How do we remember a career that did not leave behind a canonical trail? How do we fit the machine designed to illustrate a philosophical idea into a history of computing, or fit the plans for a city that can exist only in the imagination into a history of architecture?

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Image: Lebbeus Woods, Concentric Field, from the series Centricity, 1987

What is the meaning of the word ‘free’? For Lebbeus Woods’s freespace structures, it means “free of any kind of predetermined meaning or usefulness… so that there’s no way that we know from our former experience how these [spaces] might be used.” 

Love this vintage style SFMOMA poster by André Chiote via Wired’s Designer Salutes Iconic Museum Architecture With Delightfully ‘Vintage’ Posters

While Albert Einstein’s cremated remains were dispersed over the Atlantic Ocean, architect Lebbeus Woods envisioned a cosmic vessel that would carry them into the infinity of outer space, remaining in orbit on a beam of light for eons. Learn more about Woods’s fascinating “Einstein Tomb” from curator Joseph Becker at this Thursday’s gallery talk.

Image: Lebbeus Woods, Einstein Tomb, 1980; aluminum; Courtesy Aleksandra Wagner; © Estate of Lebbeus Woods

Do you have questions about the design of/creative process behind our expansion project? Next Friday, join us and Design Milk for a live Twitter chat with Ruth Berson, SFMOMA’s Deputy Museum Director, Curatorial Affairs!

To submit questions, email them or tweet them to @designmilk using the #FutureSFMOMA hashtag.

Lebbeus Woods, Architect is currently on view at SFMOMA, and throughout the run of the exhibition, we’ll be using Tumblr as a place to sequentially share Woods’s wonderful sketchbooks, since only a fraction of the pages can be on view in the galleries. Featured here is the 7th page from a sketchbook he worked on in NYC from 1995-1998.

Image: Lebbeus Woods, Sketchbook (30 July 1995, NYC - 23 May 1998, NYC), 1995; Collection SFMOMA, Accessions Committee Fund purchase; © Estate of Lebbeus Woods (2001.153 A-Y)

Lebbeus Woods, Architect is currently on view at SFMOMA, and throughout the run of the exhibition, we’ll be using Tumblr as a place to sequentially share Woods’s wonderful sketchbooks, since only a fraction of the pages can be on view in the galleries. Featured here is the 6th page from a sketchbook he worked on in NYC from 1995-1998.

Image: Lebbeus Woods, Sketchbook (30 July 1995, NYC - 23 May 1998, NYC), 1995; Collection SFMOMA, Accessions Committee Fund purchase; © Estate of Lebbeus Woods (2001.153 A-Y)

Lebbeus Woods dedicated his career to probing architecture’s potential to transform the individual and the collective. “Maybe I can show what could happen if we lived by a different set of rules,” he once said. 

Lebbeus Woods, Architect opens today at SFMOMA, and throughout the run of the exhibit, we’ll be using Tumblr as a place to sequentially share Woods’s wonderful sketchbooks, since only a fraction of the pages can be on view in the galleries. Featured here is the first page from a sketchbook he worked on in NYC from 1995-1998.

Image: Lebbeus Woods, Sketchbook (30 July 1995, NYC - 23 May 1998, NYC), 1995; Collection SFMOMA, Accessions Committee Fund purchase; © Estate of Lebbeus Woods (2001.153 A-Y)

thewhitetanktop:

I was lucky to catch Field Conditions at SFMOMA before it closed—not only did it share a name with a collection of poetry I’ve yet to write, it also had some sharp artwork. Stan Allen coined the lovely term and my favorite piece in the show was his print (indistinguishable on the far right of the temporary wall in the picture) of First 2,500 iterations of an infinite series of plan variations. it was a series of square shapes in slightly different permutations that, as I watched them carefully, started to dance like digital snow.

you can read an extensive overview of Field Conditions here on the SFMOMA blog, with a surprising (to me) but totally logical connection to Jackson Pollock.

Thanks for the thoughtful post about Field Conditions! Although it’s now being deinstalled, the exhibition gave us a lot of interesting thoughts that we’ll be thinking about well into the future.

For those who were unable to catch the show, curator Joseph Becker’s blog post is a must-read for anyone curious about architecture, design, and/or the curator’s process.

chinchinburraburra:

‘Field Conditions’ at the SFMOMA

Love this photo! Reminder: Field Conditions is only open until January 6, so get in here and see it soon!

Can there be architecture without buildings? What if elements of architecture – such as a floor or a wall – extended endlessly? 

Curator Joseph Becker was motivated by these questions when organising the exhibition Field Conditions, now on view at SFMOMA. Read an interview w/ Becker on these questions and more here.

Image: Lebbeus Woods, ‘Conflict Space 2′, 2006, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. © Lebbeus Woods