title: Joey Barton

text: In July 2021, Barton was charged with the assault by beating of a woman at an address in Kew, London in June 2021. In March 2022, a court heard that Barton had 'kicked wife in head' and 'grabbed her by throat' in a drunken row, the case being adjourned to 23 June due to a late arrival of emails. The case was further delayed until the 30–31 of October, Barton's defense team being set a deadline of two weeks to provide the list of witnesses that they would be presenting and whether or not the victim would be called as a defense witness. The case was dismissed on 31 October due to Barton being unable to get a fair trial.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Ieoh Ming Pei ( ; ; April 26, 1917 – May 16, 2019) was a Chinese-American architect. Raised in Shanghai, Pei drew inspiration at an early age from the garden villas at Suzhou, the traditional retreat of the scholar-gentry to which his family belonged. In 1935, he moved to the United States and enrolled in the University of Pennsylvania's architecture school, but he quickly transferred to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He was unhappy with the focus at both schools on Beaux-Arts architecture, and spent his free time researching emerging architects, especially Le Corbusier. After graduating, he joined the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD) and became a friend of the Bauhaus architects Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. In 1948, Pei was recruited by New York City real estate magnate William Zeckendorf, for whom he worked for seven years before establishing an independent design firm in 1955, I. M. Pei & Associates. In 1966 that became I. M. Pei & Partners, and in 1989 became Pei Cobb Freed & Partners. Pei retired from full-time practice in 1990. In his retirement, he worked as an architectural consultant primarily from his sons' architectural firm Pei Partnership Architects.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's first major recognition came with the Mesa Laboratory at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado (designed in 1961, and completed in 1967). His new stature led to his selection as chief architect for the John F. Kennedy Library in Massachusetts. He went on to design Dallas City Hall and the East Building of the National Gallery of Art. He returned to China for the first time in 1975 to design a hotel at Fragrant Hills, and designed Bank of China Tower, Hong Kong, a skyscraper in Hong Kong for the Bank of China fifteen years later. In the early 1980s, Pei was the focus of controversy when he designed a glass-and-steel pyramid for the Louvre in Paris. He later returned to the world of the arts by designing the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas, the Miho Museum in Japan, Shigaraki, near Kyoto, and the chapel of the junior and high school: MIHO Institute of Aesthetics, the Suzhou Museum in Suzhou, Museum of Islamic Art in Qatar, and the Grand Duke Jean Museum of Modern Art, abbreviated to Mudam, in Luxembourg.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei won a wide variety of prizes and awards in the field of architecture, including the AIA Gold Medal in 1979, the first Praemium Imperiale for Architecture in 1989, and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, in 2003. In 1983, he won the Pritzker Prize, which is sometimes referred to as the Nobel Prize of architecture.


title: I. M. Pei

text: I. M. Pei's ancestry traces back to the Ming dynasty, when his family moved from Anhui province to Suzhou. The family made their wealth in medicinal herbs, then proceeded to join the ranks of the scholar-gentry. Ieoh Ming Pei was born on April 26, 1917, to Tsuyee and Lien Kwun, and the family moved to Hong Kong one year later. The family eventually included five children. As a boy, Pei was very close to his mother, a devout Buddhist who was recognized for her skills as a flautist. She invited him (and not his brothers or sisters) to join her on meditation retreats. His relationship with his father was less intimate. Their interactions were respectful but distant.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's ancestors' success meant that the family lived in the upper echelons of society, but Pei said his father was "not cultivated in the ways of the arts". The younger Pei, drawn more to music and other cultural forms than to his father's domain of banking, explored art on his own. "I have cultivated myself," he said later.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei studied in St. Paul's College in Hong Kong as a child. When Pei was 10, his father received a promotion and relocated with his family to Shanghai. Pei attended St. John's Middle School, the secondary school of St. John's University that was run by Anglican missionaries. Academic discipline was rigorous; students were allowed only one half-day each month for leisure. Pei enjoyed playing billiards and watching Hollywood movies, especially those of Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin. He also learned rudimentary English skills by reading the Bible and novels by Charles Dickens.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Shanghai's many international elements gave it the name "Paris of the East". The city's global architectural flavors had a profound influence on Pei, from The Bund waterfront area to the Park Hotel, built in 1934. He was also impressed by the many gardens of Suzhou, where he spent the summers with extended family and regularly visited a nearby ancestral shrine. The Shizilin Garden, built in the 14th century by a Buddhist monk and owned by Pei's uncle Bei Runsheng, was especially influential. Its unusual rock formations, stone bridges, and waterfalls remained etched in Pei's memory for decades. He spoke later of his fondness for the garden's blending of natural and human-built structures.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Soon after the move to Shanghai, Pei's mother developed cancer. As a pain reliever, she was prescribed opium, and assigned the task of preparing her pipe to Pei. She died shortly after his thirteenth birthday, and he was profoundly upset. The children were sent to live with extended family; their father became more consumed by his work and more physically distant. Pei said: "My father began living his own separate life pretty soon after that." His father later married a woman named Aileen, who moved to New York later in her life.


title: I. M. Pei

text: As Pei neared the end of his secondary education, he decided to study at a university. He was accepted in a number of schools, but decided to enroll at the University of Pennsylvania. Pei's choice had two roots. While studying in Shanghai, he had closely examined the catalogs for various institutions of higher learning around the world. The architectural program at the University of Pennsylvania stood out to him. The other major factor was Hollywood. Pei was fascinated by the representations of college life in the films of Bing Crosby, which differed tremendously from the academic atmosphere in China. "College life in the U.S. seemed to me to be mostly fun and games", he said in 2000. "Since I was too young to be serious, I wanted to be part of it ... You could get a feeling for it in Bing Crosby's movies. College life in America seemed very exciting to me. It's not real, we know that. Nevertheless, at that time it was very attractive to me. I decided that was the country for me." Pei added that "Crosby's films in particular had a tremendous influence on my choosing the United States instead of England to pursue my education."


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 1935 Pei boarded a boat and sailed to San Francisco, then traveled by train to Philadelphia. What he found once he arrived, however, differed vastly from his expectations. Professors at the University of Pennsylvania based their teaching in the Beaux-Arts style, rooted in the classical traditions of ancient Greece and Rome. Pei was more intrigued by modern architecture, and also felt intimidated by the high level of drafting proficiency shown by other students. He decided to abandon architecture and transferred to the engineering program at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Once he arrived, however, the dean of the architecture school commented on his eye for design and convinced Pei to return to his original major.


title: I. M. Pei

text: MIT's architecture faculty was also focused on the Beaux-Arts school, and Pei found himself uninspired by the work. In the library he found three books by the Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier. Pei was inspired by the innovative designs of the new International Style, characterized by simplified form and the use of glass and steel materials. Le Corbusier visited MIT in , an occasion which powerfully affected Pei: "The two days with Le Corbusier, or 'Corbu' as we used to call him, were probably the most important days in my architectural education." Pei was also influenced by the work of U.S. architect Frank Lloyd Wright. In 1938 he drove to Spring Green, Wisconsin, to visit Wright's famous Taliesin building. After waiting for two hours, however, he left without meeting Wright.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Although he disliked the Beaux-Arts emphasis at MIT, Pei excelled in his studies. "I certainly don't regret the time at MIT", he said later. "There I learned the science and technique of building, which is just as essential to architecture." Pei received his B.Arch. degree in 1940; his thesis was titled "Standardized Propaganda Units for War Time and Peace Time China".


title: I. M. Pei

text: While visiting New York City in the late 1930s, Pei met a Wellesley College student named Eileen Loo. They began dating and married in the spring of 1942. She enrolled in the landscape architecture program at Harvard University, and Pei was thus introduced to members of the faculty at Harvard's Graduate School of Design (GSD). He was excited by the lively atmosphere and joined the GSD in .


title: I. M. Pei

text: Less than a month later, Pei suspended his work at Harvard to join the National Defense Research Committee, which coordinated scientific research into U.S. weapons technology during World War II. Pei's background in architecture was seen as a considerable asset; one member of the committee told him: "If you know how to build you should also know how to destroy." The fight against Germany was ending, so he focused on the Pacific War. The U.S. realized that its bombs used against the stone buildings of Europe would be ineffective against Japanese cities, mostly constructed from wood and paper; Pei was assigned to work on incendiary bombs. Pei spent two and a half years with the NDRC, but revealed few details of his work.


