Welch, Frank D., 1927-2017.

Philip Johnson & Texas / Frank D. Welch ; foreword by Philip Johnson ; drawings by Brian Fitzsimmons and Landry Ray ; photographs by Paul Hester.

1st ed.

Austin : University of Texas Press, 2000.

xviii, 298 pages : illustrations ; 28 cm

Celebrated, controversial, and recipient of his profession's highest honors, "Philip Johnson is unarguably the most influential and best-known American architect working at the close of this century", in the opinion of Frank Welch. For six decades he has been a leading advocate and practitioner of European-inspired modernist architecture, patron of the Museum of Modern Art, and habitue of elite East Coast artistic, cultural, and social circles. Yet his most distinguished large buildings are all in Texas.
In this book, Frank Welch draws on interviews with Johnson, his professional colleagues, and the patrons who commissioned his buildings to discover why Johnson has done his best work in the Lone Star State. He opens with an overview of Johnson's formative years as an architect, leading up to his pivotal meeting with Dominique and John de Menil, who chose him to build their house in Houston in the late 1940s. Welch fully chronicles Johnson's long association with the de Menils and other wealthy Texans and the many commissions this produced, including the University of St. Thomas and Pennzoil Place in Houston, the Kennedy Memorial, Thanks-Giving Square, and the Cathedral of Hope in Dallas, the Amon Carter Museum and the Water Garden in Fort Worth, and the Art Museum of South Texas in Corpus Christi, as well as the numerous skyscrapers Johnson designed for Houston developer Gerald Hines, and several private residences.
This history of Johnson's work in Texas reveals how the architect's bold, outspoken personality attracted Texas clients and how their referrals in turn shaped his career. It also demonstrates how Johnson's advocacy of architecture-as-art has affected the social and cultural climate of Texas cities. Perhaps most of all, it records Johnson's ongoing love affair with the state that has made him its favorite "out-of-town" architect. As he recently quipped during a slow time in his New York office, "I should have moved there; it's the only place I have any work!"

0292791348 (cl ; alk. paper)
9780292791343

Johnson, Philip, 1906-2005 Criticism and interpretation.
Johnson, Philip, 1906- Critique et interprétation.
Johnson, Philip, 1906-2005.
Architecture Texas.
Architecture United States History 20th century.
Architecture États-Unis Texas.
Architecture États-Unis Histoire 20e siècle.
Architecture.
Texas.
United States.

Essays.
Criticism, interpretation, etc.
History.

Hester, Paul
Johnson, Philip, 1906-2005
Fitzsimmons, Brian
Ray, Landry

Location: Library main 212883
Call No.: NA44.J68.9 W4 2000
Status: Available