HOW THAT BUILDING GOT TO LOOK THAT WAY Drawings from Michael Graves' Sketchbook The scientific tradition is everywhere," says architect Michael Graves, “and while some things should look machinelike, others should not. Houses and offices are two of them. " Whatever else people say about Graves’ remarkable building designs, he is never accused of creating structures that look like machines. Ancient temples perhaps, or buildings out of Flash Gordon serials — his work has been both praised and condemned. What Graves, who is also an interior designer, painter, and Princeton University professor, has done to create so much controversy among the professional establishment and people on the street alike, is to make buildings that challenge conventional ideas about what architecture should be. With his recent work, such as the Portland Building, now nearing completion, Graves flies in the face of 80 years of architectural tradition. He rejects, in his work and his writing, the stagnation of the Modernist movement, the once-vital architectural rebellion that resulted in the glass and steel boxes that have become fixtures of the contemporary skyline. Graves feels that by turning the ideal of industrial efficiency into an architectural aesthetic, the Modernists lost track of human beings, the value of poetry, and the role that myth and archetype play in our lives. In the following drawings from Michael Graves’ sketchbook, we’re given an opportunity to see this adventurous artist and architect’s ideas develop, as he works his way toward a design that will soon become a landmark of the Portland skyline. JB 4 Clinton St. Quarterly
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