My interest in John Johansen's work transcends his architecture: it is his energy, curiosity, and approach to design and life which I share and admire. And it is this energy, curiosity, and enjoyment of life that still provides inspiration today as it did thirty years ago when we first met. When I consider the lack of vision and inventiveness of most current architecture in America, I am reminded of the period of intense creativity, innovation, and research (that has all but disappeared) synthesized by John Johansen's career. Johansen's work has spanned five decades of American history, a period that has seen the architectural pendulum swing from modernism to postmodernism, and back again. 

Throughout his career his architecture has demonstrated a rare consistency, transcending experimentation in a range of formal languages: from early experiments in neoclassicism and biomorphism to successive waves of conventional modernism, organicism, and deformed geometries. His buildings are equally informed by the organising principles of biotechnology...  

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ABOUT THE ARCHITECT JOHN M JOHANSEN, FAIA                               

John Johansen’s Restless Spirit by Kevin C. Lippert Princeton Architectural Press publisher of NANOARCHITECTURE: A New Species of Architecture by John M Johansen, published by Princeton Architectural Press

On first meeting, John Johansen is an unlikely prophet of a new millennial architecture based on the latest revolutions in science and technology. [Approaching his 95th year] it seems a more propitious moment for him to bask in the current admiring rediscovery of ...many elegant houses he built in the 1950s, than to be taking to the pulpit of experimental design based on nanotechnology, bioengineering, magnetic levitation, self-regulating structures, composite materials, and other developments more likely to be found in the pages of Popular Mechanics than the newsletter of do.co.mo.mo. It's a surprising twist for [a nonagenarian] and former outspoken defender of the high-modern faith...  

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John Johansen's Present Tense by Lebbeus Woods from John M Johansen: A Life in the Continuum of Modern Architecture by John M Johansen, published by l'Arca Edizioni

From the beginning, John Johansen has been an iconoclast and a fighter for architecture as he saw it, as he believed it could be, given the right mix of intelligence and daring. For forty years, he has maintained the right mix to a remarkably high degree, realizing many good buildings and a few great ones, a record that most architects would envy. 

Today he is teacher, writer, and thinker with many things to say to the coming generation of architects, not only from his own long experience as an architect, but from a clear vision of what architecture might yet become. He is, more than ever before, an experimental architect whose projects explore concepts of form, space, structure and materials expressing ideas shaping society and culture...  

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Lebbeus Woods and John M Johanen, in Woods’ Manhattan studio.  

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Richard Rogers and John M Johansen, November 2010

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Imitation Is Suicide: The Life-work of John Johansen by Richard Rogers Richard-Rogers.html

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from John M Johansen: A Life in the Continuum of Modern Architecture by John M Johansen, published by l'Arca Edizioni Richard-Rogers.html

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