This Worthy Exhibit Is at a Loss for Words

SAN DIEGO —  There are buildings that serve their users well without much in the way of imaginative design, and there are fantastically conceived buildings that don’t serve their users at all. The best buildings meet the needs of their inhabitants with bountiful imagination, elevating architecture to the level of art.

Recognizing the dearth of the latter, La Jolla architect Greg Friesen organized “Architecture as Art,” an exhibit showcasing the work of six architects he believes are successfully balancing emotional expression with rational problem-solving.

The show, which opened at the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library in La Jolla on July 2 and runs through Aug. 10, was conceived with good intentions and gives welcome public exposure to some work that doesn’t get the attention it deserves.

But the exhibit of drawings, models and photos also has serious shortcomings, including a lack of written explanations, a shortage of visual documentation on some projects, and the omission of at least one project that should have been included.

Friesen selected a group of architects who, on the surface, seem to have little in common. But a closer examination of their work indicates that they all satisfy his art/function criteria, with varying degrees of success.

Included are two out-of-towners and four San Diegans. The outsiders are Michigan-based Gunnar Birkerts and John Lautner, the Los Angeles-based disciple of Frank Lloyd Wright. Birkerts moved to the United States from Latvia in 1949 to work for Eero Saarinen and has since designed dozens of critically acclaimed structures, including the expansion of the UC San Diego library, now under construction. Lautner has never received much attention from design journals, but he has been turning out iconoclastic houses since he designed his own in 1940.

The San Diegans are Ken Kellogg and Wallace Cunningham, both followers of some of Wright’s principles of organic architecture; Charles Slert, who apprenticed with Los Angeles architect Tony Lumsden in the 1970s and is now hitting his stride with several large projects of his own, and Bill Lewis, who has designed several projects on his own since retiring in 1988 as a partner at Deems Lewis McKinley.

Among the locals, Slert’s work is the pleasant surprise, providing evidence of his growing international reputation and abilities. Included are two major projects he is designing for sites in the province of Valencia, Spain. Unfortunately, the exhibition provides no information on these projects and several others, other than drawings.

Too bad, because Slert spins captivating tales about them.

One Spanish project is a 325-acre “Eco Park” that Slert sees as a refreshing antidote to commercialized American theme parks. Slert’s plan for the coastal site is an energetic series of interlocking circles and inlets of water. Among eight exhibits will be a dolphin show that gives spectators a view of the animals interacting underwater, in their true natural habitat.

The second Spanish project is a headquarters for the tourism bureau in the city of Valencia, consisting of two 10-story triangular concrete pylons between which is suspended the wavy-surfaced, reflective glass body of the building. Slert intends the rippled glass as a symbolic reference to nearby Turia river, but such explanations aren’t given in the show.

On an international level, Birkerts is the best-known architect of the bunch. Unfortunately, he elected not to include drawings of his UCSD library expansion.

Like Slert, Birkerts has no single identifiable style. Instead, each project is carefully tailored to respond to sites and functional requirements.

Birkerts’ Latvian National Library (1990), for example, is long and narrow, with a roof that steps up gradually like a series of architectural mesas. His U.S. Embassy in Helsinki (1975) takes on bold, asymmetrically arranged geometric forms that call to mind the work of Charles Moore. And his Novoli Multi-Use Center (1988) consists of several diamond-shaped towers rising like periscopes from a low, meticulously faceted glass complex. Again, wall texts and detailed drawings would help explain this work.

As for Lewis, he was a partner at one of San Diego’s largest architectural firms for nearly 30 years and was the lead designer on projects that included Torrey Pines High School, the new Mormon Church in the Golden Triangle and the Motorola and Cordura office buildings in Scripps Ranch.

Since departing Deems Lewis, his work has taken a more intimate, organic turn. This exhibit shows three new buildings of laminated wood beams and glass. Lewis is working with strong ideas, but his designs look dated. The simple, rectilinear forms reveal his allegiance to the 1950s post-and-beam style taught at USC (he graduated in 1954) and realized in many of the experimental 1940s and ‘50s “Case Study” houses built in Los Angeles.

Lautner, who turns 80 on Tuesday, is gearing up for major shows of his work in Vienna this October and at Harvard in November, so many of his drawings and photos were unavailable.

Still, the handful of large photos included here make a convincing argument that he is one of the most original modern California architects.

The Elrod House in Palm Springs (1968) combines glass panels with a graceful concrete skeleton to provide its inhabitants with abundant natural light, views and the most exciting of architectural spaces.

Kellogg and Cunningham are among the most imaginative of local architects. Both often work with forms inspired by nature. Cunningham’s models alone are works of art, and give a good sense of his design talents. Kellogg’s latest buildings--a wedding chapel in Japan and a house under construction in Joshua Tree--seem like the skeletons of giant prehistoric creatures.

Both architects meet Friesen’s requirement for imagination combined with livability, with a few qualifications. Kellogg’s houses, for example, have been known to cost as much as $600 per square foot ($150 to $200 is the cost of high-end, standard residential construction in San Diego), and some of Cunningham’s houses have reportedly been plagued by leaky roofs.

But then, even Frank Lloyd Wright was notorious for his leaky buildings.

“Architecture as Art” is open to the public Tuesdays through Sundays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Except for Birkerts and Lautner, the architects will each give a Friday slide show and lecture at 7:30 p.m., starting with Cunningham on July 19.