Alison and Peter Smithson.DESIGN MUSEUM The mighty Brutalist shadow cast by Alison and Peter Smithson's best-known public works (the Economist Building, the Robin Hood Robin Hood, legendary hero of 12th-century England who robbed the rich to help the poor. Chivalrous, manly, fair, and always ready for a joke, Robin Hood reflected many of the ideals of the English yeoman. He lived in Sherwood Forest with Little John (his chief archer), Friar Tuck, Maid Marion (his beloved), and his band. Robin Hood was the hero of at least 30 Middle English ballads and of many later stories and plays. Gardens) has obscured the complexity of their four-decade practice. That's the contention of this exhibition, which bookends the British architects' career by focusing on two domestic projects--the House of the Future, a model produced for the "Daily Mail Ideal Home Exhibition" in 1956, and the lesser-known Hexenhaus, an idiosyncratic piece by-piece redesign of a Hessian cottage begun in 1986. Through films and scale models, curators James Peto, Max Risselada, and Dirk van den Heuvel hope to throw light on a maverick, visionary body of work. The catalogue brings together essays by Risselada, architectural historian Beatriz Colomina, and others. Dec. 6-Feb. 29. |
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