Chicago Spire?

Santiago Calatrava is yet another great architect; his Milwaukee Art Museum dominates the shore of Lake Michigan.  It is a 90 foot high glass-enclosed reception hall covered by a movable wing-like sun screen made of 72 steel fins that control the temperature and light of the interior.  The thought that it would take to create these steel fins that can control the temperature of the interior would take a lot of calculations and thinking.  The design of the building is not only very creative, but very innovative features such as this are amazing to me as well.

After researching Santiago’s works a bit I found it very interesting how he represents the human body and the natural world in his architecture as well.

He spent five years in school studying architecture and four years after that studying engineering to develop his very unique style of design.  Santiago like Frank Gehry has a very unique style that he has developed for himself which allows you to recognize his architecture.  Also like Gehry Santiago’s architecture can be found throughout the world.



Santiago has made many bridges and train stations as seen in the video and in many of them he uses the thinner metal pieces and gives the appearance that the structure is being twisted.  I think this could be considered one of his signature designs.  In many of his structures he gives the appearance that it is being twisted.  Such as the Chicago Spire that he has designed to be built on lake shore drive, but I found in an article from this past October that this project is officially dead.  Due to financial difficulties the project was stopped and the spire which was supposed to be over 2,000 feet tall will now only exist in its drawings. 

I had never heard of this plan for the Chicago spire but I am disappointed to hear that it won’t be added to the Chicago skyline.  He may still design a building to go in its place, but it will not be near 2,000 feet tall and I’m sure not near the spectacle this spire would have been.  Santiago Calatrava is still a very popular architect today and it is due to his flowing designs, and creative style that is so aesthetically pleasing.  It blows my mind that someone could continue to create such creative pieces of architecture when the majority of the buildings you see are just the plain rectangular sky scrapers.  Calatrava has set himself apart from other architects as an artist on the international level.  His art will be viewed by millions for centuries to come. 

Frank Gehry

Some of the most interesting architecture I have ever seen has been created by someone I had never heard of before.  I had seen his work in movies such as Get Smart, and the work is beautiful.  Frank Gehry although only mentioned in a very small section of the book on page 148.  His work was much more sculptural and one thing that made me want to blog about this was because in my opinion good art is eye catching.  If I was traveling through Los Angeles, California, I would not turn my head at any of the sky scrapers or other huge buildings.  Architecture such as the Walt Disney Concert Hall which was the architecture that was in the movie Get Smart, definitely turns heads.  And this was one of many creations by Frank.

After working for different companies Gehry had begun his own firm and when he first started out he built large residential, commercial, office, and institutional projects.  “During the 1960s, Frank Gehry began to redirect his architecture by fusing the Japanese and vernacular elements in his early work with the influence of painters and sculptors in a sophisticated manipulation of perspectively distorted shapes, sculptural masses molded by light, and buildings that reveal their structures.”  Gehry began to practice these new methods on his own home shown here as well as others. 

By learning from these homes he began to apply his new methods to larger projects. 

California Aerospace Museum

Cabrillo Marine Museum

Inhabitable Fish

These all display Frank Gehry’s amazing talent as an architect.  He has a clear skill that you do not see in any other architecture around the world unless it is by him.  He has not only done work in the United States but the fish restaurant shown was in Japan.  He has a very unique style and really creates a piece of art with each individual creation of his.  The way the buildings curve and how he fits the structure together makes it look like it should not be able to stand up.  This makes his architecture even more interesting to me because I can spend quite a while looking at the structures wondering how they are put together to form the different shapes they do.  He takes ideas that have never been done before and has created a new medium in which to apply his ideas.  Now that I know who Frank Gehry is, I could pick out one if his buildings if I saw it.  His use of shape and materials is what has made him an innovator in architecture.  His buildings are not only aesthetically pleasing but structurally sound and I hope to be able to see one of his structures in person.

