Ieoh Ming Pei: He and his buildings are like bamboo
Ieoh Ming Pei, who is in his eighties, is as exciting and elusive as his buildings.
He is good at expressing the power of abstraction. In the mysterious work of talent turning into architectural quality, delicacy, lyricism and beauty imbue his buildings with the light of humanity.
Parisian, scolded me for two years
He has more than 70 architectural works in his life. What he is most proud of is that at the age of 64, he was invited to Paris, France to participate in the Louvre reconstruction project . Some people question: Is I.M. Pei good? Can he afford this important task? At that time, I.M. Pei faced the French who had a strong sense of superiority. After all, the Louvre is a place that people all over the world aspire to visit.
When French President Mitterrand selected I.M. Pei, the whole of Paris was shocked! His son Pei Zhizhong recalled, "The French were really dumbfounded at the time. They were even angry with shame" and shouted: How can I ask a Chinese to come to repair it? Our most important building? I.M. Pei would destroy Paris! They expressed their dissatisfaction day and night. To accuse the building of being a massive, destructive device was beyond the imagination of the French. French politicians and the architectural community also took turns to attack. Pei said, "My translator was shaking all over when he heard it, and he could hardly translate for me what I wanted to say in my reply."
Public opinion is always criticized. Pei spent 14 years working on the Louvre in Paris. It took almost two years to discuss the issue of who would rebuild with the people of Paris and France.
"Whether ordinary people accept it or not is not important to me. Criticism requires history and time, and we have to look at it decades later. If you say what you do today, it will be good tomorrow, I think this evaluation It’s worthless.”
In this way, Bei Xingming endured the most serious test in his architectural career with a seemingly indifferent attitude. Pei's assistant said: "I never remember Pei being depressed. He is a very calm person. Every time I see him, he also has to maintain that unique charming smile." Pei Like many great people, Ieoh Ming was always calm and peaceful, and was not affected by strong pressure from the outside world.
In 1988, the "unfortunate disaster" caused by the pyramid turned into the greatest joy for I.M. Pei and his supporters. The French, who liked to quarrel as well as agree, accepted Pei. In March of that year, Mitterrand awarded I.M. Pei France's highest medal of honor in the newly built pyramid. An embarrassment to the French: the pyramids they had so strenuously opposed. It became the pride of each of them, because Pei put the distance between the past and the present spirit of the times. Shrunk to the minimum.
Don’t learn from his drinking, but learn from his architecture
In New York, I.M. Pei spent most of his career. He has long sleeves, is good at dancing, and is exquisite in all directions. He has close friendships with business bosses, artists and heads of state, but his inner world is not something that the West can understand.
Ieoh Ming Pei was born in Suzhou in 1917. His mother was a master of flute and a devout Buddhist, so she named him Yu Ming, which means light. Ieoh Ming Pei was born in the year of the Snake, and people born in the Year of the Snake are said to be charming, intuitive, decisive, vain, and stubborn.
Ieoh Ming Pei’s grandfather was a calligrapher, and his father Pei Zuyi joined the accounting department of the Bank of China after graduating from an American university. Pei was sent to Shanghai YMCA Middle School in 1927 and mastered fluent English.
Da Guangming Cinema was the main place where I.M. Pei spent his time in middle school. He watched the best Hollywood movies and sang English songs. American culture was no stranger to Shanghai teenagers at that time.
My father suggested that Pei engage in finance or study medicine. But his father's experience made him understand early on: bankers are always under pressure and unhappy.
The International Hotel was the tallest building in the Far East at the time. I heard that it would be built with 26 floors. Ieoh Ming Pei couldn't believe it and would go there every Saturday to watch it rise. I think it’s amazing!
1935. Ieoh Ming Pei went to the University of Pennsylvania to study architecture. But his old-fashioned teaching concepts made him leave before school started.
Not confident in his painting foundation, he came to Boston and applied for the Architectural Engineering major at MIT. The head of the department suggested that he reconsider based on his painting foundation, but Pei insisted on his choice. , and haven’t looked back since.
At that time, a new architectural style was emerging in Europe. Faced with the trend of internationalization, it is difficult for I.M. Pei to accept all the trends. Because he comes from a completely different world. In the learning process of I.M. Pei. Professor Mreel of Harvard University had a profound influence on him. Mreel proposed that light is the most important to architecture. He is a worshiper of the sun and believes that the sun's rays bring life to buildings. Mreel was born to drink, one drink after another, without eating anything. Ieoh Ming Pei said: I did not imitate him in drinking. I studied his architecture.
It has something to do with Feng Shui
The more than 70 works of I.M. Pei throughout his life are all entangled with money, power and politics. He mixed diplomatic skills and unique design in buildings such as the Bank of China, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, and the Louvre in Paris, France.
Despite the public outcry in Paris against the renovation of the Louvre and the catastrophic incident in which the windows of an insurance company building in Boston fell into the street... these did not affect I.M. Pei's rise to the ranks of the world's most important architects.
Hong Kong, Bank of China Building. In 1926, Pei's father was the manager here. The Bank of China Tower was once the tallest building in Asia. His reason for accepting this mission may be more emotional. Pei tried to make the design of the Bank of China Tower almost innocent, just like the innocence of his childhood. Because architecture gives human dignity, it must represent "the ambition of the Chinese people."