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 1945 Eileen gave birth to a son, T'ing Chung; she withdrew from the landscape architecture program in order to care for him. Pei returned to Harvard in the autumn of 1945, and received a position as assistant professor of design. The GSD was developing into a hub of resistance to the Beaux-Arts orthodoxy. At the center were members of the Bauhaus, a European architectural movement that had advanced the cause of modernist design. The Nazi regime had condemned the Bauhaus school, and its leaders left Germany. Two of these, Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer, took positions at the Harvard GSD. Their iconoclastic focus on modern architecture appealed to Pei, and he worked closely with both men.


title: I. M. Pei

text: One of Pei's design projects at the GSD was a plan for an art museum in Shanghai. He wanted to create a mood of Chinese authenticity in the architecture without using traditional materials or styles. The design was based on straight modernist structures, organized around a central courtyard garden, with other similar natural settings arranged nearby. It was very well received; Gropius, in fact, called it "the best thing done in [my] master class." Pei received his M.Arch. degree in 1946, and taught at Harvard for another two years.


title: I. M. Pei

text: In the spring of 1948, Pei was recruited by New York real estate magnate William Zeckendorf to join a staff of architects for his firm of Webb and Knapp to design buildings around the country. Pei found Zeckendorf's personality the opposite of his own; his new boss was known for his loud speech and gruff demeanor. Nevertheless, they became good friends and Pei found the experience personally enriching. Zeckendorf was well connected politically, and Pei enjoyed learning about the social world of New York's city planners.


title: I. M. Pei

text: His first project for Webb and Knapp was an apartment building with funding from the Housing Act of 1949. Pei's design was based on a circular tower with concentric rings. The areas closest to the supporting pillar handled utilities and circulation; the apartments themselves were located toward the outer edge. Zeckendorf loved the design and even showed it off to Le Corbusier when they met. The cost of such an unusual design was too high, however, and the building never moved beyond the model stage.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei finally saw his architecture come to life in 1949, when he designed a two-story corporate building for Gulf Oil in Atlanta, Georgia. The building was demolished in February 2013 although the front facade will be retained as part of an apartment development. His use of marble for the exterior curtain wall brought praise from the journal "Architectural Forum". Pei's designs echoed the work of Mies van der Rohe in the beginning of his career as also shown in his own weekend-house in Katonah, New York in 1952. Soon Pei was so inundated with projects that he asked Zeckendorf for assistants, which he chose from his associates at the GSD, including Henry N. Cobb and Ulrich Franzen. They set to work on a variety of proposals, including the Roosevelt Field Shopping Mall on Long Island. The team also redesigned the Webb and Knapp office building, transforming Zeckendorf's office into a circular space with teak walls and a glass clerestory. They also installed a control panel into the desk that allowed their boss to control the lighting in his office. The project took one year and exceeded its budget, but Zeckendorf was delighted with the results.


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 1952, Pei and his team began work on a series of projects in Denver, Colorado. The first of these was the Mile High Center, which compressed the core building into less than 25 percent of the total site; the rest is adorned with an exhibition hall and fountain-dotted plazas. One block away, Pei's team also redesigned Denver's Courthouse Square, which combined office spaces, commercial venues, and hotels. These projects helped Pei conceptualize architecture as part of the larger urban geography. "I learned the process of development," he said later, "and about the city as a living organism." These lessons, he said, became essential for later projects.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei and his team also designed a united urban area for Washington, D.C., called L'Enfant Plaza (named for French-American architect Pierre Charles L'Enfant). Pei's associate Araldo Cossutta was the lead architect for the plaza's North Building (955 L'Enfant Plaza SW) and South Building (490 L'Enfant Plaza SW). Vlastimil Koubek was the architect for the East Building (L'Enfant Plaza Hotel, located at 480 L'Enfant Plaza SW), and for the Center Building (475 L'Enfant Plaza SW; now the United States Postal Service headquarters). The team set out with a broad vision that was praised by both "The Washington Post" and "Washington Star" (which rarely agreed on anything), but funding problems forced revisions and a significant reduction in scale.


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 1955, Pei's group took a step toward institutional independence from Webb and Knapp by establishing a new firm called I. M. Pei & Associates. (The name changed later to I. M. Pei & Partners.) They gained the freedom to work with other companies, but continued working primarily with Zeckendorf. The new firm distinguished itself through the use of detailed architectural models. They took on the Kips Bay residential area on the East Side of Manhattan, where Pei set up Kips Bay Towers, two large long towers of apartments with recessed windows (to provide shade and privacy) in a neat grid, adorned with rows of trees. Pei involved himself in the construction process at Kips Bay, even inspecting the bags of cement to check for consistency of color.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The company continued its urban focus with the Society Hill project in central Philadelphia. Pei designed the Society Hill Towers, a three-building residential block injecting cubist design into the 18th-century milieu of the neighborhood. As with previous projects, abundant green spaces were central to Pei's vision, which also added traditional townhouses to aid the transition from classical to modern design.


title: I. M. Pei

text: From 1958 to 1963, Pei and Ray Affleck developed a key downtown block of Montreal in a phased process that involved one of Pei's most admired structures in the Commonwealth, the cruciform tower known as the Royal Bank Plaza (Place Ville Marie). According to "The Canadian Encyclopedia" "its grand plaza and lower office buildings, designed by internationally famous US architect I. M. Pei, helped to set new standards for architecture in Canada in the 1960s ... The tower's smooth aluminum and glass surface and crisp unadorned geometric form demonstrate Pei's adherence to the mainstream of 20th-century modern design."


title: I. M. Pei

text: Although these projects were satisfying, Pei wanted to establish an independent name for himself. In 1959 he was approached by MIT to design a building for its Earth science program. The Green Building continued the grid design of Kips Bay and Society Hill. The pedestrian walkway at the ground floor, however, was prone to sudden gusts of wind, which embarrassed Pei. "Here I was from MIT," he said, "and I didn't know about wind-tunnel effects." At the same time, he designed the Luce Memorial Chapel in at Tunghai University in Taichung, Taiwan. The soaring structure, commissioned by the same organisation that had run his middle school in Shanghai, broke severely from the cubist grid patterns of his urban projects.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The challenge of coordinating these projects took an artistic toll on Pei. He found himself responsible for acquiring new building contracts and supervising the plans for them. As a result, he felt disconnected from the actual creative work. "Design is something you have to put your hand to," he said. "While my people had the luxury of doing one job at a time, I had to keep track of the whole enterprise." Pei's dissatisfaction reached its peak at a time when financial problems began plaguing Zeckendorf's firm. I. M. Pei and Associates officially broke from Webb and Knapp in 1960, which benefited Pei creatively but pained him personally. He had developed a close friendship with Zeckendorf, and both men were sad to part ways.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei was able to return to hands-on design when he was approached in 1961 by Walter Orr Roberts to design the new Mesa Laboratory for the National Center for Atmospheric Research outside Boulder, Colorado. The project differed from Pei's earlier urban work; it would rest in an open area in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. He drove with his wife around the region, visiting assorted buildings and surveying the natural environs. He was impressed by the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, but felt it was "detached from nature".


title: I. M. Pei

text: The conceptualization stages were important for Pei, presenting a need and an opportunity to break from the Bauhaus tradition. He later recalled the long periods of time he spent in the area: "I recalled the places I had seen with my mother when I was a little boy—the mountaintop Buddhist retreats. There in the Colorado mountains, I tried to listen to the silence again—just as my mother had taught me. The investigation of the place became a kind of religious experience for me." Pei also drew inspiration from the Mesa Verde cliff dwellings of the Ancestral Puebloans; he wanted the buildings to exist in harmony with their natural surroundings. To this end, he called for a rock-treatment process that could color the buildings to match the nearby mountains. He also set the complex back on the mesa overlooking the city, and designed the approaching road to be long, winding, and indirect.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Roberts disliked Pei's initial designs, referring to them as "just a bunch of towers". Roberts intended his comments as typical of scientific experimentation, rather than artistic critique; still, Pei was frustrated. His second attempt, however, fit Roberts' vision perfectly: a spaced-out series of clustered buildings, joined by lower structures and complemented by two underground levels. The complex uses many elements of cubist design, and the walkways are arranged to increase the probability of casual encounters among colleagues.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Once the laboratory was built, several problems with its construction became apparent. Leaks in the roof caused difficulties for researchers, and the shifting of clay soil beneath caused cracks in the buildings which were expensive to repair. Still, both architect and project manager were pleased with the final result. Pei referred to the NCAR complex as his "breakout building", and he remained a friend of Roberts until the scientist died in .


title: I. M. Pei

text: The success of NCAR brought renewed attention to Pei's design acumen. He was recruited to work on a variety of projects, including the S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, the Everson Museum of Art in Syracuse, New York, the Sundrome terminal at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, and dormitories at New College of Florida.


title: I. M. Pei

text: After President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in , his family and friends discussed how to construct a library that would serve as a fitting memorial. A committee was formed to advise Kennedy's widow Jacqueline, who would make the final decision. The group deliberated for months and considered many famous architects. Eventually, Kennedy chose Pei to design the library, based on two considerations. First, she appreciated the variety of ideas he had used for earlier projects. "He didn't seem to have just one way to solve a problem," she said. "He seemed to approach each commission thinking only of it and then develop a way to make something beautiful." Ultimately, however, Kennedy made her choice based on her personal connection with Pei. Calling it "really an emotional decision", she explained: "He was so full of promise, like Jack; they were born in the same year. I decided it would be fun to take a great leap with him."


title: I. M. Pei

text: The project was plagued with problems from the outset. The first was scope. President Kennedy had begun considering the structure of his library soon after taking office, and he wanted to include archives from his administration, a museum of personal items, and a political science institute. After the assassination, the list expanded to include a fitting memorial tribute to the slain president. The variety of necessary inclusions complicated the design process and caused significant delays.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's first proposed design included a large glass pyramid that would fill the interior with sunlight, meant to represent the optimism and hope that Kennedy's administration had symbolized for so many in the United States. Mrs. Kennedy liked the design, but resistance began in Cambridge, the first proposed site for the building, as soon as the project was announced. Many community members worried that the library would become a tourist attraction, causing particular problems with traffic congestion. Others worried that the design would clash with the architectural feel of nearby Harvard Square. By the mid-1970s, Pei tried proposing a new design, but the library's opponents resisted every effort. These events pained Pei, who had sent all three of his sons to Harvard, and although he rarely discussed his frustration, it was evident to his wife. "I could tell how tired he was by the way he opened the door at the end of the day," she said. "His footsteps were dragging. It was very hard for I. M. to see that so many people didn't want the building."


