Quote

The present is filled with flotsam and irony and chaos and disorder in all arenas, political and sociological. I think we have to work in the present even if it's awkward, even if it's not necessarily good, even if we don't understand it ourselves. You only find out 10, maybe 20 years later what was going on.

Frank Gehry

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Frank Gehry
Age: 95
Born: 1929
Born: February 28
Architect
Designer
Furniture Designer
Sculptor
City of Toronto
Frank Owen Gehry
Frank O. Gehry
Ephraim Owen Goldberg
Frank Goldberg
Frank Owen Goldberg
Work
Filled
Sociological
Years
Present
Arena
Good
Maybe
Awkward
Think
Understand
Disorder
Thinking
Political
Irony
Find
Chaos
Even
Necessarily
Flotsam
Going
Later
Arenas

More quotes by Frank Gehry

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I work from the inside out.
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My father was an urchin that lived in Hell's Kitchen. He was part of a family of nine. I mean, there were times that were better and worse, but mostly, by the time we got to L.A., they'd lost whatever they had. And it was a sad time. And both he and I became truck drivers for different companies.
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You never build the perfect building. Only Allah is perfect. Life is such. You make decisions on conclusions, then some guy invents something else and the world changes. That's comforting. There's no one way to use museums, no one way to do art. That also means there is no one way to build museums.
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I have always thought that L.A. is a motor city that developed linear downtowns.
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Democracy is a problem and we don't want to get rid of it.
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The idealism [in architecture] is in the formal arrangement, the relationship to the city, the use of materials that are available to me. That's where I say our powers are limited.
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When people condemn me for designing iconic buildings in cities and not having an idea what a city is, they haven't done their homework. I started in urban design and city planning. It's just that when I got out of school there wasn't much of a market for that. There still isn't.
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One of my greatest influences is the Italian artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini.
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Art is about people. I think the discussion about whether architecture is art or not is lamebrain.
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I'm of two minds about doing any interviews these days. It seems a lot of the world is out to play gotcha with me. I guess they always go after people these days. It's sport.
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In Tokyo, London or Los Angeles people go into McDonald's and the restaurants are identical and people are comfortable. It's unthreatening.
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We live and work in boxes. People don't even notice that.
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I think my best skill as an architect is the achievement of hand-to-eye coordination. I am able to transfer a sketch into a model into the building.
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You have to be optimistic. I still have doubts and conflicts, but the bottom line is, I believe in the future.
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An architect is given a program, budget, place, and schedule. Sometimes the end product rises to art - or at least people call it that.
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Chicago's one of the rare places where architecture is more visible.
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The back of Saint Peter's is one of the finest pieces of architecture I've ever seen.
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That's what you have to find in architecture. You have to find your signature. When you find it, you're the only expert on it. People can say they like it or don't like it. They can argue about it, but it's yours.
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You can look anywhere and find inspiration.
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A well-designed home has to be very comfortable. I can't stand the aesthetes, the minimal thing. I can't live that way. My home has to be filled with stuff - mostly paintings, sculpture, my fish lamps, cardboard furniture, lots of books.
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