Dom Hans van der Laan
Following on Ray's post about Lina Bo Bardi, I thought it would be fun for us to continue posting pointers to some excellent architects that, for whatever reason, are not widely enough known by young designers.
In that spirit, have a look at the work of Dom Hans van der Laan, a Dutch Benedictine monk who taught and designed at his abbey in Vaals, (1930s through the 1980s). The Dom felt that you could approach the work of God through math, and that everything else was pretty much irrelevant. More than just minimalist, the work is radically unfinished--it feels a bit like Kahn with a better strain of mysticism; or Zumthor without the sensualist hocus-pocus.
You can find a description of some of van der Laan's math
here. Alternately, you can just enjoy the architecture in Richard Padovan's book "Dom Hans van der Laan: Modern Primitive". The image below is my favorite: has there ever been a more shameless image of our fantasy, architect-as-God? A disembodied brain and hands emerging from the darkness to plonk "essential forms" down on a table-top? My goodness...
* joshua, 4/05/2004 09:20:45 PM
