Yet now, in our era of elegantly restrained and frequently dour minimalism, when architecture is almost always the province of the rich, it may be that Goff, with his aesthetic idiosyncrasies and affinity for middle-class Midwestern clients (schoolteachers, farmers, salesmen, small-town newspaper publishers), still has lessons to teach us, 36 years after his death. — The New York Times
In her NYT feature, Amanda Fortini revisits the flamboyant and impressive work of the largely forgotten midcentury architect Bruce Goff. "His daring, elaborately imagined homes—he loved unusual shapes and made ample use of found materials—are often dismissed by cultural mandarins as overly futuristic and corny, but they possess a warmth, an earthiness and a wild ingenuity that serve as an antidote to the soberly luxurious, the pared down and the austere," Fortini writes.
5 Comments
This is a really enjoyable article. We learned about Goff way back in undergrad in the late 80s - loved his work ever since.
In the late 70's he came to SCI Arc and gave a lecture which lasted for 3-4 hours. Nobody left. He had a lot of paintings too.He was working on Pavilion for Japanese Art in La Brea tar pits where LACMA is located. I remember of him being an adorable person who also critiqued some student projects.
Don't forget Andrew Geller.
Mr. Goff came and spent a week with us at Cal Poly SLO around 1980 or so. He was a gentle soul, and a very thoughtful architect.
He took the FLW ideas of organic architecture to their logical endpoint. He demonstrated how modern design need not be reductivist and impoverished. His buildings had engaging detail at all scales, from the very small to the very large, and the detail was self-similar, always reflecting the geometric theme of the particular house. In this way, his work was in tune with the fractal geometry of nature.
His clients loved him and their houses, because each one was profoundly unique and tailored to them. He literally had no personal agenda, but was like some sort of medium, channeling his client's preferences through a psychedelic geometric filter. Amazing architect.
I have met Al Strukus, the owner of the house pictured in the article, and have toured his little Goff house, which is here in LA. It's a pretty incredible little building, so unusual and yet so humane.
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