Press release for "Frederick Fisher: The Circle and the Square"

              For Immediate Release
Press Contact: Kathy MacPherson kmacpherson@otis.edu / (310) 665.6909
Otis College of Art and Design is pleased to Present the Exhibition
Frederick Fisher: The Circle and the Square
LOS ANGELES – April, 2011 – Otis College of Art and Design is pleased to present the exhibition Frederick Fisher: The Circle and the Square to be held June 25 - September 1, 2011 at Ben Maltz Gallery. A public opening reception takes place Saturday, June 25, 4-6pm.
This site-specific installation by architect Frederick Fisher is organized in honor of the 10th anniversary of his building: The Bronya and Andy Galef Center for Fine Arts at Otis. For this installation, Fisher has physically and metaphorically superimposed a 142’ circle (the same dimension of Rome’s Pantheon and the Galef building square) in the form of a literal and metaphorical “ruin” of a wall into/onto the square footprint of the Galef building and grounds. The fragments of wall are wrapped with giant reproductions of images from Fisher’s sketchbooks from his time studying at the American Academy in Rome in 2008. This frieze-like appliqué is a recollection of the narrative murals covering the interiors of buildings, a tradition erased by the abstract plastic language of Modern architecture. Fisher’s primary study during his time in Rome was Italian museum renovations of the 1950's with particular focus on the work of Carlo Scarpa and Franco Albini.
Fisher also took the opportunity to visit Roman buildings that inspired Robert Venturi to write his landmark book Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture (1966). When Fisher first read this essay, it gave him permission to combine his attachments to history, the media of collage, and a contemporary aesthetic into his work. According to Fisher, “As early as my second year in architecture school I used Leonardo's diagram of the human body inscribed in the circle and the square for the plan of a crematory project. In Roman architecture, the circle was associated with temples and funeral structures and the Pantheon remains a sublime expression of this geometric purity.” This project is funded in part by the OTIS Board of Governors and supported by Becker & Miyamoto Surveyors and to Minardos Group.
FREDERICK FISHER has over 30 years experience as a practicing architect. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Oberlin College in Art and Art History and a Master of Architecture from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). He was Chairman of the Environmental Design Department at Otis College of Art and Design for seven years and has been a visiting instructor at Harvard University Graduate School of Design, Columbia University, SCI-Arc, University of Southern California and UCLA. Selected exhibitions include “Made in California” and “Thinking by Hand,” in Los Angeles, "Architecture for the New Millennium” in Taiwan, and “Art Space” in Berlin. Fisher was a Fellow with the American Academy in Rome, having won the 2008 Franklin D. Israel Prize in Architecture. In 2001 he was awarded a first-ever C.O.L.A. Grant for an architect from the City of Los Angeles. Other recent awards include: 2009 Westside Prize and SCDF Design Award for the Annenberg Community Beach House, 2009 AIA Honor Award and SCDF Design Award for the Annenberg Center at Caltech, a 2008 Orchid Award for the Oceanside Museum of Art, 2009 and 2006 AIA Restaurant Design Awards, and 2001 Brendan Gill Prize for P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center in New York.