Brutalism and Field Theory at UIC

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Brutalism and Field Theory at UIC

Walter Netsch's Behavioral Sciences building on the University of Illinois Chicago Campus

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Liz Waytkus/Docomomo US

The University of Illinois at Chicago Circle was created between 1963 and 1968 as an “instant campus” in response to major growth in college enrollment following WWII.  Its Brutalist design by Walter Netsch and SOM became a nationally recognized model for other campuses across the country, even as it displaced thousands of neighborhood residents and sparked local grassroots protests. This tour will include virtual visits to the buildings and spaces at UIC that have delighted and frustrated users since the day they opened. The tour will conclude with a live Q&A.

Guide: Robert Bruegmann

Duration: 1 hour with live component and Q&A

Robert Bruegmann

Robert Bruegmann is an historian and critic of the built environment.  He received his PhD in art history from the University of Pennsylvania in 1976 and since 1979 has been at the University of Illinois at Chicago where he is currently Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Art History, Architecture and Urban Planning. He has also taught at the Philadelphia College of Art, MIT and Columbia University. Among his books are Holabird & Roche and Holabird & Root, An Illustrated Catalogue of Work, 1991; The Architects and the City: Holabird & Roche of Chicago 1880-1918, 1998; Sprawl: A Compact History, 2005; The Architecture of Harry Weese, 2010, and, as editor, Modernism at Mid-Century, The Architecture of the United States Airforce Academy, 1995; and Art Deco Chicago: Designing Modern America, 2018. His main areas of research are in the history of architecture, urban planning, landscape and historic preservation.

Upcoming Tours

Three Modern Houses in the Chicagoland Suburbs

This tour offers a study in contrasts at three remarkable houses in the Chicagoland suburbs. Architect Paul Schweikher designed his own House & Studio in 1938 as a sophisticated fusion of organic modernism and Japanese influences. The Ford House, designed in 1949 by Bruce Goff, is built of coal, glass, cedar, hemp, and pieces of a Quonset hut.  The McCormick House, built in 1952, is one of only three single-family houses designed by Mies van der Rohe in the US. Join the stewards of these houses for an up-close and personal view of what it means to live and work in these Modernist gems. The tour will include virtual visits inside each house and conclude with a live Q&A.

The Thompson Center: Populist Postmodernism

The “Postmodernist People’s Palace” has been controversial since it opened in 1985. Helmut Jahn’s glassy spaceship was designed to reference the dome of the state capitol and to symbolize government openness and transparency.  The building’s dizzying circular atrium (described as “a place some people love to hate”) is simultaneously an icon of the Postmodernist architectural movement and a visible reminder of the effects of deferred maintenance.

Due to the pandemic and the planned sale of the building, a full tour experience of the Thompson Center was not possible. This event will combine presentations and visual media that explore the political, cultural, and technological history of the James R. Thompson Center – and address ongoing threats to the building’s preservation. The event will conclude with a live Q&A.

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