The architecture of Barry Byrne : taking the Prairie School to Europe - Michael, Vincent L. (Urbana, Chicago, Springfield : University of Illinois Press, 2013)
" Barry Byrne (1883-1967) was a radical architect who sought basic principles as fervently as his mentor Frank Lloyd Wright and his inspiration Louis Sullivan, forging an individual style with taut planar skins enveloping modern space plans. In 1922 he designed the first modern Catholic church building, St. Thomas the Apostle in Chicago, and in 1924 he traveled to Europe where he met Mies, Mendelsohn, Oud, and other modernist architects there. He was the only Prairie School architect to build in Europe, designing the concrete Church of Christ the King, built in 1928-31 in Cork, Ireland. A dedicated modernist and progressive Catholic, Byrne concentrated for much of his career on Catholic churches and schools throughout North America, many of them now considered landmarks. This book charts the entire length of Byrne's work, highlighting its distinctive features while discussing the cultural conditions that kept Byrne in the shadows of his more famous contemporaries. Illustrated by more than one hundred photographs and drawings, this biography explores the interplay of influences and impulses--individualism and communalism, modernism and tradition, pragmatism and faith--enduring throughout Byrne's life and work. "--
"Barry Byrne (1883-1967) was one of the first significant apprentices of Frank Lloyd Wright, studying in Wright's Oak Park studio from 1902 t0 1908. He followed Wright's principles, but forged an individual style more reminiscent of Louis Sullivan and Irving Gill, with taut planar skins enveloping modern space plans. From 1914 to 1917 he was the American partner of Walter Burley Griffin. In 1922 he designed the first modern Catholic church, St. Thomas Apostle in Chicago, and concentrated on Catholic churches and schools for much of his career. This book charts the entire length of Byrne's work, highlighting its qualities while discussing the cultural conditions that kept it in the shadows of his more famous contemporaries. In 1924 he traveled to Europe where be met Mies, Mendelsohn, Oud and other modernist architects there. He was the only Prairie School architect to build in Europe, designing the concrete Church of Christ the King, built in 1928-31 in Cork, Ireland. Illustrated by more than 100 photographs and drawings, this is the first book-length study of Byrne"--
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Keywords: ARCHITECTURE / Individual Architects & Firms / General; Biografia; HISTORY / United States / 20th Century