a:33:{s:9:"weblog_id";s:2:"10";s:8:"entry_id";s:3:"387";s:6:"sticky";s:1:"n";s:14:"allow_comments";s:1:"n";s:16:"allow_trackbacks";s:1:"n";s:10:"entry_date";s:19:"2009-01-14 11:09 PM";s:15:"expiration_date";s:19:"2009-02-28  9:32 PM";s:23:"comment_expiration_date";s:0:"";s:8:"category";a:1:{i:0;s:2:"35";}s:9:"author_id";s:1:"2";s:10:"new_weblog";s:2:"10";s:6:"status";s:4:"open";s:14:"trackback_urls";s:0:"";s:18:"versioning_enabled";s:1:"y";s:5:"title";s:49:"On the Riverfront: St. Louis and the Gateway Arch";s:9:"url_title";s:47:"on_the_riverfront_st_louis_and_the_gateway_arch";s:6:"submit";s:6:"Update";s:11:"field_id_58";s:50:"On the Riverfront: St. Louis and the Gateway Arch ";s:11:"field_ft_58";s:4:"none";s:11:"field_id_62";s:221:"From Jan. 30 to March 9 the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University in St. Louis will explore that history with an exhibition and symposium titled On the Riverfront: St. Louis and The Gateway Arch.";s:11:"field_ft_62";s:4:"none";s:11:"field_id_59";s:45:"Gateway Arch, Washington University, Saarinen";s:11:"field_ft_59";s:4:"none";s:11:"field_id_63";s:74:" Steinberg Hall, near the intersection of Skinker and Forsyth boulevards. ";s:11:"field_ft_63";s:4:"none";s:11:"field_id_57";s:19:"2009-01-30 10:09 PM";s:15:"field_offset_57";s:1:"y";s:11:"field_id_56";s:19:"2009-03-09 10:09 PM";s:15:"field_offset_56";s:1:"y";s:11:"field_id_55";s:122:"Opening reception 7 to 9 p.m. Friday, Jan. 30; on view through March 9.  Symposium:  9 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 31";s:11:"field_ft_55";s:4:"none";s:11:"field_id_60";s:9849:"<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\"><span style=\"font-size: medium;\"><span class=\"black\"><strong><em></em></strong></span> </span><em><span class=\"black\">Exhibition and symposium presented by Sam Fox School in conjunction with Eero Saarinen retrospective</span></em> <br /> <img height=\"4\" src=\"http://news-info.wustl.edu/images/spacer.gif\" width=\"5\" /><br /></span><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">The Jefferson National Expansion Memorial &mdash; popularly known as the St.
Louis Gateway Arch &mdash; is the tallest monument in the United States and
an icon of modern architecture, its great stainless steel arc embodying
strength, elegance and simplicity. Yet creation of the Arch was
anything but simple. Indeed, it is a story of frequent uncertainty and
sometime bitter controversy, as planning, design and construction
stretched across more than three decades. </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">From Jan. 30 to March 9
the Sam Fox School of Design &amp; Visual Arts at Washington University
in St. Louis will explore that history with an exhibition and symposium
titled <em><strong>On the Riverfront: St. Louis and The Gateway Arch. </strong></em>Curated by <strong>Peter MacKeith</strong>, associate dean of the Sam Fox School and associate professor of architecture; and by<strong> Eric Mumford</strong>, associate professor of architecture,<em> On the Riverfront</em> will profile the people, events and conditions that culminated in the
1947-48 competition from which Eero Saarinen\'s design was chosen, as
well as the monument\'s subsequent construction and its place in
American architecture. </span></p>
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<td align=\"left\"><a href=\"http://news-info.wustl.edu/asset/page/normal/7830.html\"><img align=\"left\" alt=\"First Stage Competition entry, 1947\" border=\"0\" height=\"153\" hspace=\"0\" id=\"Saarinen 11\" src=\"http://news-info.wustl.edu/pub/libs/images/usr/7830.jpg\" title=\"First Stage Competition entry, 1947\" vspace=\"0\" width=\"250\" /></a></td>
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<h4><span class=\"photocaption\">Eero Saarinen, with
J. Henderson Barr (renderer), Dan Kiley (landscape architect),
Alexander Hayden Girard, and Lilly Swann Saarinen. Detail from
Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, First Stage Competition entry,
1947. Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Archives, National Park
Service.</span></h4>
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<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">\"The significance of the
Gateway Arch in Saarinen\'s career, as well as in the development of St.