title: I. M. Pei

text: Finally the project moved to Columbia Point, near the University of Massachusetts Boston. The new site was less than ideal; it was located on an old landfill, and just over a large sewage pipe. Pei's architectural team added more fill to cover the pipe and developed an elaborate ventilation system to conquer the odor. A new design was unveiled, combining a large square glass-enclosed atrium with a triangular tower and a circular walkway.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum was dedicated on October 20, 1979. Critics generally liked the finished building, but the architect himself was unsatisfied. The years of conflict and compromise had changed the nature of the design, and Pei felt that the final result lacked its original passion. "I wanted to give something very special to the memory of President Kennedy," he said in 2000. "It could and should have been a great project." Pei's work on the Kennedy project boosted his reputation as an architect of note.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The Pei Plan was a failed urban redevelopment initiative designed for downtown Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, in 1964. The plan called for the demolition of hundreds of old downtown structures in favor of renewed parking, office building, and retail developments, in addition to public projects such as the Myriad Convention Center and the Myriad Botanical Gardens. It was the dominant template for downtown development in Oklahoma City from its inception through the 1970s. The plan generated mixed results and opinion, largely succeeding in re-developing office building and parking infrastructure but failing to attract its anticipated retail and residential development. Significant public resentment also developed as a result of the destruction of multiple historic structures. As a result, Oklahoma City's leadership avoided large-scale urban planning for downtown throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, until the passage of the Metropolitan Area Projects (MAPS) initiative in 1993.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Another city which turned to Pei for urban renewal during this time was Providence, Rhode Island. In the late 1960s, Providence hired Pei to redesign Cathedral Square, a once-bustling civic center which had become neglected and empty, as part of an ambitious larger plan to redesign downtown. Pei's new plaza, modeled after the Greek Agora marketplace, opened in 1972. Unfortunately, the city ran out of money before Pei's vision could be fully realized. Also, recent construction of a low-income housing complex and Interstate 95 had changed the neighborhood's character permanently. In 1974, The Providence Evening Bulletin called Pei's new plaza a "conspicuous failure". By 2016, media reports characterized the plaza as a neglected, little-visited "hidden gem".


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 1974, the city of Augusta, Georgia turned to Pei and his firm for downtown revitalization. The Chamber of Commerce building and Bicentennial Park were completed from his plan. In 1976, Pei designed a distinctive modern penthouse that was added to the roof of architect William Lee Stoddart's historic Lamar Building, designed in 1916. In 1980, Pei and his company designed the Augusta Civic Center, now known as the James Brown Arena.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Kennedy's assassination also led indirectly to another commission for Pei's firm. In 1964 the acting mayor of Dallas, Erik Jonsson, began working to change the community's image. Dallas was known and disliked as the city where the president had been killed, but Jonsson began a program designed to initiate a community renewal. One of the goals was a new city hall, which could be a "symbol of the people". Jonsson, a co-founder of Texas Instruments, learned about Pei from his associate Cecil Howard Green, who had recruited the architect for MIT's Earth Sciences building.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's approach to the new Dallas City Hall mirrored those of other projects; he surveyed the surrounding area and worked to make the building fit. In the case of Dallas, he spent days meeting with residents of the city and was impressed by their civic pride. He also found that the skyscrapers of the downtown business district dominated the skyline, and sought to create a building which could face the tall buildings and represent the importance of the public sector. He spoke of creating "a public-private dialogue with the commercial high-rises".


title: I. M. Pei

text: Working with his associate Theodore Musho, Pei developed a design centered on a building with a top much wider than the bottom; the facade leans at an angle of 34 degrees, which shades the building from the Texas sun. A plaza stretches out before the building, and a series of support columns holds it up. It was influenced by Le Corbusier's High Court building in Chandigarh, India; Pei sought to use the significant overhang to unify the building and plaza. The project cost much more than initially expected, and took 11 years to complete. Revenue was secured in part by including a subterranean parking garage. The interior of the city hall is large and spacious; windows in the ceiling above the eighth floor fill the main space with light.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The city of Dallas received the building well, and a local television news crew found unanimous approval of the new city hall when it officially opened to the public in 1978. Pei himself considered the project a success, even as he worried about the arrangement of its elements. He said: "It's perhaps stronger than I would have liked; it's got more strength than finesse." He felt that his relative lack of experience left him without the necessary design tools to refine his vision, but the community liked the city hall enough to invite him back. Over the years he went on to design five additional buildings in the Dallas area.


title: I. M. Pei

text: While Pei and Musho were coordinating the Dallas project, their associate Henry Cobb had taken the helm for a commission in Boston. John Hancock Insurance chairman Robert Slater hired I. M. Pei & Partners to design a building that could overshadow the Prudential Tower, erected by their rival.


title: I. M. Pei

text: After the firm's first plan was discarded due to a need for more office space, Cobb developed a new plan around a towering parallelogram, slanted away from the Trinity Church and accented by a wedge cut into each narrow side. To minimize the visual impact, the building was covered in large reflective glass panels; Cobb said this would make the building a "background and foil" to the older structures around it. When the Hancock Tower was finished in 1976, it was the tallest building in New England.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Serious issues of execution became evident in the tower almost immediately. Many glass panels fractured in a windstorm during construction in 1973. Some detached and fell to the ground, causing no injuries but sparking concern among Boston residents. In response, the entire tower was reglazed with smaller panels. This significantly increased the cost of the project. Hancock sued the glass manufacturers, Libbey-Owens-Ford, as well as I. M. Pei & Partners, for submitting plans that were "not good and workmanlike". LOF countersued Hancock for defamation, accusing Pei's firm of poor use of their materials; I. M. Pei & Partners sued LOF in return. All three companies settled out of court in 1981.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The project became an albatross for Pei's firm. Pei himself refused to discuss it for many years. The pace of new commissions slowed and the firm's architects began looking overseas for opportunities. Cobb worked in Australia and Pei took on jobs in Singapore, Iran, and Kuwait. Although it was a difficult time for everyone involved, Pei later reflected with patience on the experience. "Going through this trial toughened us," he said. "It helped to cement us as partners; we did not give up on each other."


title: I. M. Pei

text: In the mid-1960s, directors of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., declared the need for a new building. Paul Mellon, a primary benefactor of the gallery and a member of its building committee, set to work with his assistant J. Carter Brown (who became gallery director in 1969) to find an architect. The new structure would be located to the east of the original building, and tasked with two functions: offer a large space for public appreciation of various popular collections; and house office space as well as archives for scholarship and research. They likened the scope of the new facility to the Library of Alexandria. After inspecting Pei's work at the Des Moines Art Center in Iowa and the Johnson Museum at Cornell University, they offered him the commission.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei took to the project with vigor, and set to work with two young architects he had recently recruited to the firm, William Pedersen and Yann Weymouth. Their first obstacle was the unusual shape of the building site, a trapezoid of land at the intersection of Constitution and Pennsylvania Avenues. Inspiration struck Pei in 1968, when he scrawled a rough diagram of two triangles on a scrap of paper. The larger building would be the public gallery; the smaller would house offices and archives. This triangular shape became a singular vision for the architect. As the date for groundbreaking approached, Pedersen suggested to his boss that a slightly different approach would make construction easier. Pei simply smiled and said: "No compromises."


title: I. M. Pei

text: The growing popularity of art museums presented unique challenges to the architecture. Mellon and Pei both expected large crowds of people to visit the new building, and they planned accordingly. To this end, Pei designed a large lobby roofed with enormous skylights. Individual galleries are located along the periphery, allowing visitors to return after viewing each exhibit to the spacious main room. A large mobile sculpture by American artist Alexander Calder was later added to the lobby. Pei hoped the lobby would be exciting to the public in the same way as the central room of the Guggenheim Museum is in New York City. The modern museum, he said later, "must pay greater attention to its educational responsibility, especially to the young".


title: I. M. Pei

text: Materials for the building's exterior were chosen with careful precision. To match the look and texture of the original gallery's marble walls, builders re-opened the quarry in Knoxville, Tennessee, from which the first batch of stone had been harvested. The project even found and hired Malcolm Rice, a quarry supervisor who had overseen the original 1941 gallery project. The marble was cut into three-inch-thick blocks and arranged over the concrete foundation, with darker blocks at the bottom and lighter blocks on top.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The East Building was honored on May 30, 1978, two days before its public unveiling, with a black-tie party attended by celebrities, politicians, benefactors, and artists. When the building opened, popular opinion was enthusiastic. Large crowds visited the new museum, and critics generally voiced their approval. Ada Louise Huxtable wrote in "The New York Times" that Pei's building was "a palatial statement of the creative accommodation of contemporary art and architecture". The sharp angle of the smaller building has been a particular note of praise for the public; over the years it has become stained and worn from the hands of visitors.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Some critics disliked the unusual design, however, and criticized the reliance on triangles throughout the building. Others took issue with the large main lobby, particularly its attempt to lure casual visitors. In his review for "Artforum", critic Richard Hennessy described a "shocking fun-house atmosphere" and "aura of ancient Roman patronage". One of the earliest and most vocal critics, however, came to appreciate the new gallery once he saw it in person. Allan Greenberg had scorned the design when it was first unveiled, but wrote later to J. Carter Brown: "I am forced to admit that you are right and I was wrong! The building is a masterpiece."


title: I. M. Pei

text: After U.S. President Richard Nixon made his famous 1972 visit to China, a wave of exchanges took place between the two countries. One of these was a delegation of the American Institute of Architects in 1974, which Pei joined. It was his first trip back to China since leaving in 1935. He was favorably received, returned the welcome with positive comments, and a series of lectures ensued. Pei noted in one lecture that since the 1950s Chinese architects had been content to imitate Western styles; he urged his audience in one lecture to search China's native traditions for inspiration.


