Ieoh Ming Pei's

The East Building for the National Gallery of Art in Washington, District of Columbia is a 350,000 square foot museum with public, exhibition, and research programs. It opened to the public in 1978, providing additional spaces for the existing West Building. While the old neoclassical structure was completed in 1941 under the design of John Russell Pope, the new one - at the direction of I. M. Pei - displaces convention. Likewise, the original building houses art predating the 20th century, while the newer one features modern and current works. Pei and his collaborators hardly developed the East Building in a vacuum, weaving a rich history of theory and contemporary discourse into the design. In doing so, the building constitutes a microcosm of architectural theory, rationalizing its function and form, negotiating a range of transparencies, and connecting multiple schools of thought.

Viollet-le-Duc, in his book on architecture theory, praises the church of Notre-Dame at Dijon, calling it a “masterpiece of reason.” He presents a story, hooking the reader into the building, describing its visual characteristics, offering various perspectives of the design, and examining key design elements. Le-Duc attributes Notre-Dame’s success to effective use of structure, optimal arrangement of space in an urban environment, and careful material selection. In essence, Notre-Dame and le-Duc’s subsequent analysis is the nuanced manifestation of rationalism, reflecting Gothic, Enlightenment, and Romanticist discourse. For these reasons - and for identifying the marriage between form and function - Froissart considers le-Duc a forefather of modernism, a term that often characterizes Pei’s work, including the East Building. There are face-value parallels: the use of a space frame to achieve long spans on the glass roof, careful consideration and deliberation on a difficult site, and material choices derived from the existing National Gallery of Art. Such aspects of the design echo the praises of le-Duc, but they often remain peripheral concerns in contemporary practice, per Margaret Crawford. Pei, instead, cares to develop and rationalize them. He is reverent, understanding how each element defines the East Building’s aesthetic identity while serving a functional purpose. Through his craftsmanship, Semper's attention to the “bekleidung,” and tuning of building functions, Pei channels his mentor - Walter Gropius - and Gottfried Semper and le-Duc before him. Pei’s appeals to rational expression may have come a century after that exposition of Notre-Dame, but the two are inherently linked.

There are other dimensions to this. In his interview, I. M. Pei describes the use of the triangle, first derived from the site constraints, second as a design motif throughout the entire project, per Ritchie. Geometry is a defining feature of the East Building, but its role throughout history has varied greatly. Plato theorizes that the geometric forms of fire, water, earth, and air form the building blocks of reality. Otto von Simpson attests that this idea bore Platonism and St. Augustine and Gothic. Colin Rowe highlights the mathematical logics of Andrea Palladio and Le Corbusier. Claude Perrault challenged classical understandings of order and proportion. Greg Lynn advocates to leave static forms behind for animation and vitality. Each of these philosophers offer varying rationales on the role of mathematics and geometry in architecture; in many ways, newer perspectives build on what came before. The East Building plays along, arriving after the strict regiment of neoclassicism, but before the parametric swoops of Zaha Hadid. It also succeeds the more static designs of early modernism - its atrium full of energy and light. At the same time, the East Building work never deviates from reason, the 19.47 degree angle coming directly from Pennsylvania Avenue and the L’Enfant Plan, every oblique element of the space the result of rigorous testing and refining.

In “Transparency: Literal and Phenomenal,” Colin Rowe and Robert Slutzky, inspired by the works of Cubism, describe both notions, advocating for use of the latter to produce dynamic and layered spaces. Literal transparency generally means clear visibility of an adjacent space, divided only by a translucent barrier such as glass. Phenomenal transparency is interesting and multi-dimensional, juxtaposing different elements and stacking varying opacities of material, like the depths of a Picasso painting. These notions of transparency and its multifaceted expressions present themselves at the East Building of the National Gallery. On the elevations, expansive window walls provide a direct connection from the gallery’s interior to Washington’s expansive urban environment, channeling Neutra or Johnson. The relationship is literal: museum-goers can observe people walking the streets below while those outside can peer into the space.

At the same time, Pei and his team turned their attention towards a more phenomenal expression of transparency in perhaps the most signature part of the architecture: the atrium. Over the course of seven months and numerous perspective drawings by Paul Stevenson Oles, the designers contemplated on the relationships between galleries, light, structure, and people. Earlier iterations allowed no light in, then liberal amounts of light from above. These proposals made the space uncomfortable both in terms of scale and feasibly due to heat gain. Later iterations layered different elements into the space - bridges to break up the design, trees to acknowledge the human scale, aluminum grates to control harsh daylight, a space-frame to achieve the long span and continue the motif of the triangle. The built atrium is a masterclass in phenomenal transparency, perfectly lit, with a measured interplay of site lines and sectional variations. In spite of the dynamic space, visitors can remain oriented, the three towers visible through the skylight. This application of philosophy into the built environment was not in isolation. Robert Slutzky worked with I. M. Pei after his time at the University of Austin; Rowe and Slutzky praised I. M. Pei’s Mile High Center for its use of the figure-ground and layering in their sequel transparency essay. In this way, the East Gallery builds upon a rich history of phenomenal transparency, from Cubist paintings to the Farnese villa at Caprarola to Michelangelo’s work on San Lorenzo.

