"A major new biography of Philip Johnson, an extraordinary architect whose politics and proclivities made him one of the most controversial figures in American cultural history. When Philip Johnson died in 2005 at the age of ninety-eight, he was still one of the most recognizable -- and influential -- figures on the American cultural landscape. The first recipient of the Pritzker Prize and MoMA's founding architectural curator, he introduced America to modernism and promoted generations of architects, designers, and artists. Johnson, the consummate power broker, virtually invented the 'starchitect,' the celebrity architect. His own work (most prominently the Glass House and the Chippendale-capped AT&T Building New York) was polarizing, yet can be found in most every major American city. Johnson was a man of deep paradoxes: A Nazi sympathizer who later built synagogues and supported Israel, an opportunist and a romantic, a populist and a snob. Award-winning critic Mark Lamster lifts the veil on Johnson's contradictions to tell the story of this brilliant yet deeply flawed man." -- From publisher's description.
|