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 1978, Pei was asked to initiate a project for his home country. After surveying a number of different locations, Pei fell in love with a valley that had once served as an imperial garden and hunting preserve known as Fragrant Hills. The site housed a decrepit hotel; Pei was invited to tear it down and build a new one. As usual, he approached the project by carefully considering the context and purpose. Likewise, he considered modernist styles inappropriate for the setting. Thus, he said, it was necessary to find "a third way".


title: I. M. Pei

text: After visiting his ancestral home in Suzhou, Pei created a design based on some simple but nuanced techniques he admired in traditional residential Chinese buildings. Among these were abundant gardens, integration with nature, and consideration of the relationship between enclosure and opening. Pei's design included a large central atrium covered by glass panels that functioned much like the large central space in his East Building of the National Gallery. Openings of various shapes in walls invited guests to view the natural scenery beyond. Younger Chinese who had hoped the building would exhibit some of Cubist flavor for which Pei had become known were disappointed, but the new hotel found more favour with government officials and architects.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The hotel, with 325 guest rooms and a four-story central atrium, was designed to fit perfectly into its natural habitat. The trees in the area were of special concern, and particular care was taken to cut down as few as possible. He worked with an expert from Suzhou to preserve and renovate a water maze from the original hotel, one of only five in the country. Pei was also meticulous about the arrangement of items in the garden behind the hotel; he even insisted on transporting of rocks from a location in southwest China to suit the natural aesthetic. An associate of Pei's said later that he never saw the architect so involved in a project.


title: I. M. Pei

text: During construction, a series of mistakes collided with the nation's lack of technology to strain relations between architects and builders. Whereas 200 or so workers might have been used for a similar building in the US, the Fragrant Hill project employed over 3,000 workers. This was mostly because the construction company lacked the sophisticated machines used in other parts of the world. The problems continued for months, until Pei had an uncharacteristically emotional moment during a meeting with Chinese officials. He later explained that his actions included "shouting and pounding the table" in frustration. The design staff noticed a difference in the manner of work among the crew after the meeting. As the opening neared, however, Pei found the hotel still needed work. He began scrubbing floors with his wife and ordered his children to make beds and vacuum floors. The project's difficulties took an emotional and physical strain on the Pei family.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The Fragrant Hill Hotel opened on October 17, 1982, but quickly fell into disrepair. A member of Pei's staff returned for a visit several years later and confirmed the dilapidated condition of the hotel. He and Pei attributed this to the country's general unfamiliarity with deluxe buildings. The Chinese architectural community at the time gave the structure little attention, as their interest at the time centered on the work of American postmodernists such as Michael Graves.


title: I. M. Pei

text: As the Fragrant Hill project neared completion, Pei began work on the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York City, for which his associate James Freed served as lead designer. Hoping to create a vibrant community institution in what was then a run-down neighborhood on Manhattan's west side, Freed developed a glass-coated structure with an intricate space frame of interconnected metal rods and spheres.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The convention center was plagued from the start by budget problems and construction blunders. City regulations forbid a general contractor having final authority over the project, so architects and program manager Richard Kahan had to coordinate the wide array of builders, plumbers, electricians, and other workers. The forged steel globes to be used in the space frame came to the site with hairline cracks and other defects: 12,000 were rejected. These and other problems led to media comparisons with the disastrous Hancock Tower. One New York City official blamed Kahan for the difficulties, indicating that the building's architectural flourishes were responsible for delays and financial crises. The Javits Center opened on April 3, 1986, to a generally positive reception. During the inauguration ceremonies, however, neither Freed nor Pei was recognized for their role in the project.


title: I. M. Pei

text: When François Mitterrand was elected President of France in 1981, he laid out an ambitious plan for a variety of construction projects. One of these was the renovation of the Louvre. Mitterrand appointed a civil servant named to oversee it. After visiting museums in Europe and the United States, including the U.S. National Gallery, he asked Pei to join the team. The architect made three secretive trips to Paris, to determine the feasibility of the project; only one museum employee knew why he was there. Pei finally agreed that a new construction project was not only possible, but necessary for the future of the museum. He thus became the first foreign architect to work on the Louvre.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The heart of the new design included not only a renovation of the Cour Napoléon in the midst of the buildings, but also a transformation of the interiors. Pei proposed a central entrance, not unlike the lobby of the National Gallery East Building, which would link the three major wings around the central space. Below would be a complex of additional floors for research, storage, and maintenance purposes. At the center of the courtyard he designed a glass and steel pyramid, first proposed with the Kennedy Library, to serve as entrance and anteroom skylight. It was mirrored by an inverted pyramid to the west, to reflect sunlight into the complex. These designs were partly an homage to the fastidious geometry of the French landscape architect André Le Nôtre (1613–1700). Pei also found the pyramid shape best suited for stable transparency, and considered it "most compatible with the architecture of the Louvre, especially with the faceted planes of its roofs".


title: I. M. Pei

text: Biasini and Mitterrand liked the plans, but the scope of the renovation displeased Louvre administrator André Chabaud. He resigned from his post, complaining that the project was "unfeasible" and posed "architectural risks". Some sections of the French public also reacted harshly to the design, mostly because of the proposed pyramid. One critic called it a "gigantic, ruinous gadget"; another charged Mitterrand with "despotism" for inflicting Paris with the "atrocity". Pei estimated that 90 percent of Parisians opposed his design. "I received many angry glances in the streets of Paris," he said. Some condemnations carried nationalistic overtones. One opponent wrote: "I am surprised that one would go looking for a Chinese architect in America to deal with the historic heart of the capital of France."


title: I. M. Pei

text: Soon, however, Pei and his team won the support of several key cultural icons, including the conductor Pierre Boulez and Claude Pompidou, widow of former French President Georges Pompidou, after whom the similarly controversial Centre Georges Pompidou was named. In an attempt to soothe public ire, Pei took a suggestion from then-mayor of Paris Jacques Chirac and placed a full-sized cable model of the pyramid in the courtyard. During the four days of its exhibition, an estimated 60,000 people visited the site. Some critics eased their opposition after witnessing the proposed scale of the pyramid.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei demanded a method of glass production that resulted in clear panes. The pyramid was constructed at the same time as the subterranean levels below, which caused difficulties during the building stages. As they worked, construction teams came upon an abandoned set of rooms containing 25,000 historical items; these were incorporated into the rest of the structure to add a new exhibition zone.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The new Cour Napoléon was opened to the public on October 14, 1988, and the Pyramid entrance was opened the following March. By this time, public opposition had softened; a poll found a 56 percent approval rating for the pyramid, with 23 percent still opposed. The newspaper "Le Figaro" had vehemently criticized Pei's design, but later celebrated the tenth anniversary of its magazine supplement at the pyramid. Prince Charles of Britain surveyed the new site with curiosity, and declared it "marvelous, very exciting". A writer in "Le Quotidien de Paris" wrote: "The much-feared pyramid has become adorable."


title: I. M. Pei

text: The experience was exhausting for Pei, but also rewarding. "After the Louvre," he said later, "I thought no project would be too difficult." The pyramid achieved further widespread international recognition for its central role in the plot at the denouement of "The Da Vinci Code" by Dan Brown and its appearance in the final scene of the subsequent screen adaptation. The "Louvre Pyramid" has become Pei's most famous structure.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The opening of the Louvre Pyramid coincided with four other projects on which Pei had been working, prompting architecture critic Paul Goldberger to declare 1989 "the year of Pei" in "The New York Times". It was also the year in which Pei's firm changed its name to Pei Cobb Freed & Partners, to reflect the increasing stature and prominence of his associates. At the age of 72, Pei had begun thinking about retirement, but continued working long hours to see his designs come to light.


title: I. M. Pei

text: One of the projects took Pei back to Dallas, Texas, to design the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center. The success of city's performing artists, particularly the Dallas Symphony Orchestra then led by conductor Eduardo Mata, led to interest by city leaders in creating a modern center for musical arts that could rival the best halls in Europe. The organizing committee contacted 45 architects, but at first Pei did not respond, thinking that his work on the Dallas City Hall had left a negative impression. One of his colleagues from that project, however, insisted that he meet with the committee. He did and, although it would be his first concert hall, the committee voted unanimously to offer him the commission. As one member put it: "We were convinced that we would get the world's greatest architect putting his best foot forward."


title: I. M. Pei

text: The project presented a variety of specific challenges. Because its main purpose was the presentation of live music, the hall needed a design focused on acoustics first, then public access and exterior aesthetics. To this end, a professional sound technician was hired to design the interior. He proposed a shoebox auditorium, used in the acclaimed designs of top European symphony halls such as the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and Vienna Musikverein. Pei drew inspiration for his adjustments from the designs of the German architect Johann Balthasar Neumann, especially the Basilica of the Fourteen Holy Helpers. He also sought to incorporate some of the panache of the Paris Opéra designed by Charles Garnier.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's design placed the rigid shoebox at an angle to the surrounding street grid, connected at the north end to a long rectangular office building, and cut through the middle with an assortment of circles and cones. The design attempted to reproduce with modern features the acoustic and visual functions of traditional elements like filigree. The project was risky: its goals were ambitious and any unforeseen acoustic flaws would be virtually impossible to remedy after the hall's completion. Pei admitted that he did not completely know how everything would come together. "I can imagine only 60 percent of the space in this building," he said during the early stages. "The rest will be as surprising to me as to everyone else." As the project developed, costs rose steadily and some sponsors considered withdrawing their support. Billionaire tycoon Ross Perot made a donation of US$10 million, on the condition that it be named in honor of Morton H. Meyerson, the longtime patron of the arts in Dallas.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The building opened and immediately garnered widespread praise, especially for its acoustics. After attending a week of performances in the hall, a music critic for "The New York Times" wrote an enthusiastic account of the experience and congratulated the architects. One of Pei's associates told him during a party before the opening that the symphony hall was "a very mature building"; he smiled and replied: "Ah, but did I have to wait this long?"


