Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-ndmmz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-31T16:38:27.861Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Light and wood: An intimate and human space within the art libraries of Louis I. Kahn

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 December 2017

Kraig Binkowski
Kraig Binkowski*
Affiliation:
Chief Librarian, Reference Library and Archives, Yale Center for British Art, 1080 Chapel Street, New Haven, CT 06520-8280USA Email: kraig.binkowski@yale.edu
Get access

Abstract

In the libraries of the Yale Center for British Art and the Kimbell Art Museum, Louis I. Kahn created spaces and atmospheres that are particularly conducive to reading about and viewing art. In these rooms, natural light combines with sympathetic materials and forms a timeless dance with thought and contemplation. This paper focusses on the unique library carrels which form the physical bridge between light and dark, inside and outside, and constitute a microcosm of Kahn's thoughts about reading, libraries and museums.

Type
Research Article
Information
Art Libraries Journal , Volume 43 , Issue 1 , January 2018 , pp. 16 - 23
Copyright
Copyright © ARLIS/UK&Ireland 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Loud, Patricia Cummings, The Art Museums of Louis I. Kahn (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1989), 30 Google Scholar.

2. Park, Jin-Ho, Joo, Yongsun and Yang, Jae-Guen, “Cycloids in Louis I. Kahn's Kimbell Art Museum,” in Mathematical Intelligencer 29:2 (2007): 3 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3. Johnson, Nell E., Light is the Theme: Louis I. Kahn and the Kimbell Art Museum. (Fort Worth, TX: Kimbell Art Museum, 2012), 37 Google Scholar.

4. In Pursuit of Quality: the Kimbell Art Museum: An Illustrated History of the Art and Architecture (Fort Worth, TX: Kimbell Art Museum, 1987) , 69–70 Google Scholar.

5. Wiggins, Glenn E., The Library at Phillips Exeter Academy (New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1997), 11 Google Scholar.

6. Lobell, John, Between Silence and Light: Spirit and Architecture in the Architecture of Louis I. Kahn (Boston, MA: Shambhala, 2008)Google Scholar,

7. Mattern, Shannon, “Geometries of Reading, Light of Learning: Louis I. Kahn's Library at Phillips Exeter Academy,” in Nexus Network Journal 12:3 (2010): 401 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8. Kahn, Louis I., What Will Be Has Always Been: The Words of Louis I. Kahn (New York: Rizzoli, 1986), 179 Google Scholar.

9. Kahn 1986, 21.

10. Kahn, 1986, 179.

11. Johnson, Nell E., Light is the Theme: Louis I. Kahn and the Kimbell Art Museum. (Fort Worth, TX: Kimbell Art Museum, 2012), 18 Google Scholar.

12. Johnson, 2012, 16.