O'Gorman, Juan

views updated May 21 2018

O'Gorman, Juan (1905–82). Mexican architect. He designed houses and schools, influenced by Le Corbusier, regarded as paradigms of Functionalism in the 1920s and 1930s. In the 1950s, he had a very public change of heart concerning International Modernism, and began to incorporate Pre-Columbian and vernacular motifs into his designs (e.g. the National Library, State University of Mexico, Mexico City (1952–3—covered with colourful mosaics), and the O'Gorman House II, Mexico City (1953–6—destroyed)).

Bibliography

Kalman (1994);
Jimenez (2001);
C. B. Smith (1967);
Jane Turner (1996)

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