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Architect Frank Gehry’s raised many controversial buildings over the years, but few as controversial as the middle finger he recently raised during a press conference in Spain. During a press conference for Gehry’s upcoming receipt of the Prince of Asturias Prize from the hands of Spain’s King Felipe VI, a journalist touched a nerve when he asked if Gehry’s buildings were just about public relations-grabbing spectacle. Gehry glowered and raised the one-finger salute in response, a clear, if vulgar (and not necessarily international) sign of his displeasure with the pejorative title of “starchitect” he’s been saddled with over the years. Gehry’s gesture captured the headlines, but it was his response to the next question at that press conference where he really expressed his concern not over his reputation, but rather over the purpose of contemporary architecture itself. Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "What’s Behind Frank Gehry’s Raised Middle Finger to Contemporary Architecture?"

Every new cultural institution hopes for “The Bilbao Effect”—the economic boom the faltering, former industrial city of Bilbao, Spain, enjoyed after the 1997 rise of architect Frank Gehry’s game-changing design for the Guggenheim Bilbao Museum. But even old cultural institutions want some of that same magic. So, when Gehry came to see Barnett Newman’s The Stations of the Cross with artist friend Ellsworth Kelly at the Philadelphia Museum of Art back in 2006, the museum’s then director and CEO, Anne d’Harnoncourt, approached Gehry about “doing something special” there, too. However, instead of a new signature “Gehry” look, d’Harnoncourt requested “a quiet intervention”—an underground “Philadelphia Effect.” In Making a Classic Modern: Frank Gehry’s Master Plan for the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the PMA finally unveils their “master plan” for revitalizing their classic main building first opened in 1928 for the 21^st century. The big question hanging over this whole decade-long, estimated half billion dollar project remains: can a classic museum really be made modern? Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Can a Classic Museum Really Be Made Modern?"

On October 15, 2013, the City Council of Cupertino, California, debated for 6 hours before finally approving Apple’s plans for a new $5 billion USD office headquarters to be built in their city. Apple’s then-CEO Steve Jobs approved architect Norman Foster’s design (shown above) just weeks before his death in 2011. Work on the mammoth “mother ship” begins next year and is scheduled to be finished sometime in 2016. For a company that likes to “think different,” this architectural thinking looks more like old
school thinking to me, specifically the kind of “bigger is better” mentality that spawned the building of massive cathedrals throughout Europe for centuries. Whereas the old churches rose in worship of the old gods, these new churches rise up in worship of the new tech corporate gods. Are the tech giants’ offices the cathedrals of the future? Please come over to Picture This at Big Think to read more of "Are Tech Giants' Offices the Cathedrals of the Future?"