Living Architecture: An Analysis of The Kimbell Art Museum

Living Architecture Samantha Hubbard

PREFACE In a time of lifeless and emotionless architecture, Louis Kahn’s Kimbell Art Museum served as a breath of fresh air, reintroducing life and emotion to the art of architecture. The modernist architecture of the 19th-century was tainted by purely minimal and functional desires—demands for efficiency and quantity over naturality and quality. This building came out of time when architects were tasked with experimentation and the development of new materials and technologies. Unlike his colleagues, who were solely focused on form and efficiency, Kahn found ways to experiment with emotion and spirit as well.

The Kimbell Art Museum is a living piece of architecture, even in the absence of life. Its purpose is not only to house great works of art but also to serve as a canvas for natural light to express its beauty and life-giving presence. It is a building that transcends time and leaves lasting emotional impressions on those who experience it— leaving them unable to imagine a world in which the museum does not exist. It is a building with a mind, heart, and soul of its own. A building that feels, good feelings, but also as if Louis Kahn had nothing to do with its creation. Almost as if some other hand had naturally brought it into existence. It is a building of timeless monumentality.

Louis I. Kahn defined architecture as “the thoughtful making of space.”

He believed that, as an architect, it was his job to listen to, honor, and glorify the materials. Kahn often told his students, if you are ever stuck on a project, ask your materials for advice. “You say to brick, ‘What do you want, brick?’ and brick says to you, ‘I like an arch.’ And you say to brick, ‘Look, I want one, too, but arches are expensive, and I can use a concrete lintel.’ And then you say: ‘What do you think of that, brick?’ And brick says, ‘I like an arch.’.” 1 Kahn’s unique and unprecedented approach to architecture allowed him to unlock the secrets of materials and create timeless, living architecture.

The Kimbell Art Museum is an outstanding architectural achievement of the 20th century. Unlike other architects, Louis Kahn was a true artist.

Stubborn but free. Unbothered by profit and fame, Kahn was an architect with the sole purpose of creating architecture. In a time of forced and forgettable modernism, Kahn’s buildings gave architecture the thoughtful design, attention, and intention that it demands. He believed that the true test of architecture is its lasting emotional impact— its ability to make you feel like the world cannot exist without it. The Kimbell Art Museum is one of the best examples of his ability to optimize materials and bring them to life, and to let buildings become what they want to be, what they are meant to be.

Wainwright, Oliver. “Louis Kahn: the Brick Whisperer.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 26 Feb. 2013, www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2013/feb/26/louis-kahn-brick-whisperer-architect.

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Fig. 1. Concrete portico at the museum entrance. “Kimbell Art Museum by Louis Kahn in Texas.” ArchEyes, 21 Feb. 2020, archeyes.com/kimbell-art-museum-louis-kahn/.

Fig. 2. Interior vaulted gallery space. “Louis I. Kahn Building.” Kimbell Art Museum, www.kimbellart.org/art-architecture/architecture/kahn-building.

Surrounded by architects of lifeless glass boxes and steel towers, Louis Kahn provided a new outlook on architecture. Modernist architects concerned themselves with simplicity, minimalism, and functionalism.

Their buildings were rigid, unnatural, and forced— thoughtless products of a greedy society and useless without people to give them purpose. What is Philip Johnson’s Glass House without occupation, without decoration, without life? It’s a greenhouse— uncomfortable, unnatural, and useless without someone to maintain and make it inhabitable. Now take the Kimbell Art Museum. Strip away the art, the decoration, and humans.

Instead of a purposeless structure, there stands a work of art that still tells a story. A building that lives as long as the sun shines. Louis Kahn was able to see past the restrictions of functionalism and practicality and create natural spaces that served their purpose but would also preserve meaning without occupation. Buildings of monumental timelessness.

Instead of trying to control, manipulate, and mask materials like his colleagues, Kahn saw materials as his equals. He respected them, listened to them, understood their nature, and worked with them to create artful architecture that is full of life. He believed that it is the job of an architect to help a building grow and become itself, to listen to the materials, to ask them what they want to be, and to let them speak through you to achieve a form that is natural and eternal.

Kahn often began his projects by asking, “What does this building want to be?” 2 It seems insane, but he believed that by listening to the materials, the final form would feel as if he had nothing to do with it— as if the building naturally crystallized out of thin air.

Fig. 3. Louis Kahn’s natural lighting fixture in the interior vaulted gallery space. “Louis I. Kahn Building.” Kimbell Art Museum, www.kimbellart.org/art-architecture/architecture/ kahn-building.

“Louis I. Kahn Building.” Kimbell Art Museum, www.kimbellart.org/art-architecture/architecture/ kahn-building.

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The Kimbell Art Museum optimizes natural light. It may physically consist of concrete, travertine, and white oak, but its most formidable material is the sun. To Kahn, natural light was the great maker of space. He believed that if you take away natural light, there is nothing left. So, how can you call something architecture without the presence of natural light? He always said, “...the sun never knew how great it is until it struck the side of a building.” To him, the material is nothing without light, and light is nothing without the material. “Material is derived from light, it is spent in light. Material is that which casts a shadow, and the shadow belongs to the light.” His buildings not only serve a functional purpose, but they also serve as canvases to express the beauty of natural light. He created buildings that live even in the absence of life.3 Life is not static or perfect, so why should architecture be? The museum has as many moods as there are moments in time. These moods depend on the sun, and, as long as the building stands, there will never be a reoccurring mood. Kahn achieved this by optimizing not only the physical materials but also the negative spaces within. He embraced and honored the accidental and uncontrollable gaps that tell the story of how the building came to be. He believed in an architecture that dramatizes the process of building, whereas his colleagues, honored an architecture of pristine perfection and lack of character.5 Kahn believed, “It is much better not to cover anything up but to show the full nature and relationship of part to part, including the present condition of each which is a record of how it got that way.” 4 To Kahn, buildings needed to tell the story of their creation.

He exposed their imperfections and accentuated their marks and scars, letting their knuckles and joints act as ornamentation. He did not fill gaps and plug holes with plaster, mortar, or concrete. Instead, he filled them with natural light, with life.

“Louis I. Kahn Building.” Kimbell Art Museum, www.kimbellart.org/art-architecture/architecture/kahn-building.

4 Johnson, Nell E., and Eric M. Lee. Light Is the Theme Louis I. Kahn and the Kimbell Art Museum. Kimbell Art Museum, 2011.

5 Braudy, Susan. “The Architectural Metaphysic of Louis Kahn.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 15 Nov. 1970 3

Fig. 1. Louis Kahn standing at the front of the auditorium space. Johnson, Nell E., and Eric M. Lee. Light Is the Theme Louis I. Kahn and the Kimbell Art Museum. Kimbell Art Museum, 2011.

Fig. 2. Exterior monumentality of the Kimbell Art Museum. Johnson, Nell E., and Eric M. Lee. Light Is the Theme Louis I. Kahn and the Kimbell Art Museum. Kimbell Art Museum, 2011.

Concrete is a material that must be taken for whatever irregularities or accidents reveal themselves after curing.6 Perhaps Kahn identified with concrete. His face bore the scars of a horrific childhood accident. These scars may have been unflattering and hard to look at, but they told a story of his creation. Concrete is a material that begs to speak of its creation— a material that wants to be read like a book. Kahn used this material not only for its structural properties but also for its ability to tell time and age beautifully. The Kimbell Art Museum is an architecture that has the element of time. Not only was it outstanding in its time, but, almost 50 years on, it remains great. It is a building that feels with a spirit of its own.

Johnson, Nell E., and Eric M. Lee. Light Is the Theme Louis I. Kahn and the Kimbell Art Museum. Kimbell Art Museum, 2011.

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To Kahn, monumentality was entirely enigmatic.7 Most people think of mass, structure, and weight when faced with monumentality. They find it to be a characteristic or measure of physicality. Yes, Kahn was plagued with the desire to create powerful, primitive, massive, and monumental architecture, but his monumentality was rooted in architecture’s ability to transcend time. The Kimbell Art Museum is anything but physically monumental. With vaults of comfortable and safe proportions, this building does not overpower or loom over its occupants. However, this work of art is monumentally timeless. Monumentality is not something that can be intentionally achieved, it’s something that can only be obtained through eternal existence and lasting emotional influence. Anyone that visits this building finds it hard to imagine a world in which it does not exist. They are forever impacted by the poetic fluidity of the concrete vaults and the life of the natural light softly caressing the walls of the galleries.

Many modern buildings have no life of their own, no purpose without humans to use them— not Louis Kahn’s buildings. His architecture has life through light, purpose through experience, and a real sense of timelessness and transcendence. The Kimbell Art Museum is a living piece of architecture. It is not brought to life through inhabitation. Instead, natural light is what gives it life, and, as long as the sun continues to rise, the Kimbell Art Museum will remain a monumental piece of architecture.

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Kahn, Louis I., and Robert C. Twombly. Louis Kahn: Essential Texts. W.W. Norton, 2003.