Steven Holl Biography
American architect and theoretician Steven Holl (1947) is among the best-known and most influential architects of the modern age thanks to his projects developed mainly in New York and in the Orient (China, Japan, South Korea).
After finishing from Seattle University and studying in London and Rome, he opened Steven Holl Architects in New York in 1976.
In his huge production Holl synthesises "philosophical thinking and design methodologies" in research which is at the exact same time "experience and criticism" (Heck-Chiarone).
In his essential essay Anchoring (1989 ), Holl specifies the "dialectic relationships" between buildings and places: clear examples include his New York projects of the eighties, which brought his studio popularity and acknowledgment.
His Pool House in New York (1981) and in the Museum of Modern Art Apartment (1986) expose the building and constructions' historical and geographic aspects; his showroom for the Pace Collection (1986) plainly exposes the poetics of the De Stjil motion. His workplaces for D.E. Shaw & Co (1992) and high impact façade for the Storefront for Art and Architecture (1993) are also deserving of note.
His projects in Europe include the highly speculative Kiasma Contemporary Art Museum in Helsinki.
Holl has actually developed lots of crucial single-family houses (Berkowitz-Odgis House, Stretto House) and real estate complexes, including numerous in Japan: the Void Space in Fukuoka (1991 ), in which Holl underlines the "space" of Buddhist cosmology, and the 190 Makuhari Bay systems in Chiba (1996 ).
His current tasks in China have actually had a terrific social impact: the Culture and Art Center in Qingdao City and The Nelson Atkins Museum of Art Ecocity Ecology-Planning Museums in the country's very first eco-friendly city (Tianjin Eco City).