Louis Kahn: Drawing to Find Out
Like few others, Louis Kahn cultivated the craft of drawing as a means to architecture. His personal design drawings – seen either as a method of discovery or for themselves – are unique in the twentieth century. Over two hundred – mostly unpublished – drawings by Kahn and his associates are woven together with a lively and informed commentary into an intimate biography of an architectural idea. Unfolding around the iconic project for the Dominican Motherhouse (1965–1969) the drawings form a narrative which not only reveals the richness and hidden dimensions of this unbuilt masterpiece, but provides compelling insights into Louis Kahn’s mature culture of designing.
Kahn – long considered an “architects’ architect” – emerges as a vivid and instructive guide, provoking reflection on questions which continue to remain relevant: on how works are conceived, on how they might be perceived, on how they become part of human experience. Fascinating not only in their beauty, the drawings open a new and stimulating perspective on one of the past century’s great architects.
Like few others, Louis Kahn cultivated the craft of drawing as a means to architecture. His personal design drawings – seen either as a method of discovery or for themselves – are unique in the twentieth century. Over two hundred – mostly unpublished – drawings by Kahn and his associates are woven together with a lively and informed commentary into an intimate biography of an architectural idea. Unfolding around the iconic project for the Dominican Motherhouse (1965–1969) the drawings form a narrative which not only reveals the richness and hidden dimensions of this unbuilt masterpiece, but provides compelling insights into Louis Kahn’s mature culture of designing.
Kahn – long considered an “architects’ architect” – emerges as a vivid and instructive guide, provoking reflection on questions which continue to remain relevant: on how works are conceived, on how they might be perceived, on how they become part of human experience. Fascinating not only in their beauty, the drawings open a new and stimulating perspective on one of the past century’s great architects.
“Louis Kahn’s singular plan for the Dominican Motherhouse must be among the most commonly reproduced, intriguing and difficult to comprehend of all his projects […] Drawing to Find Out offers an exhaustive account of the project’s development and the drawings are beautifully reproduced in a large, landscape format. Merrill’s commentary is consistently incisive […]”
“This large format book draws together over two hundred—mostly unpublished—drawings of Kahn’s Dominican Motherhouse. It offers a fascinating look into Kahn’s design process and his struggles with ideas about space.”
