Edgar Kaufmann Jr. (April 9, 1910 – July 31, 1989) was an American architect, lecturer, author, and an adjunct professor of architecture and art history at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manha ...

Early years

He was the son of Edgar J. Kaufmann, a wealthy

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

businessman and philanthropist who owned

Kaufmann's Kaufmann's was a department store that originated in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Summary The store was owned in the early 20th century by Edgar J. Kaufmann, patron of the famous Fallingwater house. In the post-war years, the store became a regio ...

department store, and his wife Liliane. Kaufmann Jr. attended the School for Arts and Crafts at the Austrian Museum of Applied Art in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

, in the late 1920s. He studied

painting Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ai ...

and

typography Typography is the art and technique of arranging type to make written language legible, readable and appealing when displayed. The arrangement of type involves selecting typefaces, point sizes, line lengths, line-spacing ( leading), an ...

for three years with Victor Hammer in

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico ...

. After reading

Frank Lloyd Wright Frank Lloyd Wright (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key role in the architectural movements o ...

's autobiography, Kaufmann decided to become a resident apprentice in architecture at Wright's Taliesin East School and Studio from 1933 to 1934. According to fallingwater.org, he was particular about spelling his name "Edgar Kaufmann jr."

Career

When he left Wright's Taliesin Fellowship in 1935, he joined the family business and became merchandise manager for home furnishings, and in 1938, was elected secretary of the Kaufmann Department Stores, Inc. In 1940, Edgar wrote to Alfred Barr of the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, ...

, proposing the Organic Design in Home Furnishings Competition, won by

Charles Eames Charles Ormond Eames Jr. (June 17, 1907 – August 21, 1978) was an American designer, architect and filmmaker. In professional partnership with his spouse Ray Kaiser Eames, he was responsible for groundbreaking contributions in the field of a ...

and

Eero Saarinen Eero Saarinen (, ; August 20, 1910 – September 1, 1961) was a Finnish-American architect and industrial designer noted for his wide-ranging array of designs for buildings and monuments. Saarinen is best known for designing the General Motor ...

. That same year, he left Kaufmann's to join the

. He served with the

Army Air Force The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

s from 1942 to 1946 during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. Afterwards, he was director of the Industrial Design Department at the

(MOMA) in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

. Edgar's greatest accomplishment during his tenure at MOMA was the 'Good Design' program of 1950 to 1955, in which the museum joined with the

Merchandise Mart The Merchandise Mart (or the Merch Mart, or the Mart) is a commercial building located in downtown Chicago, Illinois. When it was opened in 1930, it was the largest building in the world, with of floor space. The Art Deco structure is loca ...

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, promoting good design in household objects and furnishings. His Edgar J. Kaufmann Foundation also hired Finnish architect

Alvar Aalto Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto (; 3 February 1898 – 11 May 1976) was a Finnish architect and designer. His work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and glassware, as well as sculptures and paintings. He never regarded himself as an artist, s ...

to design the

Kaufmann Conference Center The Edgar J. Kaufmann Conference Center is a conference hall on the 12th floor of 809 United Nations Plaza in the Turtle Bay neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. Designed by Finnish architect Alvar Aalto for professor Edgar Kaufmann ...

in New York City, which was completed in 1964. From 1963 to 1986, Kaufmann was an adjunct professor of Architecture and Art History at

. He authored several books on Wright architecture and modern design, and was a contributor to ''Arts + Architecture'' journal and ''

Encyclopædia Britannica The ( Latin for "British Encyclopædia") is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It is published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.; the company has existed since the 18th century, although it has changed ownership various ...

''.

Fallingwater

Kaufmann strongly supported his father's decision to commission Frank Lloyd Wright for the famous 1936

Fallingwater Fallingwater is a house designed by the architect Frank Lloyd Wright in 1935 in the Laurel Highlands of southwest Pennsylvania, about southeast of Pittsburgh in the United States. It is built partly over a waterfall on Bear Run in the Mill Ru ...

house over

Bear Run Bear Run is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed August 15, 2011 tributary of the Youghiogheny River in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. Bear Run is i ...

, in

Stewart Township, Fayette County, Pennsylvania Stewart Township is a township in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of the Pittsburgh Metro Area. The population was 619 at the 2020 census. Stonerville and Kaufmann are the only villages in this very rural township, whic ...

