A century after his death, Philadelphia's Frank Furness is remembered in a series of events, including this exhibition at The Athenaeum. The architect continues to earn praise for his ambitious, idiosyncratic style.
By the time he died in 1912, at age 72, structural exhibitionism was passé, even vulgar, and Furness was something of a laughingstock. Only in the 1960s was he rediscovered by young architects disgruntled with modernism, for whom he was a guilty pleasure, a kind of joyous architectural Falstaff to fling against the solemnity of the Bauhaus. Robert Venturi did much to make Furness respectable again, praising the "array of violent forces within a rigid frame" that characterized his work.
Face & Form: The Art and Caricature of Frank Furness runs Nov. 30 through Jan. 11 at The Athenaeum of Philadelphia. Click
here for details and a complete calendar of Furness 2012 events.
Original source: The Wall Street Journal
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