title: I. M. Pei

text: A new offer had arrived for Pei from the Chinese government in 1982. With an eye toward the transfer of sovereignty of Hong Kong from the British in 1997, authorities in China sought Pei's aid on a new tower for the local branch of the Bank of China. The Chinese government was preparing for a new wave of engagement with the outside world and sought a tower to represent modernity and economic strength. Given the elder Pei's history with the bank before the Communist takeover, government officials visited the 89-year-old man in New York to gain approval for his son's involvement. Pei then spoke with his father at length about the proposal. Although the architect remained pained by his experience with Fragrant Hills, he agreed to accept the commission.


title: I. M. Pei

text: The proposed site in Hong Kong's Central District was less than ideal; a tangle of highways lined it on three sides. The area had also been home to a headquarters for Japanese military police during World War II, and was notorious for prisoner torture. The small parcel of land made a tall tower necessary, and Pei had usually shied away from such projects; in Hong Kong especially, the skyscrapers lacked any real architectural character. Lacking inspiration and unsure of how to approach the building, Pei took a weekend vacation to the family home in Katonah, New York. There he found himself experimenting with a bundle of sticks until he happened upon a cascading sequence.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei felt that his design for the Bank of China Tower needed to reflect "the aspirations of the Chinese people". The design that he developed for the skyscraper was not only unique in appearance, but also sound enough to pass the city's rigorous standards for wind-resistance. The building is composed of four triangular shafts rising up from a square base, supported by a visible truss structure that distributes stress to the four corners of the base. Using the reflective glass that had become something of a trademark for him, Pei organized the facade around diagonal bracing in a union of structure and form that reiterates the triangle motif established in the plan. At the top, he designed the roofs at sloping angles to match the rising aesthetic of the building. Some influential advocates of "feng shui" in Hong Kong and China criticized the design, and Pei and government officials responded with token adjustments.


title: I. M. Pei

text: As the tower neared completion, Pei was shocked to witness the government's massacre of unarmed civilians at the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. He wrote an opinion piece for "The New York Times" titled "China Won't Ever Be the Same," in which he said that the killings "tore the heart out of a generation that carries the hope for the future of the country". The massacre deeply disturbed his entire family, and he wrote that "China is besmirched."


title: I. M. Pei

text: As the 1990s began, Pei transitioned into a role of decreased involvement with his firm. The staff had begun to shrink, and Pei wanted to dedicate himself to smaller projects allowing for more creativity. Before he made this change, however, he set to work on his last major project as active partner: the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio. Considering his work on such bastions of high culture as the Louvre and U.S. National Gallery, some critics were surprised by his association with what many considered a tribute to low culture. The sponsors of the hall, however, sought Pei for specifically this reason; they wanted the building to have an aura of respectability from the beginning. As in the past, Pei accepted the commission in part because of the unique challenge it presented.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Using a glass wall for the entrance, similar in appearance to his Louvre pyramid, Pei coated the exterior of the main building in white metal, and placed a large cylinder on a narrow perch to serve as a performance space. The combination of off-centered wraparounds and angled walls was, Pei said, designed to provide "a sense of tumultuous youthful energy, rebelling, flailing about".


title: I. M. Pei

text: The building opened in 1995, and was received with moderate praise. "The New York Times" called it "a fine building", but Pei was among those who felt disappointed with the results. The museum's early beginnings in New York combined with an unclear mission created a fuzzy understanding among project leaders for precisely what was needed. Although the city of Cleveland benefited greatly from the new tourist attraction, Pei was unhappy with it.


title: I. M. Pei

text: At the same time, Pei designed a new museum for Luxembourg, the "Musée d'art moderne Grand-Duc Jean", commonly known as the Mudam. Drawing from the original shape of the Fort Thüngen walls where the museum was located, Pei planned to remove a portion of the original foundation. Public resistance to the historical loss forced a revision of his plan, however, and the project was nearly abandoned. The size of the building was halved, and it was set back from the original wall segments to preserve the foundation. Pei was disappointed with the alterations, but remained involved in the building process even during construction.


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 1995, Pei was hired to design an extension to the "Deutsches Historisches Museum", or German Historical Museum in Berlin. Returning to the challenge of the East Building of the U.S. National Gallery, Pei worked to combine a modernist approach with a classical main structure. He described the glass cylinder addition as a "beacon," and topped it with a glass roof to allow plentiful sunlight inside. Pei had difficulty working with German government officials on the project; their utilitarian approach clashed with his passion for aesthetics. "They thought I was nothing but trouble", he said.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei also worked at this time on two projects for a new Japanese religious movement called "Shinji Shumeikai". He was approached by the movement's spiritual leader, Kaishu Koyama, who impressed the architect with her sincerity and willingness to give him significant artistic freedom. One of the buildings was a bell tower, designed to resemble the "bachi" used when playing traditional instruments like the "shamisen". Pei was unfamiliar with the movement's beliefs, but explored them in order to represent something meaningful in the tower. As he said: "It was a search for the sort of expression that is not at all technical."


title: I. M. Pei

text: The experience was rewarding for Pei, and he agreed immediately to work with the group again. The new project was the Miho Museum, to display Koyama's collection of tea ceremony artifacts. Pei visited the site in Shiga Prefecture, and during their conversations convinced Koyama to expand her collection. She conducted a global search and acquired more than 300 items showcasing the history of the Silk Road.


title: I. M. Pei

text: One major challenge was the approach to the museum. The Japanese team proposed a winding road up the mountain, not unlike the approach to the NCAR building in Colorado. Instead, Pei ordered a hole cut through a nearby mountain, connected to a major road via a bridge suspended from ninety-six steel cables and supported by a post set into the mountain. The museum itself was built into the mountain, with 80 percent of the building underground.


title: I. M. Pei

text: When designing the exterior, Pei borrowed from the tradition of Japanese temples, particularly those found in nearby Kyoto. He created a concise spaceframe wrapped into French limestone and covered with a glass roof. Pei also oversaw specific decorative details, including a bench in the entrance lobby, carved from a 350-year-old "keyaki" tree. Because of Koyama's considerable wealth, money was rarely considered an obstacle; estimates at the time of completion put the cost of the project at US$350 million.


title: I. M. Pei

text: During the first decade of the 2000s, Pei designed a variety of buildings, including the Suzhou Museum near his childhood home. He also designed the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar at the request of the Al-Thani Family. Although it was originally planned for the corniche road along Doha Bay, Pei convinced the project coordinators to build a new island to provide the needed space. He then spent six months touring the region and surveying mosques in Spain, Syria, and Tunisia. He was especially impressed with the elegant simplicity of the Mosque of Ibn Tulun in Cairo.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Once again, Pei sought to combine new design elements with the classical aesthetic most appropriate for the location of the building. The sand-colored rectangular boxes rotate evenly to create a subtle movement, with small arched windows at regular intervals into the limestone exterior. Inside, galleries are arranged around a massive atrium, lit from above. The museum's coordinators were pleased with the project; its official website describes its "true splendour unveiled in the sunlight," and speaks of "the shades of colour and the interplay of shadows paying tribute to the essence of Islamic architecture".


title: I. M. Pei

text: The Macao Science Center in Macau was designed by Pei Partnership Architects in association with I. M. Pei. The project to build the science center was conceived in 2001 and construction started in 2006. The center was completed in 2009 and opened by the Chinese President Hu Jintao. The main part of the building is a distinctive conical shape with a spiral walkway and large atrium inside, similar to that of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City. Galleries lead off the walkway, mainly consisting of interactive exhibits aimed at science education. The building is in a prominent position by the sea and is now a Macau landmark.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's style was described as thoroughly modernist, with significant cubist themes. He was known for combining traditional architectural principles with progressive designs based on simple geometric patterns—circles, squares, and triangles are common elements of his work in both plan and elevation. As one critic wrote: "Pei has been aptly described as combining a classical sense of form with a contemporary mastery of method." In 2000, biographer Carter Wiseman called Pei "the most distinguished member of his Late-Modernist generation still in practice". At the same time, Pei himself rejected simple dichotomies of architectural trends. He once said: "The talk about modernism versus post-modernism is unimportant. It's a side issue. An individual building, the style in which it is going to be designed and built, is not that important. The important thing, really, is the community. How does it affect life?"


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's work is celebrated throughout the world of architecture. His colleague John Portman once told him: "Just once, I'd like to do something like the East Building." But this originality did not always bring large financial reward; as Pei replied to the successful architect: "Just once, I'd like to make the kind of money you do." His concepts, moreover, were too individualized and dependent on context to have given rise to a particular school of design. Pei referred to his own "analytical approach" when explaining the lack of a "Pei School".


title: I. M. Pei

text: "For me," he said, "the important distinction is between a stylistic approach to the design; and an analytical approach giving the process of due consideration to time, place, and purpose ... My analytical approach requires a full understanding of the three essential elements ... to arrive at an ideal balance among them."


title: I. M. Pei

text: In the words of his biographer, Pei won "every award of any consequence in his art", including the Arnold Brunner Award from the National Institute of Arts and Letters (1963), the Gold Medal for Architecture from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (1979), the AIA Gold Medal (1979), the first "Praemium Imperiale" for Architecture from the Japan Art Association (1989), the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, the 1998 Edward MacDowell Medal in the Arts, and the 2010 Royal Gold Medal from the Royal Institute of British Architects. In 1983 he was awarded the Pritzker Prize, sometimes referred to as the Nobel Prize of architecture. In its citation, the jury said: "Ieoh Ming Pei has given this century some of its most beautiful interior spaces and exterior forms ... His versatility and skill in the use of materials approach the level of poetry." The prize was accompanied by a US$100,000 award, which Pei used to create a scholarship for Chinese students to study architecture in the U.S., on the condition that they return to China to work. In 1986, he was one of twelve recipients of the Medal of Liberty. When he was awarded the 2003 Henry C. Turner Prize by the National Building Museum, museum board chair Carolyn Brody praised his impact on construction innovation: "His magnificent designs have challenged engineers to devise innovative structural solutions, and his exacting expectations for construction quality have encouraged contractors to achieve high standards." In December 1992, Pei was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George H. W. Bush. In 1996, Pei became the first person to be elected a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering. Pei was also an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei's wife of over 70 years, Eileen Loo, died on June 20, 2014. Together they had three sons, T'ing Chung (1945–2003), Chien Chung (b. 1946; known as Didi), and Li Chung (b. 1949; known as Sandi); and a daughter, Liane (b. 1960). T'ing Chung was an urban planner and alumnus of his father's "alma mater" MIT and Harvard. Chieng Chung and Li Chung, who are both Harvard College and Harvard Graduate School of Design alumni, founded and run Pei Partnership Architects. Liane is a lawyer.


