Evening Star Newspaper, April 2, 1933, Page 71

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, APRIL 2, 1933 RACE Architect Frank Lloyd 'Wright’s Project for Teaching Men and Women to Make the Most of Life in a Machine Age. F man does not master the machine, the machine will cause the downfall of man. Working on this premise, and merging his plan around the central idea that man’s work and man’s life must be a harmonized unit, Frank Lloyd Wright, famous architect, iconoclast and social ad- venturer, has carried his defiance of conven- tion into the field of education. On the “shining brow” of a wooded hill in southwestern Wisconsin, 4 miles from the vil- lage of Spring Green, and only 35 miles from Madison, capital city of the State, Wright has set up his institution, which he calls Taliesin Fellowship. When Frank Lloyd Wright constructed his hillside home nearly a quarter of a century ago, he called it Taliesin because the word means “ghining brow.” Taliesin was the name of a Welsh poet whose works praised the glory of the fine arts. At Taliesin, Wright has lived the most of his been such a curious mixture of drudgery must be abolished, and men must “co- operate actively and create joyously.” those aims in view, he founded ‘Taliesin Fellowship, where he is training men and women who, he is confident, will go out into the world and lay the foundations for this ideal civilization. Seven girls and 35 boys are now studying in the fellowship, which was officially opened last October. Prior to completion of the first new building, the fellowship’s activities were centered in Taliesin, Wright's home. Now another building is in use. It is the reconstructed main unit of the former Hillside Home School, founded more than 25 years ago by Wright's two sisters, and long in disuse. In this remodeled structure are Taliesin theater, 11 lecture and work rooms, the main living room, the library, the girls’ and boys’ living quarters, the kitchen and the dining room. : This building provides the fellowship’s com- Taliesin theater munity center. is the work- shop for a Little Theater group, The main Hving room is used for music, recreation, danc- ing and social gatherings. A printing shop, where the fellowship publishes its own maga- zine, is in the basement. e Excavation is now in progress for another new unit, 80 feet square. An architects’ studio, with a large skylight and windows on all sides, will occupy the whole top floor. The lower floor will be a boys’ dormitory. There will be four small cottages on the hill behind the school. The instructors—a painter, a sculptor, an architect and a musician—will live in these. The basic idea of the fellowship is to de- velop well-balanced human beings. Therefore . the curriculum is a combination of crafts and cultural subjects. Craft subjects now being studied by the 42 apprentices, as the students are called, are: Architectural construction and design, deco- ration, as an organic feature of architecture; of architecture, typographical de- sign, molding and casting, adapted to modern systems of construction in glass, concrete, and metal and wood working, by modern machinery. At present the students are working out practical problems in design as related to the construction of new buildings for the fellow- ship. Mr. Wright personally supervises all of their work. On the cultural side, the apprentices study philosophy, sculpture, painting, drama, music and rhythm. These are now being supple- mented by glass making, pottery and modern reproduction processes, BU’r in all these subjects, architecture is the keystone, the central point from which all lines radiate. Wright believes that “any rational attempt to integrate art and industry, and to relate both N One of Frank Lloyd Wright's studios in his home at Taliesin, where 42 young people are now studying in a new and with our everyday life, will proceed as essential architecture. It must grow by way of our secial, industrial and economic processes.” Not limited to architecture, however, the fellowship apprentices are allowed to follow their own creative impulses in whatever direc- tion they may lead. Wright believes that the aim of his school— Frank Lloyd Wright, recognized as one of the world's greatest architects, who is now exercising his genius in the field of education. to teach people how to be happy in the machine age—might well be the proper ideal of modern democracy. As an educator, Wright is not unkke Dr. Alexander Meiklejohn, whose experimental col- lege at the University of Wisconsin, recently abandoned, drew Nationwide attention. Both men believe that system, organization and rigid rules have ruined the modern educa- tional system as a social force, At Taliesin Fellowship there are no classes, no definite