Louis\' post-war identity, is unquestionable,\" says MacKeith, who also
serves as St. Louis coordinator for <em><a href=\"http://news-info.wustl.edu/news/page/normal/12971.html\"><span class=\"red\" title=\"Go to Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future.\">Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future.</span></a></em> (That exhibition &mdash; the first major museum retrospective dedicated to
the architect &mdash; will be on view at the university\'s Mildred Lane Kemper
Art Museum Jan. 30 to April 27.) </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">\"There is a degree of
attention given to the Arch within the retrospective,\" MacKeith
explains. \"But the Arch is such an icon of St. Louis, condensing
histories of place and purpose and civic pride, that we felt this would
be a good opportunity to explore the broad civic vision that ultimately
brought the Arch into being. It is a not a story of which people are
really aware.\" </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\"><em>On the Riverfront</em> begins with a condensed history of the St. Louis region, from the time
of the Cahokia Indians, though Spanish settlement, the Louisiana
Purchase and the Lewis &amp; Clark expedition, to statehood and
industrialization. Yet by the early 20th century much of the riverfront
had fallen into disrepair and local leaders were beginning to explore
strategies for revitalization. </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">Chief among these was
Luther Ely Smith, a St. Louis lawyer now known as \"the father of the
Jefferson National Expansion Memorial.\" Smith first conceived the idea
of constructing a memorial on the banks of the Mississippi in 1933 and
the following year, with the help of Mayor Bernard Dickmann, co-founded
the nonprofit Jefferson National Expansion Memorial (JNEM) Association
to enlist Federal support. In 1935 Franklin Roosevelt designated the
proposed 90-acre site as a national park and the city, having passed a
bond proposal and armed with the power of eminent domain, began
leveling 40 blocks in preparation for a national architecture
competition. </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">The site was cleared by
1942 but the JNEM Competition was delayed by the onset of World War II.
Yet when it did begin, in 1947, the competition proved a massive
success, drawing 176 entries &mdash; many of which will be on view &mdash; by
important St. Louis figures such as Harris Armstrong, Charles Eames and
Gyo Obata, as well as by international modernists such as Louis Kahn,
Isamu Noguchi and Eliel Saarinen, Eero\'s father. (Famously, when jurors
announced the five finalists, a telegram was sent to \"E. Saarinen,\" and
for a few hours the family mistakenly assumed that Eliel had advanced.) </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">\"These are all visions of
what the riverfront could have looked like if any other entry had been
chosen,\" MacKeith points out. \"In many ways they provide a snapshot of
post-war architectural concerns. The issue of the day was what we now
call the \'new monumentality.\' How do you make architecture after the
Second World War? How does one memorialize anything after the
holocaust, or in the shadow of nuclear warfare?\" </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">The final section
highlights Eero Saarinen\'s winning design, a gracefully inverted
catenary arch &mdash; calculated with the help of structural engineer
Hannskarl Bandel &mdash; that bears little resemblance to pre-war memorials.
Also on view are a number of Saarinen\'s subsequent drawings and models,
which chart subtle changes and modifications in the years leading up to
construction (which, delayed by the Korean War, did not begin until
1963.) For example, while the original proposal called for a structure
590 feet tall and located on the banks of the Mississippi, the final
plan was lengthened to 630 feet and moved to slightly higher ground. </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">\"This is a city of great
beauty, which approached its riverfront with great purpose and
deliberation,\" MacKeith concludes. \"Yes, there are tangled and
difficult histories prior to 1947, and subsequent to the Arch\'s
completion. But there was also this astonishing moment of the
competition. It\'s a moment that seemed to encapsulate St. Louis\' past
and present, and one that remains intertwined with our civic future.\" </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\"><strong>INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM</strong> </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">In conjunction with the exhibition <em>On the Riverfront</em>,
the Sam Fox School will host a daylong symposium of the same title
beginning at 9 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 31. Topics of discussion will
include \"The River and St. Louis,\" \"The JNEM Competition and the Design
of the Gateway Arch,\" \"The Era of the Arch\" and \"The Riverfront and the
Arch.\" </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">Participants will include <strong>Eeva-Liisa Pelkonen</strong>, chief researcher and co-editor of the exhibition catalog for <em>Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future</em>; architect <strong>Robert Burley</strong>, who led the Arch design team for Eero Saarinen and Associates; and <strong>Charles Birnbaum</strong>,
founder of The Cultural Landscape Foundation and former coordinator of
the National Park Service Historic Landscape Initiative. Also
participating will be landscape architect <strong>Susan Saarinen </strong>(Eero\'s daughter) and former Finnish ambassador <strong>Matti H&auml;kk&auml;nen</strong> (Eero\'s second cousin), as well as architects, historians, critics and scholars from St. Louis and abroad. </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">Formal proceedings will be
published and distributed following the symposium. For participant bios
and a complete schedule of events,<a href=\"http://news-info.wustl.edu/web/page/normal/13223.html\"><span class=\"red\" title=\"Go to click here\"> click here</span></a>. </span></p>
<p><span style=\"font-family: arial,helvetica,sans-serif;\">On the Riverfront: The Gateway Arch and St. Louis <em>will
open from 7 to 9 p.m. Jan. 30 and will remain on view through March 9
in the Sam Fox School\'s Steinberg Hall, located near the intersection
of Skinker and Forsyth boulevards. The gallery is open during regular
business hours Monday through Friday. For more information, call (314)
935-9300 or <a href=\"http://www.samfoxschool.wustl.edu\">www.samfoxschool.wustl.edu.</a></em> </span></p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
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