Cohen, Jean-Louis 1949-

views updated

Cohen, Jean-Louis 1949-

PERSONAL:

Born July 20, 1949.

ADDRESSES:

Office—James B. Duke House, 1 E. 78th St., New York, NY 10075.

CAREER:

Historian, educator, writer, and educator. French Institute of Architecture, Paris, France, appointed director 1998; New York University Institute of Fine Arts, New York, NY, Sheldon H. Solow Professor in the History of Architecture.

MEMBER:

Accademia di San Luca, Russian Academy of Architecture.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (France); Grand Prix of the Academie d'Architecture, Paris, 1996, for the best architectural book.

WRITINGS:

(Collaborator, with François Ascher and Jean Giard) Demain, la ville? Urbanisme et politique, Editions sociales (Paris, France), 1975.

(With J.-M. Boucheret and R. Joly) Les transformations de l'habitat rural: "on a cru bien faire," G.A.A. (Paris, France), 1976.

(Editor, with Alexei Gutnov) L'Éspace urbain en URSS, 1917-1978: [exposition], Centre National D'art et De Culture Georges Pompidou, Centre De Création Industrielle, du 14 Juin Au 18 Septembre 1978: Catalogue, Centre national d'art et de culture Georges Pompidou (Paris, France), 1978.

(With Marco De Michelis and Manfredo Tafuri) URSS, 1917-1978: La ville, l'architecture = URSS, 1917-1978: La cittá, l'architettura, L'Équerre (Paris, France), 1979.

(Editor, with Odile Seyler and Bruno Fortier) Architecture et politiques Sociales 1900-1940: Les principes architecturaux à l'âge du réformisme, Institut Français d'architecture (Paris, France), 1981.

(Contributor) Eugene Henard, Études sur les transformations de Paris, et autres écrits sur l'urbanisme, L'Équerre (Paris, France), 1982.

La recherche en architecture: un bilan international: Actes du colloque "rencontres, recherche, architecture," Marseille, Nancy, Nantes, Paris, 12-13-14 Juin 1984, Parentheses (Marseille, France), 1986.

Le Corbusier et la mystique de l'URSS: Théories et projets pour Moscou, 1928-1936, Pierre Mardaga Éditeur (Brussels, Belgium), 1987.

(Editor, with Bruno Fortier) Paris: La ville et ses projets: Ouvrage publié à l'occasion de l'exposition permanente "Paris, la ville et ses projets", Inaugurée le 13 Décembre 1988 au pavillon de l'arsenal = A City in the Making, Editions Babylone: Pavillon de l'arsenal: Diffusion (Paris, France), 1988.

(With André Lortie) Des fortifs au périf: Paris, les seuils de la ville, Picard Éditeur: Editions du pavillon de l'arsenal (Paris, France), 1991.

Le Corbusier and the Mystique of the USSR: Theories and Projects for Moscow, 1928-1936, translated by Kenneth Hylton, Princeton University Press (Princeton, N.J.), 1992.

(Editor, with H. Damisch) Américanisme et Modernité: L'Idéal Américain Dans L'Architecture, EHESS: Flammarion (Paris, France), 1993.

Mies Van Der Rohe, Hazan (Paris, France), 1994, translation by Maggie Rosengarten published as Mies Van Der Rohe, Spon (New York, NY), 1996, revised and expanded edition published as Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe, Birkhauser (Boston, MA), 2007.

André Lurçat: 1894-1970: Autocritique d'un moderne, Mardaga (Liege, France), 1995.

Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge, 1893-1960, preface by Hubert Damisch, Flammarion (Paris, France), 1995.

(Author of introduction) Russian Modernism: The Collections of the Getty Research Institute for the History of Art and the Humanities, I, compiled and annotated by David Woodruff and Ljiljana Grubisic, Getty Research Institute for the History of Art and the Humanities (Santa Monica, CA), 1997.

(Editor) Les Années 30: L'Architecture et les arts de l'éspace entre industrie et nostalgie, Editions du Patrimoine (Paris, France), 1997.

(With Monique Eleb) Casablanca: Mythes et figures d'une aventure urbaine, Hazan (Paris, France), 1998.

(With Monique Eleb) Paris Architecture, 1900-2000, photographs by Antonio Martinelli, Éditions Norma (Paris, France), 2000.

(With Monique Eleb) Une cité à Chaillot: Avantpremière: La cité de l'architecture et du patrimoine, with the collaboration of Renata Cortinovis, Éditions de l'Imprimeur (Besançon, France), 2001.

(With Monique Eleb) Casablanca: Colonial Myths and Architectural Ventures, Monacelli Press (New York, NY), 2002.

(Editor, with Joseph Abram and Guy Lambert) Encyclopédie Perret, Monum (Paris, France), 2002.

(Editor, with Nabila Oulebsir and Youcef Kanoun) Alger: Paysage urbain et architectures, 1800-2000, contemporary photographs by Dominique Delaunay, Imprimeur (Paris, France), 2003.

Le Corbusier, 1887-1965: The Lyricism of Architecture in the Machine Age, Taschen (Los Angeles, CA), 2004.

Le Corbusier, La planète comme Chantier, Zoé (Paris, France), 2005.

Urban Structures: Yves Lion, Birkhauser-Publishers for Architecture (Boston, MA), 2005.

Above Paris: The Aerial Survey of Roger Henrard, Princeton Architectural Press (New York, N.Y.), 2006.

Le tour de Paris: Les promenades aériennes de Roger Henrard, D. Carré: Paris musées (Paris, France), 2006.

(Editor, with G. Martin Moeller, Jr.), Liquid Stone: New Architecture in Concrete, Princeton Architectural Press (New York, NY), 2006.