Bob Dylan and Folk Rock

Rock music became one of the many music genres in the 1950’s.  The phrase “rocking and rolling” originated as a reference to sexual activity.  These references can be seen in a lot of rock and roll songs.  The genre as a whole is often associated with dancing, sexual freedom, and rebellion against parents.  In the 1960’s Bob Dylan emerged as a folk-rock hero.  As a child he had many influences from country and folk music and as he entered his teenage years the rock movement began to break out.  He dropped out of college and moved to New York to seek out his hero Woody Guthrie and start a folk revival scene. 

                In 1963 he was signed to Columbia Records and Dylan’s first album had a folk and blues feel to it.  In 1965 he began to expand his musical approach and began the genre folk rock with his first single Bringing It All Back Home.  At the end of this year he would release his most popular album of his career, Highway 61 Revisited.  Dylan’s lyrics often reference things occurring in the world.  In his song The Times They Are A Changing, Dylan talks about how society is changing.  The lines from the song: “And admit that the waters around you have grown” and “Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone.”  Dylan is describing that you need to accept that society is constantly changing and move on. 

In 1963 Dylan also wrote the song Masters of War.  This song is against fighting and war in general, but in the 60’s is was specifically against the Vietnam War.  With Lyrics such as:

Come you masters of war
You that build the big guns
You that build the death planes
You that build all the bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks

Dylan discusses war and because of the time period this was is said to be about the Vietnam War.  One aspect that makes it such as good song is that if you listen to the entire song you can see that it can be applied to any war fought even today. This song also references the bible with the lyric “Like Judas of old.”  Although some of his songs have a more serious tone, the music that is incorporated with the words is very catchy and the melody can easily be put into your head.  I was unable to find this song performed by Bob Dylan but I did in fact find a cover done by Pearl Jam. 

Bob Dylan’s most recent sensation is the song Knocking on Heavens Door.  It has a very nice acoustic guitar playing along with the electric keyboard playing the melody and really combining for a beautiful combination.  The harmonica part midway through gives it some of the folk feel that Bob Dylan started out with. 

Bob Dylan has a very innovative style that had never been done before.  His incorporation of electronic instruments into his folk style created a new style of music that will never be forgotten.  Many current bands say that Bob Dylan had an influence on what they did as well.  His lyrics are very well thought out and often have a deeper meaning behind them which I personally am not used to.  Many of the songs that are at the top of the charts today do not have any meaning such as this at all.  Bob was an amazing artist and is a living legend today in the Rock and Roll word.  He has left his mark on music and will always be looked at as an inspiration for rock generations to come. 

Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol began his work as a commercial illustrator and had his first work take off at a Supermarket exhibit in an art gallery.  His piece Campbell’s tomato soup painting became very popular.

 

He became even more famous for painting like the Green Coca-Cola Bottles.

 

He became famous by producing images that repeat again, again, and again.  Warhol's Coke bottles do this exact thing.  The art of the past was about evoking emotion and feeling out of the viewer.  The art was “creative” and at times very abstract, but Andy did not follow this trend.  The bottles are about sameness (though some lighter than others): same brand, same size, same paint surface, same fame as product. They mimic the condition of mass advertising.  Warhol worked to depersonalize a subject by enlarging it or reproducing it in monotonous, postage-stamp rows resembling supermarket displays.  One would think that this would make the art very boring and unpopular, but the art is in a way interesting and appealing.  It was almost a little bit of a shock factor when I first saw it because I was curious as to how it was created and in a way it was very interesting to look at. 

Andy also did pieces like his Mint Marilyn Monroe.  Just as his paintings like the Green Coca-Cola Bottles Andy became very well known for these pieces.  He again challenged the traditional distinctions between fine and applied art in his portrayals of political figures and celebrities.  The shades of yellow, green, and orange were used to portray her well known face in a new light.  It was the different colors that Andy incorporates into his paintings of celebrities that allows you to recognize the art as his.  He has made his own mark on his paintings so that when you see his style you know that it is a work of Andy Warhol.  This to me makes him an innovator in his form of art.  Although he sold his art for a profit which some people say takes him out of the category of artist.  I think that he is an artist because of the new style he created.