Ieoh Ming Pei was born in Guangzhou in 1917, where he lived until he began his studies in architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1935, paying particular attention to the work of Le Corbusier. He then studied at the Harvard Graduate School of Design under Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. For these associations, Pei is often characterized as a modernist, supported by Gropius’ praise for his studio project and Pei’s first project, 131 Ponce de Leon Avenue, echoing the clean lines of Mies van den Rohe, per Wiseman. That being said, the label is misleading. If modernism is known colloquially for its minimal aesthetic and in architectural discourse for seeking to systemically address social issues, Pei hardly sought to do either. The aesthetic form celebrates the site, the existing building, shifting perspectives, and fragmentation. His clients were typically institutions, the National Gallery of Art included. Even as his first (unbuilt) work was funded through the Housing Act of 1949, Pei did so under the direction of the developer William Zeckendorf. Throughout his career, Pei played to the tune of the market: he sought out projects to establish his name, he broke away from Zeckendorf partially due to financial woes, and he faced legal battles for the construction failures of Hancock Tower. With the East Building, Pei had to answer to the Capital Park and Planning Commission, the Pennsylvania Avenue Development Corporation, and benefactor Paul Mellon. These associations more closely resemble the critical processes and professionalization of postmodern architecture; a school of thought which is, according to José Gámez and Susan Rogers, apolitical, “pragmatic,” and “symptomatic.”

Clement Greenberg associates the German term “kitsch” with popular art: the goal is to get people to consume while shortcutting the processes that make art valuable as a discourse. This idea has commodified the built environment itself. Big box retail stores, suburban sprawl, and industrial farms cover the land, much to the dismay of writers such as Rem Koolhaas, and with far worse outcomes for natural systems and the poor per Delahanty. It is highly doubtful that I. M. Pei approached the East Gallery with these intentions: his team iterated over several years a space that could enrich culture and educate the public. In the proliferation of information and loss of obscenity, as attested by Jean Baudrillard, this monument is not immune to the noise of today’s society. Its website advertises the museum’s quirks and features; visitors of all kinds post their experiences online, each open to a plethora of perspectives; one tourism blog naively praises the atrium stair for being “as Instagram-worthy as it gets.” Even as Pei’s contemporaries criticized him along similar lines, the East Gallery seems a modest example, with other schools of thought lying more evidently in the design.

“Architecture requires the displacement of conventions; the history of any discipline is about displacing conventions … Architecture displaces in order to create what will be. Creation does not repeat what is.”

Through interviews, author Vladimir Belogolovsky and architect Peter Eisenman explore the latter’s perspective on architectural discourse - or to give it a name - neo-avant-garde. Eisenman indicates the movement to be countercultural, but its major emphases are on the rigorous processes of design, the emotional reactions of the user, and utilizing context, among other things. The East Gallery also offers perspective in these areas. If the prior explorations and accounts from I. M. Pei and others indicate anything, the design process was long, featuring much collaboration, experimentation, and evaluation. Phenomenal layering in the atrium gives way to an experience that feels warm, visually delightful, and in some ways, sublime as described by Edmund Burke. Likewise, Pei examines the site, calling it the first priority in his process. The museum continues the east-west axis of the existing building, the shape of the site bears the motif of the triangle, the ensuing monument matches the scale of the National Mall (Ritchie). In the same way Eisenman describes, the East Gallery could never be removed from its site and placed in another city. Relatedly, the East Gallery can hardly compare to any other building. I. M. Pei and his team created something that is innovative and unique - in other words - avant-garde. This should be distinguished from Greenberg, who argues for avant-garde to separate the wealthy class from the worker. Neo-avant-garde does not exclude, indicated by the likes of Dana Cuff and Aaron Betsky. In a world of kitsch, junkspaces, and segregation of classes, the East Gallery is publicly accessible, a monument to educate and to be a seat of deliberation.

In bridging these schools of thought, testing a spectrum of transparencies, and imploring reason in every design element, I. M. Pei and his collaborators wove a rich tapestry of history and discourse into the East Building for the National Gallery of Art. Nearly half a century later, the design remains a valuable asset for one’s enjoyment and enrichment - but more importantly, it provides an understanding of the players and processes that created it. Engaging these things is vital, for architecture is at a crossroads in terms of its professional stature and political pull. The East Building recalls a time when the political stakes were lower, but the industry was not in a position to create social change. Even then, Pei and his team rigorously examined history, the site, and the needs of the public. As the practice moves forward, such drive must remain, in order that the industry create spaces that empower people, culture, and society.

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Additional Research

“AD Classics: East Building, National Gallery of Art / I. M. Pei.” ArchDaily. January 13, 2011. Accessed December 13, 2024. https://www.archdaily.com/97193/ad-classics-east-building-national-gallery-of-art-i-m-pei.

“Deaths.” Almanac (University of Pennsylvania), May 17, 2005. Accessed December 13, 2024. https://almanac.upenn.edu/archive/volumes/v51/n33/obit.html.

Diamonstein-Spielvogel, Barbaralee. Interview of I. M. Pei and Peter Eisenman. Originally aired in 1976 on About the Arts. Uploaded by Duke Library to YouTube on August 29, 2019. Accessed December 13, 2024. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEVOsbWYrU0.

Fan, Jiayang. "I. M. Pei and the Asian-American Experience." The New Yorker. May 17, 2019. Accessed December 13, 2024. https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/i-m-pei-and-the-asian-american-experience.

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Pei Cobb Freed & Partners. National Gallery of Art, East Building. Accessed December 13, 2024. https://www.pcf-p.com/projects/national-gallery-of-art-east-building/.

Saval, Nikil. "The Impeccably Understated Modernism of I. M. Pei." The New Yorker. May 27, 2019. Accessed December 13, 2024. https://www.newyorker.com/culture/dept-of-design/the-impeccably-understated-modernism-of-i-m-pei.

Taylor, Jake. "I. M. Pei: The Enduring Modernist." Jake Taylor Architecture. Accessed December 13, 2024. https://www.jaketaylorarchitecture.com/im-pei-the-enduring-modernist.