Peter Eisenman

Peter Eisenman (Newark, August 11, 1932) is an American architect, one of the leading exponents of deconstructivism in American architecture.

Considered one of the New York Five, Eisenman is known for his writing and speaking about architecture as well as his designs, which have been called high modernist or deconstructive.

Peter Eisenman was born to Jewish parents on August 11, 1932, in Newark, New Jersey. As a child, he attended Columbia High School located in Maplewood, New Jersey. He transferred in to the architecture school as an undergraduate at Cornell University and gave up his position on the swimming team in order to commit full-time to his studies. He received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Cornell, a Master of Architecture degree from Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Cambridge. He received an honorary degree from Syracuse University School of Architecture in 2007.

He first rose to prominence as a member of the New York Five (also known as the Whites, as opposed to the Grays of Yale: Robert A.M. Stern, Charles Moore, etc.), five architects (Eisenman, Charles Gwathmey, John Hejduk, Richard Meier, and Michael Graves) some of whose work was presented at a CASE Studies conference in 1969. Eisenman received a number of grants from the Graham Foundation for work done in this period. These architects' work at the time was often considered a reworking of the ideas of Le Corbusier. Subsequently, the five architects each developed unique styles and ideologies, with Eisenman becoming more affiliated with Deconstructivism.
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