Henry N. Cobb, Peter Eisenman, and Rafael Moneo, “How Will Architecture Be Conceived?”

Date: 

Tuesday, April 17, 2018, 6:30pm to 8:00pm

Location: 

Harvard Graduate School of Design, Gund Hall, Piper Auditorium, Room 105, 48 Quincy St., Cambridge

Please join us for an evening with Rafael Moneo, Henry N. Cobb, and Peter Eisenman as they investigate the question, “How will architecture be conceived?” Eachparticipant will give brief presentations after which they will engage in a discussion.

Henry N. Cobb (AB '47, MArch ’49) was among three University alumni to receive the Harvard Medal during the 2017 commencement exercises. The award, which recognizes extraordinary service to the University, was presented to honorees by Harvard University President Drew Gilpin Faust at the Annual Meeting of the Harvard Alumni Association.

Cobb is the first Harvard Graduate School of Design alumnus to receive the Harvard Medal in 30 years, and only the second GSD alumnus to be honored with the award.

Cobb has demonstrated a strong commitment to Harvard as an alumnus, teacher, administrator, and architect. During his term as president of the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD) Association from 1969 to 1971, he also served as an appointed director for the HAA, representing the GSD, and as a member of the GSD visiting committee. From 1980 to 1985, he was studio professor of architecture and urban design and chair of the Department of Architecture, where he continues to teach occasionally as a visiting lecturer and design critic. Currently, he serves as an honorary member of the GSD Campaign Committee.

Cobb designed the Harvard Center for Government and International Studies (CGIS), completed in 2005 and comprising two buildings flanking Cambridge Street; the renovation of several houses on Sumner Road; and the rehabilitation of an important mid-block open space shared by the University and the adjoining residential community. Dean Mohsen Mostafavi described the CGIS project as “representative of Harry’s contributions to the University and the Harvard community, and of his vision as an architect.”

As a founding partner of Pei Cobb Freed & Partners LLP, Cobb has contributed to the work of his firm since its formation in 1955. His practice has embraced a wide variety of building types across North America and around the world, including 200 Clarendon St. (formerly the John Hancock Tower), the John Joseph Moakley U.S. Courthouse in Boston, and the Portland Museum of Art in Maine. His current projects include the Four Seasons Private Residences Boston and the International African American Museum in Charleston, S.C.

Born and raised in Boston, Cobb and his wife, Joan Spaulding Cobb, live in New York and are the parents of three daughters, two of whom are graduates of Harvard College. Joan Cobb’s father, Francis T. Spaulding, was dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education from 1940 to 1945.

Rafael Moneo is the first Josep Lluís Sert Professor of Architecture. He was chair of the Department of Architecture from 1985 until 1990 and teaches the lecture courses On Contemporary Architecture and Design Theories in Architecture.

Before joining the Graduate School of Design, Moneo was a fellow at the Spanish Academy in Rome and taught in Barcelona and Madrid. His scholarly work includes numerous articles and lectures published throughout the world. His projects include the Bankinter Building in Madrid, the Museum of Roman Art in Mérida, the L'Illa building in Barcelona, the Pilar and Joan Miró Museum in Palma de Mallorca, the “Kursaal” Auditorium and Congess Center in San Sebastián, the extension of the Prado Museum in Madrid, as well as the Davis Art Museum at Wellesley College, the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, and the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles. Moneo has been awarded the Gold Medal by the Spanish government, the Arnold W. Brunner Memorial Prize by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Prince of Viana Prize (Spain), the Swedish Schock Price for the Visual Arts and the Royal Institute of British Architects Gold Medal. In 1996, he received the UIA Gold Medal and the Pritzker Prize.

Peter Eisenman is an internationally recognized architect and educator whose award-winning large-scale housing and urban design projects, innovative facilities for educational institutions, and series of inventive private houses attest to a career of excellence in design.

Prior to establishing a full-time architectural practice in 1980, Mr. Eisenman worked as an independent architect, educator, and theorist. In 1967, he founded the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies (IAUS), an international think tank for architecture in New York, and served as its director until 1982.

Mr. Eisenman is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Among other awards, in 2001 he received the Medal of Honor from the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, and the Smithsonian Institution’s 2001 Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award in Architecture. He was awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 2004 Venice Architecture Biennale. Popular Science magazine named Mr. Eisenman one of the top five innovators of 2006 for the University of Phoenix Stadium for the Arizona Cardinals. In May 2010 Mr. Eisenman was honored with the Wolf Foundation Prize in the Arts, awarded in Jerusaleum.

Currently the Charles Gwathmey Professor in Practice at the Yale School of Architecture, Mr. Eisenman’s academic career also includes teaching at Cambridge, Princeton, Harvard, and Ohio State universities. Previously he was the Irwin S. Chanin Distinguished Professor of Architecture at The Cooper Union, in New York City. He is also an author, whose most recent books include: Written Into the Void: Selected Writings, 1990-2004 (Yale University Press, 2007) and Ten Canonical Buildings, 1950-2000 (Rizzoli, 2008), which examines in depth buildings by ten different architects.

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