Bruce Goff's 'Gratifying Sense of Harmony'

From its lilting and occasionally bouncy score and gentle narration to the fading of the 16mm film's colors, The Artistry of Bruce Goff is clearly of its time. Recently uploaded to Vimeo by USModernist, the film is also revealing of Goff's artistic sensibilities: it starts with an explanation of his two-dimensional compositions before moving on to the architecture of the Joe and Etsuko Price House and Studio—aka Shin'en Kan (1956)—in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, one of Goff's most famous buildings, and certainly one Price knew intimately. Later, Price gifted his collection of Japanese art to LACMA and worked with Goff on the building that would house it—the only 20th-century building at LACMA retained in its recent overhaul. Just as the Pavilion for Japanese Art strove to fuse architecture and art, The Artistry of Bruce Goff ultimately argues the same: that architecture is art.