UF CityLab student Christopher Fadely's concepot for a conference center and hotel in doswntown Sarasota. The project was part of coursework in the first semester of the master's degree program. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 1-7-2016.
The Center for Architecture Sarasota is living up to its promise to display compelling exhibits in its Don Chapell Gallery.
Not even a year old, the gallery has held exhibits on the work of architects Joe Farrell, Toshiko Mori and Guy Peterson.
In advance of its exhibit on the work of acclaimed landscape architect Dan Kiley, CFAS is showing the projects created by the first class of six architecture students at UF CityLab. The University of Florida’s masters of architecture program shares the McCulloch Pavilion, 265 S. Orange Ave., Sarasota, with CFAS.
The student work will be on display until Wednesday, after just a week on the walls. I took a few minutes to look at the work on Thursday, and was impressed. If I had just walked in off the street, I would have thought the panels and models represented the work of accomplished professionals. The assignment was to design a theoretical hotel and conference center for downtown Sarasota.
They also offered concepts as to how the alley on the north side of the McCulloch Pavilion could be used as an outdoor display space, and, in their “spare” time, the students created a video on their impressions of Sarasota.
In the front corner of the gallery stand two souvenirs, if you will, of the Mori exhibit, “Dialogue in Details.” They are two of the 12 “Totems” that were created by Mori as slices of a building’s walls.
Two of architect Toshiko Mori's "Totems," which represent cross-sections of buildings, have been donated to the Center for Architecture Sarasota by Dan Denton. They are on permanent display at CFAS' Don Chapell Gallery. Staff photo / Harold Bubil; 1-7-2016.
These two Totems are details of a Paul Rudolph house alongside a similar detail that Mori used in her own design for an addition to the same house, the Burkhardt/Cohen house on Casey Key. The house was featured on a CFAS tour in October led by Mori.
The totems are the gift of Dan Denton, a CFAS member and a long-time local champion of good design. The gift is dedicated to Robert Beardsworth (1947-1993), a modernist who worked as a commercial and residential designer.
“I want to support the Center because it underscores the importance of good design now and for future generations,” Denton said.
The Kiley exhibit opens on Jan. 16. Kiley was one of the most important and influential modernist landscape architects of the 20th century, said CFAS’ Cindy Peterson. The traveling exhibit, produced by The Cultural Landscape Foundation, will be on view until March 15.
On April 15, New York architect Wendy Evans Joseph, FAIA, LEED AP, of Studio Joseph, will lecture at CFAS.
The gallery is open from noon to 5 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, noon to 8 p.m. Wednesdays, and 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturdays.