title: I. M. Pei

text: In 2015, Pei's home health aide, Eter Nikolaishvili, grabbed Pei's right forearm and twisted it, resulting in bruising and bleeding and hospital treatment. Pei alleges that the assault occurred when Pei threatened to call the police about Nikolaishvili. Nikolaishvili agreed to plead guilty in 2016.


title: I. M. Pei

text: Pei celebrated his 100th birthday on April 26, 2017. He died in Manhattan on May 16, 2019, at the age of 102. He was survived by three of his children, seven grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Sandra Ávila Beltrán (born 16 October 1960) is a Mexican drug cartel member, dubbed "La Reina del Pacífico" (The Queen of the Pacific) by the media. She was arrested on September 28, 2007, and was charged with organized crime and conspiracy to drug trafficking. Some charges were later dropped but she was still held on possession of illegal weapons and money laundering, pending her extradition to the United States. On August 10, 2012, she was extradited to the United States to answer to criminal charges by the U.S. government.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Mexican and U.S. officials consider her as an important link between the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico and the Colombian Norte del Valle Cartel.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Ávila Beltrán was born in Baja California, Mexico, the daughter of María Luisa Beltrán Félix and Alfonso Ávila Quintero, a family member of Rafael Caro Quintero, a former leader of the Guadalajara Cartel. Family connections have played a major role in her criminal career, having kinship with the Beltrán-Leyva Brothers, then top heads of the Sinaloa cartel "federation." Ávila Beltrán was in fact a "third-generation" drug trafficker in her family. Officials in Mexico say Ávila Beltrán is the niece of Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, the godfather and the boss of bosses of the Mexican drug trade who is now serving a 40-year sentence for his alleged involvement in the 1984 murder of Enrique Camarena, a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) special agent. Her great uncle Juan José Quintero Payán was extradited to the United States on drug trafficking charges. On her mother's side, the Beltráns got involved in heroin smuggling in the 1970s and later diversified into cocaine. DEA officials state that Ávila Beltrán never shrank from employing the violence that comes with the turf and that "she used the typical intimidation tactics of Mexican organizations."


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: She reportedly had affairs with several well-known drug barons in her youth. She was married twice; both of her husbands were ex-police commanders who became drug traffickers and both were later killed by hired assassins. The police attribute her rise to power in the drug world primarily to her most recent relationship with Juan Diego Espinoza Ramírez, alias "The Tiger," who is said to be an important figure in the Colombian Norte del Valle Cartel. Ávila Beltrán lived in Guadalajara, Jalisco, and Hermosillo, Sonora until the police found more than 9 tons of cocaine on a ship in the Pacific port of Manzanillo, Colima in 2001 and tracked the shipment to her and her lover Espinoza Ramírez.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Despite her high-profile lifestyle, Beltrán long avoided leaving police any evidence. In 2002, however, she unexpectedly contacted authorities for help when her teenage son was kidnapped for a US$5 million ransom. She eventually got her son back, but not without raising suspicions that launched an investigation. It took more than four years and 30 federal agents to close in and finally arrest Ávila. She was arrested, along with Espinoza Ramírez, on 28 September 2007, in Mexico City. She was charged with and convicted of laundering money for billions of dollars' worth of drugs smuggled from Colombia to Mexico.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: In a tape of her police interrogation, she describes herself as a housewife who earns a little money on the side "selling clothes and renting houses." When asked why she had been arrested, she responded, "Because of an extradition order to the United States." Her life behind bars at the Santa Martha Acatitla women's prison in Mexico City has apparently not been to her liking as she filed a complaint with a Mexico City human rights commission, saying her cell had insects, which she referred to as noxious fauna. She also said the ban on bringing in food from restaurants violated her human rights.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: In January 2011 an investigation was launched after a doctor was allowed to enter the prison to give Beltrán a Botox injection treatment, a therapy that is not authorized for inmates. The prison's director and hospital chief were relieved of their duties. All of the drug charges were dropped in early 2011. As of February 2015 Sandra is free according to CNN "Now, after more than seven years behind bars, the woman known as "The Queen of the Pacific" is free.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: In June 2012 several Mexican judges ruled out major obstacles to extradite Ávila Beltrán to the United States on cocaine trafficking charges that date back to 2001. Originally, previous requests seeking to extradite Ávila Beltrán had been denied twice by a panel and then by a judge, but Ávila Beltrán had to answer to the charges by the United States for several cocaine shipments seized in Chicago.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: On 10 August 2012, Ávila Beltrán was extradited to the United States and flown to Florida to face cocaine possession and trafficking charges. Ávila denied the charges and as part of the plea deal said she provided "financial assistance for travel, lodging, and other expenses" to Espinosa from 2002 to 2004.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Ávila Beltrán was then deported back to Mexico, where she was immediately arrested on money laundering charges on 20 August 2013 and was sentenced to five more years in prison and a fine. She was imprisoned at the Federal Social Readaptation Center No. 4 federal prison in Tepic, Nayarit. She was released in 2015 and now lives in the city of Guadalajara. Since her arrest in 2007, she spent a total of seven years in prison, including two years in isolation.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: She also published a book, "The Queen of the Pacific: Time to Talk", based on a series of prison interviews she gave to Mexican journalist Julio Scherer.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Arturo Pérez-Reverte, author of the book (2002), stated that the story of his heroine Teresa Mendoza is partly based on Sandra Ávila Beltrán's life.


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Los Tucanes de Tijuana wrote a folk ballad that pays homage to Sandra Ávila as "a top lady who is a key part of the business."


title: Sandra Ávila Beltrán

text: Los Tigres del Norte wrote a song called "La Reina del Sur", based on the story of Teresa Mendoza, the fictional drug lord in by Arturo Pérez-Reverte.


title: Martin Milner

text: Martin Sam Milner (December 28, 1931 – September 6, 2015) was an American actor and radio host. He is best known for his performances on two television series: "Route 66", which aired on CBS from 1960 to 1964, and "Adam-12", which aired on NBC from 1968 to 1975.


title: Martin Milner

text: Milner was born on December 28, 1931 in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Mildred (née Martin), a Paramount Theater circuit dancer, and Sam Gordon Milner, who worked as a construction hand and later a film distributor. Sam was a Polish-Jewish immigrant. The family left Detroit when Milner was a young child, moved frequently, and settled in Seattle, Washington by the time he was nine. There he became involved in acting, first in school, and then in a children's theater group at the Cornish Playhouse.


title: Martin Milner

text: When Milner was a teenager, he moved with his family to Los Angeles where his parents hired an acting coach and later an agent for him. Milner had his first screen test and began his film career with his debut in the Warner Bros. film "Life with Father" (1947) in the role of John Day, the second oldest son of Clarence Day, played by William Powell, and Vinnie Day, portrayed by Irene Dunne. Less than two weeks after that film was completed in August 1946, Milner contracted polio. He recovered within a year and had bit parts in two more films, then graduated from North Hollywood High School in 1949. He immediately landed a minor role in the film "Sands of Iwo Jima" starring John Wayne.


title: Martin Milner

text: Milner attended the University of Southern California where he studied theater. He dropped out after a year in the fall of 1950 to concentrate on acting. He made his first television appearance in 1950 as a guest star in episode 28 titled "Pay Dirt" on "The Lone Ranger". The same year, he began a recurring role as Drexel Potter on the sitcom "The Stu Erwin Show".


title: Martin Milner

text: He had several more roles, both minor and major, in war films in the 1950s, including another John Wayne picture titled "Operation Pacific" (1951) and "Mister Roberts" (1955), with William Powell and Henry Fonda, James Cagney and Jack Lemmon. On the set of "Halls of Montezuma" (1950), he met and befriended actor Jack Webb, and he began intermittent work on Webb's radio series "Dragnet".


title: Martin Milner

text: In 1952, Milner began a two-year stint in the United States Army. Assigned to Special Services at Fort Ord on California's Monterey Bay Peninsula, he directed training films and was both an emcee and performer in skits for a touring unit created to entertain soldiers. Milner was encouraged by fellow soldier and future actor David Janssen to pursue an acting career when his time in the Army ended. Jansen and Milner served at Fort Ord with fellow future actors Clint Eastwood and Richard Long. While in the Army, Milner continued working for Jack Webb, playing Officer Bill Lockwood (briefly the partner of Sgt. Friday) and other characters on the "Dragnet" radio series on weekends. He also appeared on six episodes of Webb's "Dragnet" television series between 1952 and 1955.


title: Martin Milner

text: After his military service ended, Milner had a recurring role on "The Life of Riley" from 1953 to 1958. He also made guest appearances on numerous television shows, including episodes of "The Bigelow Theatre", "The Great Gildersleeve", "TV Reader's Digest", "Science Fiction Theatre", "Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse", "NBC Matinee Theater", "The West Point Story", "The Twilight Zone" (episode: "Mirror Image"), "Wagon Train" and "Rawhide".


