CARBON COPY

From the Wright Gallery:

“On view from November 4th, 2024 – January 16th, 2025, Wright Gallery at Texas A&M University presents “Carbon Copy,” an exhibition of original photography by Austin-based photographer, Leonid Furmansky, and panel discussion surrounding Brutalist architecture, supported by the Academy for the Visual & Performing Arts. Furmansky’s solo exhibition establishes the context for “Carbon Copy” with black and white photographs ranging from (40 x 40 inches) to large-scale (80 x 80 inches). For the exhibition, Co-curator and Associate Professor, James Michael Tate, and his students in the College of Architecture have fabricated three-dimensional models to center the exhibition with comparisons of three Brutalist buildings built between 1960’s – 1980’s. Models of The Couvent Sainte Marie de la Tourette, designed by Le Corbusier in 1961, are aligned in close proximity with later examples such as Boston City Hall and the Langford Architecture Complex (building A) designed by HKS in the early 1970’s, and completed in 1977, for Texas A&M University’s main campus in College Station. Furmansky will participate in the panel discussion as part of the Department of Architecture lecture series on January 13th, 2025, from 5:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. in Geren Auditorium (ARC B), immediately followed by a reception from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. in Wright Gallery (ARC A). Open to the public.

Furmansky’s affinity of brutalist architecture has developed over several years, and in 2022 he noticed it forming into a collection within his body of work. It was at that time Jack Murphy, Executive Editor of The Architect’s Newspaper, and Tate shared a subchapter near the end of the 1972 edition of Learning From Las Vegas by Robert Venturi, Denise Scott Brown, and Steven Izenour titled “From La Tourette to Neiman Marcus.” Furmansky’s response was to create the series of comparative photographs in Carbon Copy. Making comparisons through formal terms and photographic compositions, Furmansky traveled to the remote countryside of the Burgundy region of France to the photograph Le Corbusier’s, La Tourette, which Tate describes, “at the time of its completion, La Tourette stood as a turning away from modernist tendencies of the previous decades.” For this work, Furmansky has traveled to photograph several brutalist buildings located in the United States including Yale Architecture Building in New Haven. Brutalist architecture can be found in many commonplace sites such as universities, government buildings, libraries, housing, and even shopping centers such as The Galleria in Houston, TX.

Visitors will have a unique opportunity to view the exhibition while occupying a Brutalist building; Wright Gallery is in Langford Architecture Center’s building A. The exhibition ultimately “situates Langford among a set of other brutalist buildings. As a late example of brutalist architecture, Langford’s design, intentionally or not, references – dutifully copies and creatively reinterprets – characteristics of other brutalist buildings […].” Tate states that although, “it is unknown if the HKS project directly references La Tourette. […] Langford A is perhaps as much an early postmodern building, clad in brutalist clothes,” some which are photographed and on view in the exhibition. Wright Gallery is open Monday – Thursday, 8:00 a.m. – 7:45 p.m., and Friday 8:00 a.m. – 5 p.m. Free and open to the public. To learn more about the Wright Gallery, please visit www.arch.tamu.edu/inside/services/wright-gallery/.”