Renowned French architect to lecture on Le Corbusier

Renowned French architect to lecture on Le CorbusierJanuary 16, 2007Mary Kate O’Brienmcobrien@syr.edu

French architect and author Jose Oubrerie will speak at the Syracuse University School of Architecture on Wednesday, Jan. 31, at 4:30 p.m. in the main auditorium of the school’s home, The Warehouse, 350 W. Fayette St. His lecture, “Heretic or Heir-Ethic? Oubrerie at Le Corbusier’s Firminy,” is free and open to the public. For information on parking at The Warehouse, call (315) 443-8238.

Oubrerie is a professor at The Ohio State University Austin E. Knowlton School of Architecture and founding principal of the firm Atelier Wylde-Oubrerie. He studied architecture at the Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris and painting at the School of Fine Arts in Nantes, France. As an apprentice to Le Corbusier, arguably the 20th century’s most influential architect, Oubrerie helped develop the designs for the church of Saint-Pierre de Firminy in France, the last of Le Corbusier’s unfinished projects.

Commissioned in 1960 as part of a redevelopment scheme for the former mining town, the church was begun 10 years later, but work stopped on the project in 1978. Under Oubrerie’s direction, the church was completed in 2006. No major design by a celebrated modern architect has ever been completed decades after its commission.

Other major works by Oubrerie include the Miller Residence in Lexington, Ky.; the French Cultural Center in Damascus, Syria; and L’Esprit Nouveau exhibit hall in Bologna, Italy.

For more information, contact Mary Kate O’Brien, communications manager of the School of Architecture, at (315) 443-2388 or mcobrien@syr.edu.