Louis I. Kahn’s influence on American architecture during his life was great, and his influence has only increased in the thirty-three years since his death—with interest in his work lately
moving into the realm of popular culture through the successful film about him, My Architect (New Yorker Films, 2004). John Lobell’s classic work presents stunning black-and-white photos of
some of Kahn’s greatest buildings, including the Salk Institute, the Yale Study Center, and the Exeter Library, combining them with excerpts from his writings that reveal him as a remarkable
creative thinker. Kahn searched for beginnings: the origin of joy and wonder, of intelligence and intuition. He sought the basic principles of being, which he called Silence and Light. He spoke
of these things with a tremendous yet gentle power. Reading his words and looking at his buildings, we experience him as architect, visionary, and poet.
