Notes from the Archive: James Frazer Stirling, Architect and Teacher explored the career of James Frazer Stirling (1924–1992) as revealed through the James Stirling/Michael Wilford fonds of the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA), Montréal. A Pritzker Prize laureate and the William B. and Charlotte Shepherd Davenport Visiting Professor of Design at the Yale School of Architecture from 1966 to 1984, Stirling earned international renown through such prominent, innovative—and frequently controversial—projects as the University of Leicester Engineering Building (1959–63); the History Faculty Building at the University of Cambridge (1964–67); the Neue Staatsgalerie Stuttgart (1977–84); the Clore Gallery at Tate Britain (1984); and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum at Harvard University (1979–84).
This exhibition brought together architectural drawings, models, and photographs from the archives of the CCA, revealing both the range of Stirling’s approach to architectural languages and the fundamental importance of British architectural antecedents to his work. Through the extensive evidence of his design process, the exhibition demonstrated Stirling’s understanding of architecture in a formal and volumetric sense rather than as stylistic formulae. The final section of the exhibition focused on key aspects of Stirling as teacher, using audio recordings and lecture notes to evoke Stirling’s consistent explanation of a project as a tight formal response to the client’s brief; the continuous exploration of themes from the critique of modernist rationalism; and the acknowledgement of a crisis following the death of the heroes of the Modern movement.
Venues
Yale Center for British Art: October 14, 2010–January 2, 2011
Tate Britain, London: April 5–August 31, 2011
Staatsgalerie Stuttgart: October 1, 2011–January 15, 2012
Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal: May 16–October 14, 2012
View works from the collection included in this exhibition here.
Credits
The exhibition was jointly organized by the Center and the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal, and curated by Anthony Vidler, Dean and Professor of The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture at The Cooper Union. The organizing curator at the Center was Eleanor Hughes, Associate Curator and Head of Exhibitions and Publications.
An associated exhibition, An Architect’s Legacy: James Frazer Stirling’s Students at Yale, 1959–1983, was on view from October 13, 2010, through January 28, 2011, at the Yale School of Architecture. It was organized by the Yale School of Architecture and curated by Emmanuel Petit, Associate Professor, Yale School of Architecture.
Top image
Notes from the Archive: James Frazer Stirling, Architect and Teacher installation, Yale Center for British Art, photo by Richard Caspole
Extended reading
James Frazer Stirling: Notes from the Archive
Written by Anthony Vidler