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  • Essay / Analysis of Frank Gehry as a Postmodern Deconstructivist Architect

    Frank Gehry is a deconstructivist and one of the most recognizable figures in postmodern architecture. Postmodern architecture is an architectural movement that emerged in the mid-20th century as a reaction against the strict rules, formality, lack of variation, and ignorance of the history and culture of modern architectural style, which was at its peak at the time. that time. However, this was the first spark of change after architect and architectural theorist Robert Venturi wrote (Venturi) his book Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture in 1966 describing modern architecture as a doctrine and calling for complex architecture and contradictory based on richness and ambiguity. of modern experience. Venturi called for a hybrid, diverse, disordered and compromised architecture, one that embodies the unity of inclusion rather than exclusion. Since then, many architects and pioneers have opened their eyes to the very diverse and commitment-free architecture that could be achieved. At that time, Canadian architect Frank Gehry was just beginning his private professional career, with his pre-qualifications and scope freely open for contributions, Gehry thus succeeded in defining a new dimension of postmodern architecture. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Gehry's works fall within the framework of deconstructivism, which is a late postmodern approach to architecture developed from the semiotics of French philosopher Jacques Derrida. Additionally, it encourages a radical freedom of form and the open manifestation of complexity in a building rather than a strict attention to functional concerns and conventional design elements such as right angles or grids (Merriam-Webster Dictionary). Deconstructivism primarily seeks to expose the deep-rooted contradictions in a work by looking beyond its superficial meaning, meaning that a thing or drawing can have different meanings, it only depends on how it is interpreted. According to Derrida, reading texts that are classically constructed is easier to deconstruct. Likewise, deconstructivist architecture requires the existence of a defined archetypal construction, in order to be able to be deconstructed. As a result, the best example of this technique in Gehry's designs is Gehry's Santa Monica residence. It was achieved by curbing and deconstructing the traditional design of suburban houses by wrapping it with an unfinished industrial-looking facade while modifying the conventional spatial arrangements and volumetry of the existing. building. Furthermore, by placing the kitchen in the driveway of the old house outside the frame of the house, Gehry was able to break the boundaries of the old house, resulting in a collision that breaks the boundaries between interior /exterior, interiority/exteriority. This type of deconstruction of duality is a major postmodern characteristic. Another approach very evident in all of Gehry's creations is the absolute rejection of an ideal form or a perfect form for a particular activity, which relates to postmodernism as a kind of refusal of a strict form. rules of modern architecture, the architecture of typologies. Established, Gehry uses the free play approach, creating and designing unconventional curved buildings that defy gravity, combined with the use of strange and unusual materials such as corrugated iron, stainless steel, special types of glass.