"When I was a child, I stayed in Hong Kong, and it was so different from today. In fact, what I miss the most is the aroma of the coffee beans back then." It's a pity. When Pei's father passed away, he did not even see photos of the model of the Bank of China Tower designed by his son.
After the building was completed, many Hong Kong people said that the Bank of China was a knife, and the topic of Feng Shui began. Pei admitted to absorbing some of the Feng Shui master's sayings: use water. There is water coming down on both sides of the tall building. Water is the source. It is a source of wealth. So the water turns into a pond when it reaches the bottom, and fish are raised in the pond. Chinese people think that they should save their wealth.
Ieoh Ming Pei said that Feng Shui is very reasonable, but it should not be too extreme. But you have to believe in Feng Shui. China used to say that you should build a house close to the mountains and the sea. This is true, and it is also true to face south, so many places are related to Feng Shui.
Working for a real estate developer
In the 1940s. Pei Xingming's father asked his son to return to China after studying to build and share China's future. However, when Japan invaded and the Chinese people were rising up to resist Japan, Pei Xingming lost contact with his family. later. Ieoh Ming Pei decided to become an American citizen. This was a difficult decision for him. It is also a painful choice. "I became an American citizen and had an American family. My children are all Americans, and they are all still Chinese."
After the war, New York, the United States, was in dire straits, which made Pei Yu Ming could not sit peacefully on the Harvard platform, and he plunged into the rapidly developing economy. But I never dreamed that my first job would be working for a real estate agent. This developer is extremely conceited. So much so that if you want to satisfy his ego, you have to do something very special.
Ieoh Ming Pei and he were completely different people, but they both had the same dream. The most creative buildings in the city at that time were some cheap houses. In the slums of Washington in 1951, some people lived in dilapidated houses with flying dust and water pipes laid in the open... Pei began to become interested in private houses.
During the period of building residential buildings, I.M. Pei accumulated engineering experience. Soon, I.M. Pei was lucky enough to receive an order - the National Center for Atmospheric Research. This was a new starting point for Pei's career. It also became the first time in Pei's life that he established a long-term and friendly personal relationship with a customer.
American Public Figure
Ieoh Ming Pei truly became a public figure during a turning period in American history.
In 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated, and the construction of the Kennedy Library became a top priority for the presidential family. They invited world-renowned architects, it was an unprecedented gathering, and everyone wanted a chance. Pei was not well-known at the time and had only done some residential buildings. Also invited.
The location of the library was chosen at Harvard. It took 10 years to select the location and the project was completed. Kennedy's wife, Jacqueline, said that I.M. Pei's aesthetic world was unparalleled.
Just when I.M. Pei was triumphant and people began to pay attention to his works, the windows of the Boston Insurance Company building were blown down by the wind, the glass scattered throughout the street, and one-third of the windows fell off !
Criticisms and censures poured in, and I.M. Pei was almost pushed to the edge of the cliff. Although he tried hard to prove his innocence, seven years later, the door and window company settled the matter, but for The damage to Pei and his family has been done. Ieoh Ming Pei said: "After that accident, those companies were ashamed of us."
Just when Ieoh Ming Pei attracted infamy. The National Gallery of Art in Washington celebrates its completion...Ieoh Ming Pei's life in the United States has been ups and downs. He likes to be with young people. He himself seemed to grow younger every time he was around young people. He always wears a suit sewn in China. The artistic atmosphere exuding on his body is obvious at a glance. His playful eyes make his gentle appearance full of lively emotions.
I.M. Pei loved music throughout his life. He compared his buildings to Bach's music. Dallas in the United States has a first-class symphony. But there is no real concert hall. Pei was trying to build a concert hall and the two hit it off, using ring structures to create space that once you start moving around. The entire space also begins to move, allowing people to forget the trivial matters of the day and enter another time and space. Pei used this design to relax people's spirits. Here he used the method of "changing scenery with each step" in Chinese gardens.
When I returned to my motherland for the first time, the work I.M. Pei designed was the Xiangshan Hotel. He wanted to repay the culture that nurtured him through architecture and help the Chinese architectural community explore a new path. He wanted to revive a character that everyone could relate to—not a pedantic palace, but the white walls and gray bricks of an ordinary home. Far from being a relic of the past, he believes it has the power to inform the present.
In the United States, immigrants generally get lost in different cultures and cannot find their true destination in the end. The only exception is the Chinese. As an elegant ferryman in the cultural gap, I.M. Pei had his cake and eat it too. He absorbed the most avant-garde things in the West. At the same time, it does not abandon its rich tradition.
His buildings are like bamboo, such as the Bank of China, and he himself is also like bamboo, no matter how strong the wind and rain are. It's just a bend.
I.M. Pei regarded every morning after waking up as a gift, because it meant that there was still another day to work. He only does what he thinks is beautiful. In New York, people often see the architect Ieoh Ming Pei dashing across 57th Street as nimbly as a young man. Hurry home.
"Reader" Issue 15, 2009, page 44