Alvar Aalto - Life and Works

1. Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto
Presented By:
Manish Singh
B.Arch 3
061016
History of Modern
Architecture
AR 306

2. February 3, 1898 — May 11, 1976
Introduction
Finnish architect and designer
"Father of Modernism" in the Scandinavian countries
Work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and
glassware
born in Kuortane, Finland
His father, Johan Henrik Aalto, was a Finnish-speaking land-
surveyor
married architect Aino Marsio, who became Aino Alto
In 1952 Aalto married architect Elissa Mäkiniemi

3. Nordic modernism
Humanistic Modernism
Functionalism
Bio Architecture
Philosophy:
Embodied Rationalism

4. Philosophy:
Nordic modernism
•First and most influential architects of
Nordic modernism.
•Nordic countries architects were practicing
so-called Nordic Classicism style - a style
that had been a reaction to the previous
dominant style of National Romanticism -
before moving, in the late 1920s
•Aalto's career spans the changes in style
from (Nordic Classicism) to purist
International Style Modernism to a more
personal, synthetic and idiosyncratic
Modernism

5. Humanistic Modernism
• Viewed the machine age as dehumanizing and believed it harmed
social relationships and human worth
• Humanistic design
• Clear message: Aesthetics and functionality belong to all

6. Functionalism
Usage dictates the outward form, without
regard to such traditional conceptions of
symmetry, proportions, etc

7. •Strongly influenced by the nature : Finnish forests and
lakes
•Bio-climatic solutions
•There is a particular care in the use of natural
materials, in the insertion of the building in the natural
environment, in the best sunshine conditions and
natural lighting.
Bio Architecture

8. Viipuri Library
Alvar Alto
Vyborg, Russia
1927-35

10. Won the design competition in 1927 :: Nordic Classicism
The final decision on the construction of the library was taken in September 1933
Its final form it represented International Modernism
Sunken reading-well, free-flowing ceilings and
cylindrical skylights, first tested in Viipuri
Destroyed in WW2, for a decade

11. Below ground (-1)

13. Rotated Plan of Robie House : F.L.Wright (1906-10)

14. Second Floor (+1)

28. Palau Güell , Barcelona
(1885-90) by Antoni Gaudi

30. LUDWIG MIES VAN DER ROHE
TUGENDHAT HOUSE, CZECH REPUBLIC, 1930, MIES VAN DER ROHE

31. Otaniemi Technical University Library
Alvar Alto ,Otaniemi, Finland,1964-69

32. Otaniemi Technical University Library Alvar Alto ,Otaniemi, Finland,1964-69

33. •Red brick, black granite, and copper
•University include the main building, the
library, the shopping centre, and the water
tower, with a crescent-shaped auditorium
at the center
•International Style
•Campus buildings pivot around landmark
form of main auditorium, reminiscent of a
Greek Theater

34. Colloseum
Greek Theatre

35. Otaniemi Technical University Library

36. Otaniemi Technical University Library

37. LARKIN BUILDING, BUFFALO, NEW YORK, 1904; F.L. WRIGHT

38. Otaniemi Technical University Library

39. Otaniemi Technical University Library

40. VILLA SAVOYE, POISSY, FRANCE, 1928-29; ARCHITECT: LE CORBUSIER

41. Furniture
• Armchair 41
• Designed originally to exude
warmth and humanity in a Finnish
Hospital
• In the permanent collection of the
Museum of Modern Art.
Barcelona
Chair

42. Larkin Building , FLW

43. Robie House

44. Armchair 41
Trolley 900
Stool 60Table 83

46. Glassware
• Aalto vase (Savoy)
• “With its asymmetric shape and freely curving
tapering walls it represents the quintessential
qualities of Finnish design: originality, organic
form, straightforwardness, aesthetic
sophistication” - www.aalto.com
• Resembles natural lakes, cut by trees
• Still produced by Iittala Glassworks

47. Embodied Rationalism
Alvar Aalto is often treated as the most important
early Modernist
who doesn’t fit
The mainstream, nearly filmic
narrative begins with the work of Frank Lloyd Wright, and then,
in a series of cuts, presents a central cast of characters in which
Le Corbusier, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe,
and Walter Gropius play leading roles
Many of his design methods contravene
the precepts by which Modernism is
typically conceived

48. If Modernism was concerned with mass production, Aalto
almost defiantly celebrated the irregularities and idiosyncracies
of handicraft.
If Modernism aspired to universalism, Aalto—
putatively, at least—practiced particularism. If Modernists
embraced structural rationalism, or at least the pretense of it,
Aalto exhibited an only occasional interest in exhibiting the
structure of his buildings.
Aalto refused to integrate structure with form and masked hybrid
structural solutions freely: load-bearing masonry here, steel beams, or
poured concrete there.
If Modernism insisted upon the symbolic
importance and pragmatic superiority of new materials, Aalto
liberally mixed old with new—wood; stucco; reinforced, poured,
and prefabricated concrete; steel; brick.
If Modernism suffered a
deep ambivalence toward typology and historic precedent, Aalto
freely drew from Eric Gunnar Asplund’s Stockholm Public Library,
Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoye, the Vesnin Brothers’ project for
Pravda, Italian Renaissance palazzi, Finnish country churches,
Karelian courtyard farmhouses, Roman amphitheaters, and more.
Source ::
Ultraviolet: Alvar Aalto’s
Embodied Rationalism
Howard Design Magazine
(2008)

49. If Modernism mandated a functional approach to planning and
consequently a formal abstraction, Aalto’s buildings pulsate with
figuration and symbols.
If Modernism redefined architecture as
space, Aalto celebrated objectness. If Modernism whispered
or shouted transparency, Aalto’s buildings revel in their long
passages of opacity
Source ::
Ultraviolet: Alvar Aalto’s
Embodied Rationalism
Howard Design Magazine (2008)

50. For Aalto, rationalism and humanism intermeshed so much
that the concepts were practically coterminous.
Aalto’s rationalism better describes the cognitive realities of
human experience than did the multifarious rationalisms
advanced by his contemporaneous Modernist colleagues.
Aalto’s conception of rationalism and place it within these longstanding
intellectual traditions. Only then can the alternative
notion of rationalism, which I call embodied rationalism.
Conclusion
Embodied Rationalism : Alvar Alto

51. Thank You