Jeffrey Kipnis

Jeffrey Kipnis's writing, thinking, and teaching casts architecture as both an intellectual discourse and a lived, affective experience. His essays on contemporary architects are less about making critical judgments than about explication, exegesis, and provocation. In these eleven essays, written between 1990 and 2008, he considers projects, concepts, and buildings by some of the most recognized architects working today, with special attention to the productions of affect. He explores "intuition" in the work of Morphosis, "exhilaration" in Coop Himmelb(l)au, "freedom" in the work of Rem Koolhaas and OMA, "magic" in Steven Holl's buildings, and "anxiety" in Rafael Moneo's writing about contemporary architecture. Kipnis's deft integration of art, critical theory, philosophy, pop culture, classical music, and science -- what the volume's editor Alexander Maymind calls "ancillary material" -- into a rigorous architectural theory and criticism makes A Question of Qualities an exemplar of a new way to write about architecture. It is also a distinct pleasure to read. Kipnis transcends the fractious intellectual climate in architecture, stepping outside the boundaries mandated by the vast specialized criteria that the discipline now claims to address. The essays in this volume demonstrate a style of writing that is not so much about architecture as it is an affect of architecture itself.

Essays in Architecture

A Question of Qualities

Would you dash headlong into deadly danger to find a possibly non-existent mystical tome at the direction of an incarcerated lunatic, to save a man you saw die, just because the lunatic is your boyfriend? Well, if you're Miss Phoebe Katonic, and the lunatic is Dano K. Dath, and you'll have a heroic squirrel at your side and a robot army at your command, of course you'll go! After all, there were reasons that you were in the Squirrel's Nest Home yourself a couple of years ago. If you're not already asking yourself, "Now, who is this daft squirrel canoe, and why would it want apoplectic cramps?", you soon will be! Join Lightning Squirrel and Phoebe in the world spanning, action packed sequel to The Blawnox Unpleasantness. Lightning Squirrel and Phoebe leave a trail of mayhem as they battle sinister foes across the globe in hopes of saving the lost librarian, Rudolph Barter, as Dano himself struggles to unpuzzle a terrible peril awaiting the planet. And join Dr. Alin Sicoh as he delves into The Adventures of Lightning Squirrel, the allegedly autobiographical tale penned by Dano, to unravel the mysteries that led to Dano's present and Phoebe's former psychoses.

The Adventures of Lightning Squirrel

Cosmic Redshifted Anthrocentric Worms

A new paradigm for the twenty-first-century museum from renowned architect Steven Holl.

Steven Holl/The Nelson-Atkins Museum Expansion

Stone and Feather

John Whiteman

Richard Burdett

Strategies in Architectural Thinking

Bernard Tschumi

Todd Gannon

Laurie A. Gunzelman

"Including an exhaustive presentation of sketches, models, computer renderings, working drawings, and photographs of the construction process and the finished work, this book documents the project at a level of detail that allows complete and careful study from its conception to its completion. This in-depth graphic presentation is accompanied by commentaries from the architect, as well as series editors Jeffery Kipnis and Todd Gannon, that further explore both the cultural and technical significance of this important building."--BOOK JACKET.

Jeffrey Kipnis

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