Jorn Utzon

Jørn Utzon 2003 Laureate Biography
Jørn Utzon’s father was director of a shipyard in Alborg, Denmark, and was a brilliant naval architect, many of whose yacht designs are still in production today. