Leon Krier Speaks Out Against Frank Gehry's Eisenhower Memorial Design

By Karissa Rosenfield
(click here for original article)

The controversy surrounding Frank Gehry’s proposal for the Eisenhower Memorial has just reached new heights as the Chicago Tribune’s Blair Kamin has recently published a 1,500-word essay, written by the influential neo-traditionalist architect Leon Krier, that bashes Gehry’s proposal and ideology. Krier calls Gehry a “greatly confused artist” who’s “style is a century old” and “seems “innovative” only to the ignorant”. Kier continues to claim the commission who appointed Gehry’s design “shares his [Gehry’s] intellectual confusion and distaste of classical Washington D.C.”

Krier describes the 25 meter-tall woven metal tapestries as embodying a “chain-link aesthetic” that that has served as “a widespread formula used since the early 1950s in Germany by Egon Eiermann to dress up superstores.”

Krier states, “The scale and character of the blotted tagged fence relates more to highway billboards and graffiti than to the historic tapestry it declaredly refers to. The giant illustrated screens intend to create a sacred memorial area, but the devotional imagery is perceived like a mere backdrop through a thicket of trees, best read from the outside. The centerless monument effectively amounts to an open-air cinema overtaken by a wild-growth of sycamore. An anti-monument if there can be such a thing.”

Judging on the essay, it is safe to say Krier has joined Richard Driehaus in the campaign for a replacement scheme. Out of fairness, they have requested a response, however there has been no word from Gehry.

Learn more about the controversy here on ArchDaily and be sure to read the entire essay by Leon Krier on the Chicago Tribune.

Reference: Chicago Tribune, BDOnline

Comments

[ZeraLee]

04:41 PM on 02/28/2012

Call me crazy, but I would think that the first requirement for a memorial design is that it is easily recognizable as a memorial. What is this supposed to look like, the Berlin Wall?

Considering how the MLK memorial was bungled, I'm not in the mood for another memorial just now.

If I was, I would want something more along the lines of an oversized tomb of the unknown soldier, wrapped with panels representing important accomplishments in his lifetime - including his "military-industrial complex" speech.

[DG in SLC]

03:23 PM on 02/20/2012

Sorry, but while he was a good general, he was just "a" president, not a great one. He does not deserve this kind of monument.

[Patrick Brennan]

08:21 PM on 02/20/2012

What a ridiculous and unqualified comment. But hey, if your in SLC what else should anyone expect?

[DG in SLC]

06:01 PM on 03/05/2012

It's quite qualified. Just because he was a president, doesn't mean he was a great one. He certainly would be in the top 1/2 in my opinion, but to give him such an expansive imposing monument in that location is ridiculous.

As for your regionalist comment, if you knew anything about SLC you'd know that the very ground here oozes Republican support.

[cookscove]

02:43 PM on 02/20/2012

Does Washington really need yet another memorial? Do we really need to memorialize every president or political activist who ever lived? If so, why don't we raze a city like, say, Detroit and beautify it with these garish tourist attractions.

[keith w oliver]

01:39 PM on 02/20/2012

the realisation of this project would place "city beautification"
high upon the list of most eggregious oxymorons.

[mx5az]

02:00 AM on 02/20/2012

U-G-L-Y! Don't waste our taxes on Frank Gehry K-R-A-P!

[keith w oliver]

01:34 PM on 02/20/2012

omg are they serious? ...... thank you ... f/f/9

[Phalanxman]

12:35 AM on 02/20/2012

I'd be the first to confess I don't know much about architecture; haven't got a clue who Frank Gehry, Blair Kamin, Leon Krier, Egon Eirmann, or Richard Driehaus are or why I should care about them; didn't even know there was an Eisenhower memorial planned for D.C.; and couldn't construct my own building with even Lincoln Logs. But I do know that we already have a fabulous memorial to President Eisenhower -- his Interstate Highway System. And we all use it frequently. Perhaps it would be a more fitting tribute to our late president to keep it maintained.

[Bascoda]

02:36 AM on 02/20/2012

Well said, I completely agree.

[keith w oliver]

01:35 PM on 02/20/2012

^^this^^

huffpost "post-of-the-day" f/f/386

[alexandra23]

12:27 AM on 02/20/2012

Chain-link? Is this guy on bad drugs? Crass and ugly.

[jwalter]

10:41 PM on 02/19/2012

Why does Eisenhower get a memorial?

[trumbull desi]

11:03 AM on 02/20/2012

Well, he was a president. And then there was that little escapade called D-Day. You know, the battle that saved the world?