entrance requirements. Mr. Wright accepts those students whose general attitudes, qualifications or natural abilities seem to fit them into his scheme. No diplomas are given to graduates. There is no graduation. Serious- minded students need none of this “claptrap” to stimulate their desire for knowledge, Wright believes. Taliesin Fellowship is a communistic com- munity. Each apprentice must help with the work necessary to keeping up the institution, For three hours each day, each student does some sort of labor. Thus are costs of operation kept at a minimum, so that the only cost of entering the fellowship is a nominal tuition fee, figured on a strictly cost basis, to cover living expenses and the pay of instructors. “In addition to reducing the cost of an educa- tion to the student, this work plan gives each apprentice a real sense of co-operation which has a high spiritual value in such a commu- nity,” Wright explains. Already the educational scoffers are pooh- poohing Mr. Wright and his fellowship. But Wright does not care. While they scoff from their lofty academic perches, he is planning, building, struggling to complete the machinery which he hopes will give impetus to an educa- tional revolution in America. The same deflant spirit that has carried Wright through a tempestuous career of archi- tectural and social non-conformity now is spur- ring him on toward this new goal. IGHTING all the traditions of architecture, he won his battle, winning recognition first in Europe and the Orient, and later in his own land. Now he is confident that victory again will come to rest on the “shining brow” of Taliesin, One of his triumphs in architecture was the famous Imperial Hotel in Tokio, Japan. This structure alone was left standing after the great JapaneSe earthquake. . s, Midway unorthodox kind of school. When Wright designed the Imperial Hotel, the world’s leading architects scoffed. It was impractical, it was a monstrosity, they said. Vindication for Wright's cantilever principle monstrosity. . Accepting his triumphs with the attitude that has earned them, and that therefore they of no further acclaim, Wright re- the deflant iconoclast when society balks at his unconventional conduct. ‘Wright now lives at Taliesin with his fourth wife, the former Olgivanna Milanov of Mon- tenegro. His first wife, Catherine Lee, whom he married before he was 20, and when she was but 17, bore him six children. Miriam Noel Wright, the architect’s third wife, bore him no children. She died in Mil- waukee, Wis., about two years ago. Wright was born in Richlande Center, Wis., on June 8, 1869, the son of Russell Cary Wright Jones. From 1884 to 1887 he studied civil engineering at the University of Wisconsin. - Tiring of the confinements of academic life at Madison, he pawned his books, and with $7 in cash went to Chicago to start his career in architecture, Now, at Taliesin Fellowship, he is applying to the field of education essentially the same principles which he employed so successfully in architecture. As an architect Wright was a non-conform- ist because he designed buildings to fit their surroundings, instead of trying to change sur- roundings to fit certain architectural styles. As an educator, he believes the school should 2 A figure from Frank Lloyd Wright's Gardens in Chicago. adapt itself to the student, instead of trying to change the student to fit a certain system of The parallel may be carried further. Just as Wright went straight to nature for archi- tectural inspiration, so has he gone back to the land for material with which to construct his fellowship at Taliesin. < “We haven't much money and little credit, so we're going back to the land for everything to build this school,” he explains. ‘“The plant which we are going ta set up here would cost $125,000 under the usual conditions of con- struction. It won't cost us one-quarter of that amount.” Workmen have gone back into the hills on Wright’s 250-acre estate and consiructed a lime kiln. They are quarrying, reducing the stone and performing all the other functions necessary to preperation of the building ma- terial from the time it is taken from the earth. 2 is needed, so the architect has his men are clearing neighbor. the men working on the buildings are . They work for addition to a small able shifting in the rank of relative impor- tance of agricultural products. commodity has dropped to second place, while dairy products have risen to leadership. Vege- last, rose to third Wheat Stock Dwindles N improvement in the price of wheat in recent weeks probably forecasts the long- -for reduction in the huge surplus of the grain which has just about brought ruin to the wheat farmer of the United States. Latest reports indicate that the stock of wheat in