John Hejduk fonds

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Part of

• Fonds: John Hejduk fonds, 1947-2000, predominant 1947-1996

People

• John Hejduk (creator)
• John Hejduk (archive creator)

Title

John Hejduk fonds

Dates of creation

1947-2000, predominant 1947-1996

Form

• archives

Level of archival description

Fonds

Extent and Medium

• 3145 drawings
• 633 reprographic copies
• 266 panels
• 22 prints
• 22 negatives
• 16 models
• 9 sketchbooks
• 8 transparencies
• 4 photographs
• 3 artist's books
• 3 collages
• 1 book
• 0.01 l.m. of textual records

Scope and Content

The fonds documents the professional practice of architect John Hejduk. It chiefly illustrates and includes architectural, installation, exhibition, publishing, design, and urban planning projects by Hejduk, notably his student work of the late 1940s and early 1950s, the Texas House and Diamond House series of the 1950s and 1960s, the Wall Houses and Masques of the 1970s and 1980s, and the late work of the 1990s: Berlin Night, Soundings, Vladivostok, Adjusting Foundations, and Pewter Wings, Golden Horns and Stone Veils. Material in this fonds was produced between 1947 and 2000.

The fonds contains architectural drawings, representing nearly every project by John Hejduk (and his firm), and including predominantly presentation drawings and panels, conceptual, design and design development drawings, and also including some working drawings. A number of Hejduk's sketchbooks and artist's books, as well as one study model and seventeen presentation models, are present in the fonds.

Reference Number

AP145

Arrangement

Materials in this fonds are arranged in two series:

S1. Student work

S2. Professional work

Biographical notes

JOHN HEJDUK

New York City, New York, 19 July 1929 - New York City, New York, 3 July 2000

John Hejduk was born in New York City in 1929. After studies at the Cooper Union School of Art and Architecture, the University of Cincinnati, and the Harvard Graduate School of Design, Hejduk studied in Italy in 1953-1954 on a Fulbright Scholarship before returning to the United States to teach at the University of Texas, Austin. It was there, in the company of Colin Rowe, Robert Slutzky and others that Hejduk carried out research and readings in the development of his approach to architecture. Between 1964 and 2000, he taught at the Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in New York City, serving as its first dean between 1975 and 2000. John Hejduk died in New York City in 2000.

Hejduk's work has been exhibited throughout North-America and Europe. Structures based on his drawings have been built at the Gropius Bau (Berlin), the Architectural Association (London), the University of the Arts (Philadelphia), the Oslo School of Architecture (Norway), the Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta), Prague Castle (Czech Republic), the City of Groningen (Netherlands), and New York City. Hejduk was the architect of the renovation of the Cooper Union Building (1970-74), which was recognized by the National Historic Landmark Foundation. Among his realized buildings are the Tegel Housing in Berlin (1988), a Civic Centre in Santiago de Compostela, Spain (2000), and Wall House 2 in Groningen (2001).

In his lifetime Hejduk published more than twenty books, including 'Mask of Medusa' (1985), 'Victims' (1986), 'Collapse of Time' (1987), 'Bovisa' (1987), 'Vladivostok' (1989), 'The Lancaster/Hanover Masque' (1992), 'Soundings' (1993), 'Adjusting Foundations' (1995), and 'Pewter Wings, Golden Horns, Stone Veils' (1997). In 1991 an edition of 'Aesop's Fables' featuring his illustrations was published and a folio of his lithographs accompanied the first illustrated edition of Thomas Mann's 'The Black Swan'.

John Hejduk was a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects and of the Royal Society of Arts in Britain, and an Honorary Member of the Association of Artists Mánes of the Czech Republic as well as the Bund Deutscher Architekten BDA (Federation of German Architects).

Conditions governing access

• Access by appointment only.

Conditions governing reproduction

• Contact the CCA for copyright information and permission to reproduce (reproductions@cca.qc.ca).

Immediate source of acquisition or transfer

• Acquired between 1997 and 2005.

Custodial history

CCA acquired John Hejduk's entire surviving fonds in 1998. At that date the archive was stored at Cooper Union at the The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture Archive located at 41 Cooper Square, Room 204, New York. After 1998, small numbers of related drawings were transferred to the CCA from the Cooper Union Archive as they were discovered.

Archivist's note

• The John Hejduk fonds was processed and described in 2009, with funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, by Colin MacWhirter, under the supervision of Howard Shubert, Curator, Prints and Drawings. The finding aid was edited in 2009 by Alexis Lenk.

Credit line

When citing the collection as a whole, use the citation:
John Hejduk fonds, Collection Centre Canadien d’Architecture/Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal.
When citing specific collection material, please refer to the object’s specific credit line

Language of material

Documents are predominantly in English, with some in Italian, French, German, and Spanish.

Related units of description

• In addition to the materials found in the John Hejduk fonds, the CCA Collection contains the following objects related to John Hejduk: - The Peter Eisenman fonds (AP143) contains three design development drawings by Hejduk for Texas House 5 and Texas House 3 (DR1994:0162:001-003), and textual records (DR1994:0138:1524-1526) and drawings (DR1994:0138:1527-1531) for the Bernstein House. - The Anyone Corporation fonds (AP116) contains a book of poems by Hejduk, titled 'Such Places As Memory: Poems 1953-1996' and published in 1998 (ARCH242167). - The Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies fonds (AP057) contains transcripts of discussions involving various architects, including Hejduk, at the second Conference of Architects for the Study of the Environment Meeting (CASE 2) (ARCH153543); three versions of an unpublished essay by Hejduk, titled 'Out of Time and into Space' (ARCH153659); an unpublished transcript of a discussion involving various architects, including Hejduk, at the 1976 Venice Biennale (CASE) Meetings (ARCH153618); files containing various documents relating to the publication of the exhibition catalogue, "John Hejduk, 7 Houses : January 22 to February 16, 1980", transcripts of interviews with Hejduk and others, a copy of an essay by Hejduk with a preface by Peter Eisenman, a typescript of a class discussion at Cooper Union, exhibition catalogues for a Hejduk exhibition at the Fondation Le Corbusier, and correspondence (ARCH153754, ARCH252152). Where pertinent, related objects from the CCA Collection have also been noted elsewhere in the finding aid.