Paul Rudolph

Walker Guest House, at Sanibel Island, Florida, 1952.

      map of works

(b. Elkton, Kentucky 1918; d. 1997)

Paul Rudolph was born in Elkton, Kentucky in 1918. He graduated from Alabama Polytechnic Institute and studied under Walter Gropius at Harvard. After graduating in 1947, he entered into a five year partnership with Ralph Twitchell in Florida. When this partnership ended, Rudolph practiced by himself in Boston, New Haven and New York.

Rudolph acted as Chairman of the Department of Architecture at Yale University from 1958 to 1965. During this same period his office worked on an immense and diverse volume of work. Since 1952 he has worked on commissions in America, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and the Far East.

In his designs, Rudolph synthesizes the Modernist ideas of Le Corbusier, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Louis I. Kahn. He uses sweeping monolithic forms and intricate interior spaces to create a powerful sculptural quality.

Rudolph has displayed an interest in the problems of urban design and completed a succession of unexecuted projects. Preoccupied with the notion of an industrialized "plug-in" city, he has devised schemes in which mobile residence pods are plugged into a steel frame which connects to mechanical and electrical services.

Rudolph's work exhibits a highly personal and uncompromising style. Although his works qualify as part of the Modern Movement, he has questioned the validity of the movement's precepts in his later works.

References
Dennis Sharp. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Architects and Architecture. New York: Quatro Publishing, 1991. ISBN 0-8230-2539-X. NA40.I45. p130-131.

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