Professor Diana Agrest's Film Screened at MoMA

POSTED ON: February 10, 2013

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film still, The Making of an Avant-garde: IAUS 1967-1984

film still, The Making of an Avant-garde: IAUS 1967-1984

The Making of an Avant-garde: IAUS 1967-1984, had a private screening at the Museum of Modern Art in fall 2012. Diana Agrest has received grants from the Graham Foundation, NYSCA, and the Brunner Grant among others for the film project, which she has written, directed and produced.  

"The Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies (IAUS), founded in 1967, was an independent, non-profit organization that became an important center of architectural debate. The critical undertakings by members of the IAUS made it the center of new architectural ideas produced through research, public lectures, publications (such asOppositions, Books, and Skyline), exhibitions, and education programs. The IAUS reversed architectural dependency on Europe, becoming  "the" international destination for architecture, and making New York architecture's global center. Participants at the IAUS included Peter Eisenman, founder and director; Emilio Ambasz; Mario Gandelsonas; Kenneth Frampton; Anthony Vidler; Rosalind Krauss; Philip Johnson; Richard Meier; Charles Gwathmey; Frank Gehry; Rem Koolhaas; and Aldo Rossi. The IAUS has had an enormous influence and legacy, both in terms of the great amount of work it produced, and through the dissemination of ideas that its fellows worked on and taught. Agrest's documentary film brings new insight into this important institution."

- GRAHAM FOUNDATION

  • Founded by inventor, industrialist and philanthropist Peter Cooper in 1859, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art offers education in art, architecture and engineering, as well as courses in the humanities and social sciences.

  • “My feelings, my desires, my hopes, embrace humanity throughout the world,” Peter Cooper proclaimed in a speech in 1853. He looked forward to a time when, “knowledge shall cover the earth as waters cover the great deep.”

  • From its beginnings, Cooper Union was a unique institution, dedicated to founder Peter Cooper's proposition that education is the key not only to personal prosperity but to civic virtue and harmony.

  • Peter Cooper wanted his graduates to acquire the technical mastery and entrepreneurial skills, enrich their intellects and spark their creativity, and develop a sense of social justice that would translate into action.