All artwork and architecture by Le Corbusier (Charles-Édouard Jeanneret) (French, born Switzerland 1887-1965). Blue Mountains, 1910, pencil, watercolor, ink on paper. Fondation Le Corbusier (FLC), Paris. Copyright 2013 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris/FLC.
Modern architect Le Corbusier (Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, 1887-1965) still influences architecture and town planning. MoMA's comprehensive retrospective, "Le Corbusier: An Atlas of Modern Landscapes," examines interactions in his oeuvre between architecture, painting, design, photography, film, urbanism, and other disciplines, spanning the range of his creative practice over six decades, across five continents. The Jura landscape, above, from Le Corbusier's early life in his hometown of La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland.
Le Corbusier at the Acropolis, September 1911. Copyright FLC-ADAGP.
In 1911, Le Corbusier took his "Journey to the East" through the Balkans and Istanbul to Greece. He filled his notebooks with descriptive passages and sketches, recording his impressions--in Athens of the Parthenon, Temple of Athena Nike and the Acropolis.
The Parthenon, Athens, 1911. Pencil, gouache and watercolor on paper. FLC, Paris. Copyright 2013 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris/FLC.
Visiting sites of sculptural and architectural antiquity was central to his development. He evaluated the contour, composition and proportions of the Parthenon in detail; it remained for him a measure of all architecture. From the Acropolis, he derived his interest in the architectural promenade, which became a key component of his design. Architectural spaces should flow together visually as they are experienced while walking through and around them.
The architectural spectacle offers itself consecutively to the view; one follows an itinerary and the views develop with great variety.
Painter Amédée Ozenfant, Albert Jeanneret and Le Corbusier in the workshop at 29 rue d'Astorg, Paris, 1922. Copyright FLC-ADAGP.
He established an architecture studio in Paris in 1922, collaborating with painter Amédée Ozenfant on the journal L'Esprit nouveau, a publication of modernism in painting and architecture.With the first issue, he adopted his pseudonym--Charles-Édouard Jeanneret became Le Corbusier, a derivation from his grandfather's name, Lecorbesier.
Villa Le Lac, Corseaux 1924-25. Perspective of living room with view toward Lake Geneva. Ink and colored pencil on paper. FLC, Paris. Copyright 2013 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris/FLC.
Interweaving interior and exterior rooms with a horizontal window along the length, the building transforms into a viewing device for the landscape. Villa Le Lac in Corseaux, a small house Le Corbusier designed for his parents on the shore of Lake Geneva, illustrates his creation of the ribbon window, which reoccurs in his later work, introducing "...the immensity of the outdoors, the unity of a lakeside landscape with its storms and radiant calms." He used drawings extensively in his projects, from first observation of a site until completion, a link between his painting and architecture.
Villa Le Lac, Corseaux 1924-25. Chromogenic color print, 2012, photograph by Richard Pare.
The villa's courtyard and garden patio are contained by a lakefront wall raised on the eastern side to form a screen with an opening, its proportions similar to a landscape painting. While the house's ribbon window suggests a panorama, the courtyard view selects and frames a fragment of the lake and Alps.
Villa Le Lac, Corseaux 1924-25. Copyright FLC-ADAGP.
Nature morte, 1920, oil on canvas. The Museum of Modern Art. Copyright 2012 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris/FLC.
Throughout his career, Le Corbusier divided the day between his painting studio and the architecture office. His paintings and architecture correlate, the spatial compositions in his paintings reflecting in his buildings with multiple viewpoints and readings.
Co-workers at the atelier at the Rue de Sèvres, Paris, 1926. Copyright FLC-ADAGP.
Model of the Villa Savoye, Poissy 1928-31. Wood, aluminum and plastic. The Museum of Modern Art. Copyright 2012 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/ADAGP, Paris/FLC.
Le Corbusier originally exhibited at MoMA in the 1932 "International Exhibition of Modern Architecture" with three projects, one of which was his commissioned country weekend house outside Paris, Villa Savoye, a realization of his "Five Points of a New Architecture." Buildings have five essentials: Pilotis (first floor columns that elevate the building off the ground), roof gardens, the free plan, the free façade (no longer structural and no defined front, side or back of the building), and the ribbon, or horizontal window. Le Corbusier's Five Points were intended to open new perspectives to architecture, extending to town planning.
Villa Savoye, Poissy 1928-31. Chromogenic color print, 2012. Photograph by Richard Pare.
The house must not have a front. Positioned on top of the dome, it must open out to the four horizons. The living floor, with its hanging garden, will be suspended above piloti so as to afford distant views over the horizon.
Lego's model of the Villa Savoye. Copyright 2012, the LEGO Group.
The villa was added to Lego's Architecture series last year, created by German architect Michael Hepp and Lego's model builder Steen Sig Anderson. Intended for ages 12 and up. According to Lego, nearly 95% of architects spent time building with construction toys as children, learning principles of architecture (Lincoln Logs, Tinker Toys, Lego sets).
Urban plan for Rio de Janeiro. Aerial perspective with Guanabara Bay, the center and the beaches, 1929. Charcoal, pencil and pastel on paper. Copyright FLC, Paris.
Le Corbusier extended his architectural practice with a series of lecture tours starting in 1929. A tour of South America led him to develop plans for Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires. His conception of regional planning emerged from "the view of the airplane," observing continents, islands and mountains.
Le Corbusier and engineer-architect Alberto Monteiro de Carvalho in Rio, 1929. Copyright FLC-ADAGP.
Plan for Buenos Aires. Profile view from the Rio de la Plata, 1929, pastel on paper. Copyright FLC, Paris.
For Buenos Aires, Le Corbusier suggests buildings on pilotis above the water on an island in the Rio de la Plata that would serve as a presence for travelers arriving by boat. Modernism began to be explored locally in part due to his travels to South America.
Chapelle Notre-Dame du Haut, Ronchamp 1950-55. Chromogenic color print, 2012, Museum of Modern Art. Photograph by Richard Pare.
Architecture is the masterly, correct and magnificent play of volumes brought together in light...it is appreciated on the move, on foot; by walking and moving around, one can see how the architecture's ordering devices unfurl.
MoMA, 11 West 53 Street. On view through September 23.
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