitly portrayed, their stereotypical presence adds a potent impact. These pervasive stereotypes have been ingrained in our collective consciousness, which Zwakman masterfully juxtaposes to create contradictory scenes that stir up previously undefined but vaguely familiar anxieties. Through this dissonance between images, he unveils the true depth and magnitude of the abyss that lies just beneath the surface.
www.ftn-books.com has the van Abbemuseum catalog Façades now available.
The birthplace of Jan Piet Kloos was Schiedam. He pursued studies in civil engineering at MTS in Utrecht, later continuing his education in Amsterdam during evening hours. At his day job, he worked under the direction of architect G.J. Langhout. Around 1927, he was involved with the construction of the Zonnestraal sanatorium in Hilversum; a Modernist masterpiece by Jan Duiker, where he served as an overseer and draftsman. Kloos himself also embraced the principles of functionalism.
In 1932, he established his own architectural firm. During this time, he occasionally collaborated with colleague Holt. Especially after the war, Kloos received numerous commissions for schools, hospitals, nursing homes, and residential buildings. One of his noteworthy projects in Amsterdam was the Kabouterhuis (1952) on Amsteldijk, a daycare center for young children.
He combined the functionalist approach of the Nieuwe Bouwen movement with mass-production techniques, yet managed to avoid creating monotonous structures. In literature, his housing project on Dijkgraafplein in Amsterdam, featuring suspension bridges, is often cited as an example of this.
www.ftn-books.com has the most important book on Kloos now available.
Upon completing his studies from the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (1952-1957), Luigi Snozzi (born 29.07.1932) sought to further his knowledge through internships with Ticino architects Peppo Brivio and Rino Tami. In 1958, he opened his own office in Locarno, marking the beginning of his career as an architect.
At the time, modern architecture was still a novelty in the canton of Ticino. Snozzi, along with his colleagues Livio Vacchini and Aurelio Galfetti, had studied the principles of modernism at ETH Zurich and aimed to incorporate them in their work. From 1962 to 1971, Snozzi collaborated on various design projects and competition proposals with Livio Vacchini. He also served as a guest lecturer for architectural design at ETH Zurich from 1973 to 1975. In addition, Snozzi maintained a second office in Zurich from 1975 to 1988, alongside his partner Bruno Jenni. Eventually, in 1985, he became a full professor at EPFL Lausanne, where he taught until 1997.
In 1986, Snozzi served as the president of the advisory design board in the city of Salzburg for two years. A decade later, in 1988, he opened a second office in Lausanne. His 1975 exhibition “Tendencies – New Architecture in Ticino” in Zurich solidified his position as a leading figure in the Ticino School of Architecture, and his influence on the younger generation of Swiss architects continues until now.
For Snozzi, modernist architects serve as a constant source of inspiration, but he is not one to blindly follow their methods. Instead, he uses history as a framework for creating something new. As he often says, “Architecture must not invent, but rather reframe.”
www.ftn-books.com has the scarce Electa p[ublication on Snozzi now available.
Frédéric Borel is renowned for his iconic housing projects that embody a new architectural hedonism on Boulevard de Belleville, Rue Oberkampf, and Rue Pelleport. Drawing from the Paris experienced and described by surrealist poets as a profusion of secret spaces and a collage of heterogeneous elements, capable of generating improbable events and unexpected encounters, these constructions testify to a unique approach to the urban question. These fragmented or unitary forms, always in rupture, strive to create new communal spaces or attractive hubs around which social life can condense.
His expressionist architectures branch out to offer truly sensitive spaces, animated by free and audacious forms. In Béthune, Rouen, Grand-Quevilly, or Paris with the École d’Architecture de Paris Val de Seine, housing or public facilities projects stand out as tutelary figures that radiate in the urban landscape.
Answering these bursts of colorful volumes are the objects, more compact, more internalized, public facilities that assert themselves in front of nature or the city as calm and serene masses. The Hotel des Impôts de Brive-la-Gaillarde, the University of Agen, the Moskowa school, the palace of justice in Narbonne stand as monoliths in suspension. The fire stations of Besançon, Dijon, Nogent sur Marne…all compose a gentle continuity with the landscape.
This principle of active architecture remains at work in all projects, with spaces offered to all, where specific atmospheres intersect and overlap under the benevolent masses of blocks in levitation, to create a sumptuous city dedicated to walking and wandering, luxury and sensuality.
This dreamlike and visionary architecture opens new windows to the world, and proposes true fictions that fuel and enrich.
www.ftn-books.com has one title on Borel now available.
Is Kiefer one of the great artists of our time…..certainly YES!
Is the Kiefer exhibition at Museum Voorlinden worth visiting? My personal answer is no. Far too crowded,. too many objects in one and the same room and expensive at euro 22 ,00 per person. Because of the many people present you can not take a distance from the large objects, showcases and paintings. It felt so crowded that it was unpleasant and after half an hour we decided to leave the museum. One of my personal observations was the analogy i felt with the 90’s and 00’s paintaings by Frank van Hemert.
Left and right are van Hemert paintings from the late 90’s and 00’s in the middle there is a work by Kiefer ca. 1996/97
I really love these sunflower paintings . whoever the artist, both convince me being great art. The large Kiefer paintings are very worth visiting at Voorlinden however , the bicycle objects and large showcases can not convince me and because they are over half the exhibition i thought it a disappointing visit.
All paintings , objects and cases deserve space and because this is limited at Voorlinden and the spaces were shared with far too many people the overall experience was disappointing.
The exhibition can be visited until the 25th of February and for those seeking catalogs on this artist please visit www.ftn-books.com
Here are some photographs i took at the exhibition:
This list is invented to make some quick and easy blogs for this month filled with festivities. I chose the buildings because i think they belong to the most important from all buildings realized in the last 100 years.
So here is no. 1. Falling Water house, by Frank Lloyd Wright
We have never visited this one, but hope that at some time we will. Whenever there is a chance to visit and enter a great building we do not hesitate and enter…. In the past there were the Empire state, Eifel tower, Musee Louis Vuitton, Atomium, the Glasshouse in Retiro Park Madrid and so many more, but this one is probably the highest on the wish list. Together with the Rothko chapel it would be the ultimate US destination for us.
The house is build over the waterfall and combines the best in japanese landscape architecture together with the modernism of FLW. Build as a vacation home for the Kaufmann family, the building quality was far less than perfect. It was necessary to restore it in order to preserve it. But restoration has completed some decades ago and now the house is a museum and can be visited .
www.ftn-books.com has some nice Frank Lloyd Wright publications available.