title: Martin Milner

text: Milner was under contract at Hecht-Lancaster, Burt Lancaster’s production company. He also acted in films, including "The Long Gray Line" (1955), "Mister Roberts" (1955), "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" (1957), "Sweet Smell of Success" (1957), "Marjorie Morningstar" (1958), "Compulsion" (1959), and "13 Ghosts" (1960). He later costarred in "Valley of the Dolls" (1967), based on the best-selling novel by Jacqueline Susann.


title: Martin Milner

text: In 1960, Milner was cast as Tod Stiles on the television series "Route 66", which ran from 1960 to 1964. Created by Stirling Silliphant, "Route 66" is about two regular but distinctly different young men in a car touring the United States. After the sudden death of his father left him penniless, Milner's character travels across the United States in a Chevrolet Corvette, taking a variety of odd jobs along the way and getting involved in other people's problems. His traveling partner on his escapades is his friend Buz Murdock (played by George Maharis), a former employee of his father's. During the series' third season, Glenn Corbett replaced Maharis.


title: Martin Milner

text: "Route 66" was shot on location, so Milner spent nearly four years traveling the U.S. for the series, sometimes taking his wife and children along.


title: Martin Milner

text: By the mid-60's, Milner and Jack Webb had a long-established working relationship. Milner had appeared in numerous episodes of both the radio and television versions of the series "Dragnet", and had worked with Webb in the films "Halls of Montezuma" (1950) and "Pete Kelly's Blues" (1955).


title: Martin Milner

text: In 1968, Milner returned to television as seven-year LAPD veteran uniform patrol Officer Peter Joseph "Pete" Malloy in "Adam-12", a Webb-produced police drama. Kent McCord played his partner, rookie Officer James A. "Jim" Reed. The series ran from 1968 to 1975. Like Webb's "Dragnet", it was based on real Los Angeles Police Department procedures and cases.


title: Martin Milner

text: Milner was Webb's choice for Pete Malloy in part because of his relative youth and prior acting credits and because of his on-camera driving experience from his days on "Route 66". He guest-starred in three episodes of "Emergency!" between 1972 and 1976, during and after "Adam-12"s run on NBC, the best known and first of which was the pilot movie "The Wedsworth-Townsend Act".


title: Martin Milner

text: In 1971, Milner portrayed the murder victim in the premiere episode of "Columbo" titled "Murder by the Book". After "Adam-12", Milner starred as Karl Robinson in a television series version of "The Swiss Family Robinson" (1975–1976), produced by Irwin Allen. Most of his later work was as a guest star, including "MacGyver" (as the protagonist's father); "Airwolf"; "Murder, She Wrote"; and "". In 1983, Milner hosted a morning radio wake-up show on AM 600 KOGO in San Diego.


title: Martin Milner

text: In 1990, Milner teamed again with Kent McCord in the cable TV-movie "Nashville Beat" (1990), on The Nashville Network. The story was co-written by McCord, who cast himself as an LAPD detective who works with his former partner, played by Milner, in Nashville, Tennessee. In 1992, Milner guest-starred on five episodes of ABC's "Life Goes On".


title: Martin Milner

text: After retiring from acting, Milner co-hosted a radio show about fishing called "Let's Talk Hook-Up" on San Diego-area sports station XETRA AM 690 (now XEWW).


title: Martin Milner

text: In 1998, Milner took part in a documentary film, "Route 66: Return to the Road with Martin Milner", in which he drove a 1961 Corvette from Chicago to Santa Monica.


title: Martin Milner

text: In May 1956, Milner met singer and actress Judith Bess Jones at a Hollywood dinner party. They were married on February 23, 1957 in Waukegan, Illinois; together they had four children.


title: Martin Milner

text: In February 2003, Milner's eldest daughter Amy, who appeared in an episode of "Adam 12", was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia. She died in December 2004.


title: Martin Milner

text: On September 6, 2015, Milner died of heart failure at his home in Carlsbad, California at age 83. Milner's remains were cremated.


title: Crime film

text: Crime films, in the broadest sense, is a film genre inspired by and analogous to the crime fiction literary genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and its detection. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine with many other genres, such as drama or gangster film, but also include comedy, and, in turn, is divided into many sub-genres, such as mystery, suspense or noir.


title: Crime film

text: Screenwriter and scholar Eric R. Williams identified crime film as one of eleven super-genres in his Screenwriters Taxonomy, claiming that all feature-length narrative films can be classified by these super-genres.  The other ten super-genres are action, fantasy, horror, romance, science fiction, slice of life, sports, thriller, war and western. Williams identifies drama in a broader category called "film type", mystery and suspense as "macro-genres", and film noir as a "screenwriter's pathway" explaining that these categories are additive rather than exclusionary. "Chinatown" would be an example of a film that is a drama (film type) crime film (super-genre) that is also a noir (pathway) mystery (macro-genre).


title: Crime film

text: Crime films are often based on real events or are adaptations of plays or novels, or a remake or adoption of a previous film. Some plots are original and entirely fictional. For example, the 1957 film version of "Witness for the Prosecution" is an adaptation of a 1953 stage play of that name, which is in turn based on Agatha Christie's short story, originally published in 1933. The film version was remade in 1982, and there have been other adaptations. However, each of these media has its own advantages and limitations, which in the case of cinema is the time constraint.


title: Crime film

text: "Witness for the Prosecution" is a classic example of a courtroom drama. In a courtroom drama, a charge is brought against one of the main characters, who claims to be innocent. Another major part is played by the lawyer (in England a barrister) representing the defendant in court and battling with the public prosecutor. They may enlist the services of a private investigator to find out what really happened and who the real perpetrator is. However, in most cases it is not clear at all whether the accused is guilty of the crime or not—this is how suspense is created.


title: Crime film

text: Often, the private investigator storms into the courtroom at the last minute in order to bring a new and crucial piece of information to the attention of the court. This type of literature lends itself to the literary genre of drama focused more on dialogue (the opening and closing statements, the witnesses' testimonies, etc.) and little or no necessity for a shift in scenery. The auditorium of the theatre becomes an extension of the courtroom. When a courtroom drama is filmed, the traditional device employed by screenwriters and directors is the frequent use of flashbacks, in which the crime and everything that led up to it is narrated and reconstructed from different angles.


title: Crime film

text: A classic courtroom drama is U.S. playwright Reginald Rose's "Twelve Angry Men" (1954), which is set in the jury deliberation room of a New York court. Eleven members of the jury, aiming at a unanimous verdict of "guilty", try to get it over with as quickly as possible. And they would really succeed in achieving their common aim if it were not for the eighth juror (played by Henry Fonda in the 1957 movie adaptation), who, on second thoughts, considers it his duty to convince his colleagues that the defendant may be innocent after all, and who, by doing so, triggers much discussion, confusion, and anger.


title: Crime film

text: Crime action films are those that favor violence. According to Jule Selbo, the crime and action genres are intertwined: "the films could not exist in their popular form without the other on equal footing—therefore they are working in "tandem"". Examples include the "Fast & Furious" film series.


title: Crime film

text: Crime comedy films are a hybrid of the crime film and the comedy that play with the conventions of the crime film and may introduce aspects of dark humor. Generally, they feature dim-witted criminals or crime sprees that are bumblingly executed or are presented in a lighthearted manner. The genre had a resurgence in popularity in the independent film scene of the 1990s, which combined the clichés of the crime thriller with comic appropriations.


title: Crime film

text: Crime dramas are films that focus on the moral dilemmas of criminals. They differ from crime thrillers as the films generally focus on a grimmer and more realistic portrayal of the criminal world over violence and gunplay sequences. Occasionally these films begin with the flashier elements of the crime thriller such as in "The Godfather", "Goodfellas", and "Once Upon a Time in America" to develop into more contemplative narratives.""


title: Crime film

text: Crime thrillers focus on the exciting elements of both successful and unsuccessful crimes. Unlike police procedurals, they focus on a criminal or a group of criminals rather than law enforcement. These films tend to focus on conspiracies and psychopathology of criminals, and are often violent and nihilistic. Examples include "The Killers", "The Peacock","Joseph" and "Nayattu".


title: Crime film

text: Dacoit films are a genre of Indian cinema revolving around dacoity. The genre was pioneered by Mehboob Khan's "Aurat" (1940) and "Mother India" (1957). Other examples include "Gunga Jumna" (1961), "Sholay" (1975) and "Bandit Queen" (1994).


title: Crime film

text: Gangster films are films that tell the story from the perspective of gangsters, who are portrayed as idealistic antiheroes. The gangster film is among the oldest genres of films, with examples dating as early as "Underworld", "Little Caesar" and "Scarface". After World War II, these films became increasingly violent and menacing with films like "Underworld USA". These films also were made outside the United States in Hong Kong, Japan and France.


title: Crime film

text: This film deals with a group of criminals attempting to perform a theft or robbery, as well as the possible consequences that follow. Heist films that are lighter in tone are called caper films. Examples include "The Killing", "Ocean's 11", "Dog Day Afternoon", "Reservoir Dogs", and "The Town".


title: Crime film

text: Mumbai underworld is an Indian cinema crime film genre. The genre frequently draws inspiration from real Mumbai underworld gangsters, such as Haji Mastan, Dawood Ibrahim and D-Company. The genre was pioneered by Salim–Javed's "Zanjeer" (1973) and "Deewaar" (1975), starring Amitabh Bachchan. Other examples include the "Don" franchise (19782012), "Nayakan" (1986), "Salaam Bombay!" (1988), "Parinda" (1989), "Satya" (1998), "Company" (2002), "Black Friday" (2004), "Slumdog Millionaire" (2008) and "Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai" (2010).