[shamanbart]

01:40 PM on 02/19/2012

From the photo shown, it looks horrible. I see nothing in that memorial that reflects or even suggests an attribute of Eisenhower the warrior or the President. Scrap it ASAP.

[Phalanxman]

12:38 AM on 02/20/2012

I agree that the design does not particularly inspire me, either. On the other hand, the 1950s was one of the worst period for U.S. architecture in history, as concrete and pillar pill boxes replaced Romanesque and Gothic Revival due to the need to build public buildings following WWII. But I don't think Eisenhower had much to do with that. Perhaps they should let anybody submit designs, and then let the people who own the DC Mall -- i.e., us -- vote on the one we like the best.

[keith w oliver]

01:37 PM on 02/20/2012

indeed f/f/103

i cannot see how they can even argue for it with a straight face
gaudy ... tacky ... unnecessary

[carolgregor]

10:45 AM on 02/19/2012

Design that lacks sacred geometry is detached and mechanistic. Unhealthy and unsustainable, Gehry continues to build randomly designed buildings that will hold no permanence which may be the very point. Cold, dated and unenlightened, architecture as frozen music can be so much better.

[AnthropologistAmongApes]

01:03 PM on 02/20/2012

"Harmonic geometry" is the technical phrase, and it is impossible to tell with this design without a set of plans and the ability to do harmonic analysis. LeCorbusier was a modernist whose works are often characterized as "sterile" and "stark", but he retrieved harmonic geometry from it's near destruction by religion almost single handedly in his work "The Modulor".

In my experience, harmonics are sensed but seldom sufficient for the typical observer; they are inclined to want adornment superimposed. So rejection of architecture that is abstract but harmonic is almost always due to a bias toward ornamentation rather than poor design.

I have an extensive library of virtually every work of literature along these lines if you are interested. Robert Lawlor's work is one of the most concise and articulate; but by no means is it complete in itself. The most esoteric and difficult work I've encountered is Schwaller De Lubicz's monumental treatise "The Temple of Man"; harmonic geometry applied to the Temple of Luxor. For a delightful overview, try "A Beginners Guide to Constructing the Universe" by Schneider. If you are already familiar with these works then I have many more which are also worthwhile.

[carolgregor]

04:49 PM on 02/21/2012

Thank you. I am in post production on a film about the design model we use today and Lawlors work is a powerful influence. I have also studied the background of philosophical oppression which made our relationship to the symbolic sphere one of heresy. I am most interested in the use of these proportions for our health in the built world today. These forms can bring us to beauty and sustainability as nothing else can. The random moment in design that stumbles upon these harmonies are actually always available using a large system in analysing design. I have worked for the last decade on them and have traveled around the world insearch of a simple, sustainable and beautiful approach to design and construction. M I wI would like to keep you in the loop and would enjoy a response about my film. The Global Peace Film Festival held a screaning last June and the film features AT Mann,"Sacred Architecture", Thomas Moore,"Care of the Soul" and Dr Bernie Siegel, Love Medicine adn Miracles. We all look at our built world as a tragic loss of the sacred in design and function. We need to reach much deeper into practices from the past that see our connection adn interdependence to nature and use her harmonics as a guide. Best! sorry for misspelling..I can't see the page..

[NYC07]

01:09 AM on 02/19/2012

Where's the James Buchanan memorial?

[Erik Bootsma]

07:37 PM on 02/19/2012

In Meridian Hill Park: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BuchananmonmtDC.JPG

[Jim281]

09:30 PM on 02/18/2012

I don't get it. Its ugly!

[fzriely]

03:35 PM on 02/18/2012

Do we really need an Eisenhower memorial?

[PitBullWoman]

10:03 PM on 02/18/2012

Ditto. Plus, what did he do to deserve one?

[mater]

06:43 AM on 02/19/2012

He organized D-Day, for one thing. If we can recognize the Bushes, we can recognized President Eisenhower. He was the president who worked to build the entire national highway Interstate system. I'm a Dem, but I think Pres. Eisenhower, who was our President at a time of peace, did a fair job and can't see why a memorial is a bad thing.

[Matt12]

10:41 AM on 02/18/2012

The Eisenhower's family feelings should take precedence over the Gehry's interpretation steam roller. President Eisenhower's amazing military and political career, the argument goes, is being diminished or ignored by Gehry interpretation - which on balance makes a great deal of sense.

[Phalanxman]

12:40 AM on 02/20/2012

Who annointed Gehry as the designer anyway?

[Bascoda]

02:41 AM on 02/20/2012

Agreed.