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Louis Kahn's Yale Center For British Art Captures The AIA Twenty-Five Year Award For Architecture of Enduring Significance
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For Immediate Release |
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Washington, D.C., December 7,
2004 — The American Institute of Architects (AIA) announced today that
the Yale Center for British Art in New Haven, Conn., has been
selected to receive the 2005 AIA Twenty-five Year Award. The
prestigious award honors significant architectural landmarks
completed 25-35 years ago that have withstood the test of time. The
Yale Center for British Art is the fifth building by Louis I. Kahn,
FAIA, to receive the Twenty-five Year Award from the AIA. Both
building and architect will be honored at the American
Architectural Foundation’s Accent on Architecture gala
February 11, 2005, in Washington D.C.
Begun in 1973, one year before Kahn’s death, and opened to the
public in 1977, the Yale Center for British Art is among
Kahn’s finest structures. When the building received an AIA
Honor Award in 1978, the jury noted, “This building is a
gentle urbane masterpiece. It offers a quiet foil to its more
demonstrative neighbors and, from the interior, frames and augments
them. The small specialty shops tucked into its façade give
vitality and continuity to the pedestrian character of the street.
The interior spaces are well planned for easy movement through the
exhibits. They frequently reveal surprising glimpses of one
another. A quiet feeling of delight grows within you with the
discovery of each new space, and the manner in which the whole is
subtly revealed has an ever-surprising complexity.”
Andrea O. Dean wrote in a story on the building that ran in AIA
Journal, “The new Yale Center for British Art serves as a
fitting summation of [Kahn’s] work and ideas … . In fact,
many of the most forward-looking aspects of this building …
are adaptations of Beaux-Arts principles firmly repudiated by most
‘Modern’ architects. Kahn returned to the use of natural
light, though employing it in a completely novel way. Instead of
undifferentiated spaces, he created rooms complementing the scale
and tone of Paul Mellon’s collection, never overwhelming
it.”
The Yale Center for British Art was erected to house the largest,
most comprehensive collection of British art outside the U.K.
Located across the street from the Yale University Art Gallery,
Kahn’s first major commission, the Center for British Art was
the first museum in the U.S. to incorporate retail shops on the
street. Pellechia & Meyers, formed in 1973 by Anthony
Pellecchia and Marshall Meyers, FAIA, project architects at the
time in the office of Louis I. Kahn, completed the Yale Center for
British Art after Kahn's death in 1974. A monumental yet
restrained civic structure, the Center’s taut exterior of
matte steel and reflective glass becomes animated in the sunlight.
“On a gray day the building looks like a moth; on a sunny day,
like a butterfly—just as Kahn once predicted,” wrote
James F. Williamson, AIA, and Louis R. Pounders, FAIA, in their
nomination letter.
The geometrical interior is designed around two courtyards, one
housing a massive concrete cylinder concealing a spiral stair that
dominates the library courtyard. Travertine flooring, Belgian linen
wall coverings, white oak woodwork, stainless steel panels and
ducts, and exposed concrete structural elements complete the
restrained and formal palette of materials. As Vincent Scully
observed, “the effect is rather Miesian, and suggests a kind
of dignified, if reductive, Classicism.”
Kahn believed that natural light is essential to fully appreciate
the works contained within. Hence, the majestic four-story entrance
courtyard is awash in natural light. That light is then filtered
into the adjoining galleries through unglazed interior windows.
Skylights provide illumination for the top-floor galleries; angled
louvers and baffles in the truncated, pyramidal, concrete coffers
block bluish north light and screen ultraviolet rays, admitting
larger quantities of light when the sun is low than when it is
higher in the sky. The jury noted, “This building reflects
Kahn’s continuous search for simplicity and the use of
daylight to define space. It is one of the quietest expressions of
a great building ever seen—so rewarding and exhilarating when
you step inside. The materiality and the language of the wood,
stainless steel, concrete, and natural linen is still a delight for
the eye.”
Kahn emigrated to the U.S. from Estonia at the age of four. After
receiving his bachelor of architecture degree (BArch) from the
University of Pennsylvania, Kahn taught at Yale from 1947 to 1957.
During that time, he was also resident architect at the American
Academy in Rome. While there, he traveled throughout Italy, Egypt,
and Greece, recording historic architecture in drawings and
sketches. After his tenure at Yale, Kahn became dean of the School
of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania. In the
mid-1950s, Kahn rose to prominence in the field, receiving
significant awards and commissions. Kahn’s Salk Institute for
Biological Studies, La Jolla, Calif.; the Kimbell Art Museum, Ft.
Worth, Tex.; the Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Conn.; and
the Phillips Exeter Library, Exeter, NH have all been honored by
the AIA with the Twenty-five year Award.
About The American Institute of Architects
Since 1857, the AIA has represented the professional interests of
America's architects. As AIA members, over 74,000 licensed
architects, emerging professionals, and allied partners express
their commitment to excellence in design and livability in our
nation's buildings and communities. Members adhere to a code of
ethics and professional conduct that assures the client, the
public, and colleagues of an AIA-member architect's dedication to
the highest standards in professional practice
Note to editors: For additional background information or images,
contact Cara Battaglini in the AIA's media relations office, (202)
626-7462, email carab@aia.org
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