Research Paper Abstract M.

RISHI
IEOH MING PEI
1917-2019 4CM19AT036

Influence of Social Conditions on Architects: A Case Study on Ar. Ieoh Ming Pei

Ieoh Ming Pei (26 April 1917 – 16 May 2019) , Born in Shanghai, China was a Chinese-
American Architect. Pei drew inspiration at an early age from the garden villas
at Suzhou, the traditional retreat of the scholar-gentry to which his family belonged. In
1935, he moved to the United States and enrolled in the University of Pennsylvania's
architecture school, but he quickly transferred to the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology. He was unhappy with the focus at both schools on Beaux-Arts
architecture, and spent his free time researching emerging architects, especially Le
Corbusier. After graduating, he joined the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD)
and became a friend of the Bauhaus architects Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. In
1948, Pei was recruited by New York City real estate magnate William Zeckendorf, for
whom he worked for seven years before establishing an independent design firm in
1955, I. M. Pei & Associates. In 1966 that became I. M. Pei & Partners, and in 1989
became Pei Cobb Freed & Partners. Pei retired from full-time practice in 1990. In his
retirement, he worked as an architectural consultant primarily from his sons'
architectural firm Pei Partnership Architects. The younger Pei, drawn more to music and
other cultural forms than to his father's domain of banking, explored art on his own. "I
have cultivated myself," he said later.

I.M.Pei’s Design Philosophy

As a student of Le Corbusier and modernist architecture, I.M. Pei took the core belief of
modernism that form follows function, and added his own interpretation. Pei believes
that form follows intention (which incorporates function). His work reflects this philosophy
by his incorporation of functional symbols into all his great works. I.M. Pei also rejects the
Internationalist vision of architecture as future vs. past, and instead sees his role
as creating a bridge between the present and the past. These core beliefs explain how
Pei designs a wide variety of structures that are all consistent to his vision. He wanted to
create a mood of Chinese authenticity in the architecture without using traditional
materials or styles. "Ieoh Ming Pei has given this century some of its most beautiful interior
spaces and exterior forms His versatility and skill in the use of materials approach the
level of poetry."

Awards
Arnold Brunner Award from the National Institute of Arts and Letters (1963)
The Gold Medal for Architecture from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (1979)
The AIA Gold Medal (1979)
In 1983 he was awarded the Pritzker Prize
The first Praemium Imperiale for Architecture from the Japan Art Association (1989)
The Lifetime Achievement Award from the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum
The 1998 Edward MacDowell Medal in the Arts
The 2010 Royal Gold Medal from the Royal Institute of British Architects

CITATION
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I._M._Pei

https://www.inc.com/elizabeth-kiehner/3-essential-design-lessons-from-legendary-architect-im-pei.html

https://study.com/academy/lesson/im-pei-buildings-philosophy.html