title: Crime film

text: Police procedurals focus on the police who investigate the actions of criminals, with examples such as "He Walked by Night", "In the Heat of the Night", "Madigan", and "The French Connection".


title: Crime film

text: The prison film is a type of crime film that focuses on the difficult living conditions in prisons, as well as occasionally focusing on inmates adjusting to life outside of prison.


title: Terracotta

text: Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense is an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous.


title: Terracotta

text: In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta is the term normally used for sculpture made in earthenware and also for various practical uses, including vessels (notably flower pots), water and waste water pipes, roofing tiles, bricks, and surface embellishment in building construction. The term is also used to refer to the natural brownish orange color of most terracotta.


title: Terracotta

text: In archaeology and art history, "terracotta" is often used to describe objects such as figurines not made on a potter's wheel. Vessels and other objects that are or might be made on a wheel from the same material are called earthenware pottery; the choice of term depends on the type of object rather than the material or firing technique. Unglazed pieces, and those made for building construction and industry, are also more likely to be referred to as terracotta. Glazed terracotta for tableware, and other vessels, is called earthenware, or by a more precise term such as faience which denotes a particular type of glaze.


title: Terracotta

text: Glazed architectural terracotta and its unglazed version as exterior surfaces for buildings were used in East Asia for some centuries before becoming popular in the West in the 19th century. Architectural terracotta can also refer to decorated ceramic elements such as antefixes and revetments, which made a large contribution to the appearance of temples and other buildings in the classical architecture of Europe, as well as in the Ancient Near East.


title: Terracotta

text: This article covers the senses of terracotta as a medium in sculpture, as in the Terracotta Army and Greek terracotta figurines, and architectural decoration. East Asian and European sculpture in porcelain is not covered.


title: Terracotta

text: Terracotta is a very flexible material to sculpt. Pieces can be formed by both an "additive" technique, adding portions of clay to the growing pieces, or a "subtractive" one, carving into a solid lump with a knife or similar tool. Perhaps most common is a combination of these, building up the broad shape and then removing pieces, or adding more, to produce details.


title: Terracotta

text: The most common method of production is to take an appropriate refined clay, then form it to the desired shape. Alternatively it may be made with one or more moulds. After drying, it is placed in a kiln or atop combustible material in a pit, and then fired. The typical firing temperature is around , though it may be as low as in historic and archaeological examples. The iron content, reacting with oxygen during firing, gives the fired body a reddish color, though the overall color varies widely across shades of yellow, orange, buff, red, "terracotta", pink, grey or brown.


title: Terracotta

text: A final method is to carve fired bricks or other terracotta shapes. This is less common, but features for example in the architecture of Bengal on Hindu temples and mosques.


title: Terracotta

text: Fired terracotta is not watertight, but surface-burnishing the body before firing can decrease its porousness and a layer of glaze can make it watertight. It is suitable for use below ground to carry pressurized water (an archaic use), for garden pots and irrigation or building decoration in many environments, and for oil containers, oil lamps, or ovens. Most other uses, such as for tableware, sanitary piping, or building decoration in freezing environments, require the material to be glazed. Terracotta, if uncracked, will ring if lightly struck.


title: Terracotta

text: Painted (polychrome) terracotta is typically first covered with a thin coat of gesso, then painted. It has been very widely used but the paint is only suitable for indoor positions and is much less durable than fired colors in or under a ceramic glaze. Terracotta sculpture was very rarely left in its "raw" fired state in the West until the 18th century.


title: Terracotta

text: Terracotta female figurines were uncovered by archaeologists in excavations of Mohenjo-daro, Pakistan (3000–1500 BC). Along with phallus-shaped stones, these suggest some sort of fertility cult. The Burney Relief is an outstanding terracotta plaque from Ancient Mesopotamia of about 1950 BC. In Mesoamerica, the great majority of Olmec figurines were in terracotta. Many ushabti mortuary statuettes were also made of terracotta in Ancient Egypt.


title: Terracotta

text: The Ancient Greeks' Tanagra figurines were mass-produced mold-cast and fired terracotta figurines, that seem to have been widely affordable in the Hellenistic period, and often purely decorative in function. They were part of a wide range of Greek terracotta figurines, which included larger and higher-quality works such as the Aphrodite Heyl; the Romans too made great numbers of small figurines, which were often used in a religious context as cult statues or temple decorations. Etruscan art often used terracotta in preference to stone even for larger statues, such as the near life-size Apollo of Veii and the "Sarcophagus of the Spouses". Campana reliefs are Ancient Roman terracotta reliefs, originally mostly used to make friezes for the outside of buildings, as a cheaper substitute for stone.


title: Terracotta

text: Indian sculpture made heavy use of terracotta from as early as the Indus Valley civilization (with stone and metal sculpture being rather rare), and in more sophisticated areas had largely abandoned modeling for using molds by the 1st century BC. This allows relatively large figures, nearly up to life-size, to be made, especially in the Gupta period and the centuries immediately following it. Several vigorous local popular traditions of terracotta folk sculpture remain active today, such as the Bankura horses.


title: Terracotta

text: Precolonial West African sculpture also made extensive use of terracotta. The regions most recognized for producing terracotta art in that part of the world include the Nok culture of central and north-central Nigeria, the Ife/Benin cultural axis in western and southern Nigeria (also noted for its exceptionally naturalistic sculpture), and the Igbo culture area of eastern Nigeria, which excelled in terracotta pottery. These related, but separate, traditions also gave birth to elaborate schools of bronze and brass sculpture in the area.


title: Terracotta

text: Chinese sculpture made great use of terracotta, with and without glazing and color, from a very early date. The famous Terracotta Army of Emperor Qin Shi Huang, 209–210 BC, was somewhat untypical, and two thousand years ago reliefs were more common, in tombs and elsewhere. Later Buddhist figures were often made in painted and glazed terracotta, with the Yixian glazed pottery luohans, probably of 1150–1250, now in various Western museums, among the most prominent examples. Brick-built tombs from the Han dynasty were often finished on the interior wall with bricks decorated on one face; the techniques included molded reliefs. Later tombs contained many figures of protective spirits and animals and servants for the afterlife, including the famous horses of the T'ang dynasty; as an arbitrary matter of terminology these tend not to be referred to as terracottas.


title: Terracotta

text: European medieval art made little use of terracotta sculpture, until the late 14th century, when it became used in advanced International Gothic workshops in parts of Germany. The Virgin illustrated at the start of the article from Bohemia is the unique example known from there. A few decades later, there was a revival in the Italian Renaissance, inspired by excavated classical terracottas as well as the German examples, which gradually spread to the rest of Europe. In Florence Luca della Robbia (1399/1400–1482) was a sculptor who founded a family dynasty specializing in glazed and painted terracotta, especially large roundels which were used to decorate the exterior of churches and other buildings. These used the same techniques as contemporary maiolica and other tin-glazed pottery. Other sculptors included Pietro Torrigiano (1472–1528), who produced statues, and in England busts of the Tudor royal family. The unglazed busts of the Roman Emperors adorning Hampton Court Palace, by Giovanni da Maiano, 1521, were another example of Italian work in England. They were originally painted but this has now been lost from weathering.


title: Terracotta

text: In the 18th-century unglazed terracotta, which had long been used for preliminary clay models or maquettes that were then fired, became fashionable as a material for small sculptures including portrait busts. It was much easier to work than carved materials, and allowed a more spontaneous approach by the artist. Claude Michel (1738–1814), known as Clodion, was an influential pioneer in France. John Michael Rysbrack (1694–1770), a Flemish portrait sculptor working in England, sold his terracotta "modelli" for larger works in stone, and produced busts only in terracotta. In the next century the French sculptor Albert-Ernest Carrier-Belleuse made many terracotta pieces, but possibly the most famous is "The Abduction of Hippodameia" depicting the Greek mythological scene of a centaur kidnapping Hippodameia on her wedding day.


title: Terracotta

text: Terracotta tiles have a long history in many parts of the world. Many ancient and traditional roofing styles included more elaborate sculptural elements than the plain roof tiles, such as Chinese Imperial roof decoration and the antefix of western classical architecture. In India West Bengal made a speciality of terracotta temples, with the sculpted decoration from the same material as the main brick construction.


title: Terracotta

text: In the 19th century the possibilities of terracotta decoration of buildings were again appreciated by architects, often using thicker pieces of terracotta, and surfaces that are not flat. The American architect Louis Sullivan is well known for his elaborate glazed terracotta ornamentation, designs that would have been impossible to execute in any other medium. Terracotta and tile were used extensively in the town buildings of Victorian Birmingham, England. Terra cotta was marketed as a miracle material, largely impervious to the elements. Terra cotta, however, can indeed be damaged by water penetration or exposure or fail through faulty design or installation. An excessive faith in the durability of the material led to shortcuts in design and execution, which coupled with a belief that the material did not require maintenance tainted the reputation of the material. By about 1930 the widespread use of concrete and Modernist architecture largely ended the use of terracotta in architecture.


title: Terracotta

text: Along with serving decorative purposes, terracotta tile is also a flooring construct. In fact, terracotta floors are found worldwide with some being several hundred years old. The quality of terracotta tiles is directly impacted by factors including the source of the clay, the manufacturing methods (kiln-fired being more durable than sun baked), and whether the terracotta tiles are sealed or not.


title: Terracotta

text: As compared to bronze sculpture, terracotta uses a far simpler and quicker process for creating the finished work with much lower material costs. The easier task of modelling, typically with a limited range of knives and wooden shaping tools, but mainly using the fingers, allows the artist to take a more free and flexible approach. Small details that might be impractical to carve in stone, of hair or costume for example, can easily be accomplished in terracotta, and drapery can sometimes be made up of thin sheets of clay that make it much easier to achieve a realistic effect.