(Editor, with G. Martin Moeller) Architectures du Béton: Nouvelles Vagues, Nouvelles Recherches, Moniteur (Paris, France), 2006.

(Author of introduction), Le Corbusier, Toward an Architecture, translated by John Goodman, Getty Research Institute (Los Angeles, CA), 2007.

Contributor to books, including The Art of Architecture Exhibitions, NAI Publishers (Rotterdam, Netherlands), 2001; Frank Gehry, Architect, Guggenheim, 2001; The Lost Vanguard: Russian Modernist Architecture 1922-1932, by Richard Pare, Monacelli Press (New York, NY), 2007.

SIDELIGHTS:

Jean-Louis Cohen is an architectural historian whose primary interests include nineteenth- and twentieth-century architecture and urbanism in Germany, France, Italy, Russia and North America; contemporary issues in architecture; and town planning and landscape design. In his book Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge, 1893-1960, Cohen focuses on urbanization in the twentieth century by looking at the influences of American and European architects on each other, starting with Chicago's 1893 World's Columbian Exposition and on through to the 1960s. The author pays special attention to how the work of American architects, such as Frank Lloyd Wright and Buckminster Fuller, led many European architects to feel that they had to come to America to view the work of these and other architects as their work pertained to living in large cities. Kent Anderson wrote in School Arts that Scenes of the World to Come is a "literary montage of text, photographs, drawings, and other artworks."

Paris Architecture, 1900-2000, written by Cohen and sociologist Monique Eleb, focuses on thirty-three buildings in Paris and its interior suburbs. The authors chose the buildings to examine by the buildings' relationships to important points in the evolution of French architectural theory. Writing in Houses, Julie Oliver noted that Paris Architecture, 1900-2000 is appropriate both for "architects and general readers" as well as "anyone planning to visit Paris."

Cohen collaborated with Eleb again to write Casablanca: Colonial Myths and Architectural Ventures. The authors provide a history of architecture in the city of Casablanca from 1900 to the 1960s, with a focus on how the architecture of this period combined European and native cultures. Relating the architecture and city planning with social conditions, Cohen and Eleb note how French Colonial repression was somewhat offset by enlightened urban planning that tried to create decent living conditions for a wide range of classes within the local social stratum. In addition to providing excerpts from numerous documents and interviews, the authors include photographs and reproductions of plans. David Soltesz, writing in the Library Journal, called Casablanca "impressively researched" and "a feast for serious students of North Africa, urban planning and trends in 20th-century architecture."

Cohen is also a contributor to Frank Gehry, Architect, an exhibition catalog created for a retrospective of Gehry's architectural accomplishments held at the Guggenheim Museum in New York. "His highly sculptural buildings develop from lively, fluid sketches and study models that often include crumpled paper," noted Paul Glassman in the Library Journal. Cohen's essay specifically examines Gehry's urban work.

In Liquid Stone: New Architecture in Concrete, Cohen and coeditor G. Martin Moeller, Jr., present a collection of case studies by various scholars looking at how the use of concrete in architecture—both in its technical application and its aesthetics—has changed since concrete was first incorporated by the ancient Roman architects. Most of the book focuses on the modern use of concrete in buildings such as the Torre Agbar in Barcelona, the National Theatre of Okinawa, and the Millau Viaduct in Southern France. Contributors also examine the different types of surfaces that have been created using concrete, and the future of concrete as a material for architectural design. "This is a book with a great deal of novel and interesting information on concrete, and even specialists in the field are certain to find something that is new," wrote Henry Jacob Cowan in the Architectural Science Review. The book includes sketches, plans, diagrams, and photographs. An Internet Bookwatch contributor commented that Liquid Stone provides "insights on concrete production, design, and art." Writing in the Library Journal, Paul Glassman called the book "a tribute to concrete."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Historical Review, April, 1993, William C. Brumfield, review of Le Corbusier and theMystique of the USSR: Theories and Projects for Moscow, 1928-1936, p. 535.

American Studies International, April, 1996, Richard Longstreth, review of Scenes of the World to Come: European Architecture and the American Challenge, 1893-1960, p. 76.

Architects' Journal, November 23, 1995, Brian Edwards, review of Scenes of the World to Come, p. 61.

Architectural Record, August, 2007, William Morgan, review of Liquid Stone: New Architecture in Concrete, p. 60.

Architectural Review, August, 1992, Richard Padovan, review of Le Corbusier and the Mystique of the USSR, p. 7.

Architectural Science Review, September, 2007, Henry Jacob Cowan, "The Architectural Characteristics of Concrete," review of Liquid Stone, p. 295.

Architecture, November, 1998, "Jean-Louis Cohen," p. 59.

Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, December, 2001, C.W. Westfall, review of Frank Gehry, Architect, p. 676; February, 2007, T. Sexton, review of Above Paris: The Aerial Survey of Roger Henrard, p. 978.

Houses, November, 2001, Julie Oliver, review of Paris Architecture, 1900-2000, p. 70; December 2006, Katelin Butler, review of Liquid Stone, p. 120.

Internet Bookwatch, November, 2006, review of Liquid Stone.

Library Journal, September 1, 2001, Paul Glassman, review of Frank Gehry, Architect, p. 172; May 1, 2003, David Soltesz, review of Casablanca: Colonial Myths and Architectural Ventures, p. 108; November 1, 2006, Paul Glassman, review of Liquid Stone, p. 75.

New Statesman & Society, November 3, 1995, review of Scenes of the World to Come, p. 34.

School Arts, May-June, 1997, Kent Anderson, review of Scenes of the World to Come, p. 42.

Times Literary Supplement, September 18, 1992, Richard Sennett, review of Le Corbusier and the Mystique of the USSR, p. 3.

Virginia Quarterly Review, summer, 1992, review of Le Corbusier and the Mystique of the USSR, p. 80.