. After his father's death in 1955, Kaufmann inherited the Fallingwater house, continuing to use and share it as a mountain retreat until 1963. Then, he entrusted the Wright structures and several hundred acres of the surrounding pristine

Laurel Highlands The Laurel Highlands is a region in southwestern Pennsylvania made up of Fayette County, Somerset County and Westmoreland County. It has a population of about 600,000 people. The region is approximately fifty-five miles southeast of Pitts ...

lands in the

Allegheny Mountains The Allegheny Mountain Range (; also spelled Alleghany or Allegany), informally the Alleghenies, is part of the vast Appalachian Mountain Range of the Eastern United States and Canada and posed a significant barrier to land travel in less devel ...

to the

Western Pennsylvania Conservancy The Western Pennsylvania Conservancy (WPC) is a private nonprofit conservation organization founded in 1932 and headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. WPC has contributed land to 12 state parks and conserved more than a quarter million acres o ...

as an architectural house museum and conservation open space preserve, in memory of his parents.

Personal life

Kaufmann, who did not marry and had no children, died in 1989. His ashes were scattered around the property at Fallingwater by his partner

Paul Mayén Paul Mayén (May 31, 1916 – November 3, 2000) was a Spanish architect and industrial designer known for his work at Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater. Early years Mayén was born on May 31, 1916, in La Línea de la Concepción, a town in Cádi ...

, with whom he shared his life since the 1950s. Mayén oversaw the building of the Fallingwater pavilion from 1979 to 1981, which houses the café, gift store, and visitor’s center at Fallingwater. Following his own death in 2000, Mayén's ashes were also scattered at Fallingwater in accordance with his wishes. Kaufmann was among the public figures at the core of the effort to save Olana, the home of

Frederic Edwin Church Frederic Edwin Church (May 4, 1826 – April 7, 1900) was an American landscape painter born in Hartford, Connecticut. He was a central figure in the Hudson River School of American landscape painters, best known for painting large landscape ...

, before it was designated a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

in 1965 and subsequently became a New York State Historic Site.

Art collection

After his death, 21 pieces of his collection of art and sculpture were auctioned off at

Sotheby's Sotheby's () is a British-founded American multinational corporation with headquarters in New York City. It is one of the world's largest brokers of fine and decorative art, jewellery, and collectibles. It has 80 locations in 40 countries, an ...

in New York. They included

Mondrian Pieter Cornelis Mondriaan (), after 1906 known as Piet Mondrian (, also , ; 7 March 1872 – 1 February 1944), was a Dutch painter and art theoretician who is regarded as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. He is known for being o ...

's ''Facade in Tan and Grey'' and ''Composition in a Square'', Klee's ''Face of a Flower'',

Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is kn ...

's ''Guitar and Pink Fruit Dish'',

Braque Georges Braque ( , ; 13 May 1882 – 31 August 1963) was a major 20th-century French painter, collagist, draughtsman, printmaker and sculptor. His most notable contributions were in his alliance with Fauvism from 1905, and the role he play ...

's ''Harlequin'', a

Matisse Henri Émile Benoît Matisse (; 31 December 1869 – 3 November 1954) was a French visual artist, known for both his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primar ...

's ''Nude With Pink Shoes'', Léger's ''Forms in Contrast'' and ''Acrobats'', de Kooning's ''Untitled III'', Calder's ''Little Tree'',

Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...

's ''

Waterlilies ''Water Lilies'' (or ''Nymphéas'', ) is a Serial imagery, series of approximately 250 oil paintings by French Impressionism, Impressionist Claude Monet (1840–1926). The paintings depict his Fondation Monet in Giverny, flower garden at Fond ...

'',

Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...

's ''Small Horse'',

Giacometti Alberto Giacometti (, , ; 10 October 1901 – 11 January 1966) was a Swiss sculptor, painter, draftsman and printmaker. Beginning in 1922, he lived and worked mainly in Paris but regularly visited his hometown Borgonovo to see his family and ...

's ''Woman With a Broken Shoulder'', and Miró's ''Bird Flying Toward a Silver Tree''.

References

External links

official Fallingwater website

Biography at official Fallingwater website

official Western Pennsylvania Conservancy website

Edgar J. Kaufmann papers on Fallingwater, 1909-1976
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kaufmann, Edgar Jr. 1910 births 1989 deaths Columbia University faculty American architecture writers 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American male writers American male non-fiction writers LGBT architects 20th-century LGBT people Architects from Pittsburgh Writers from Pittsburgh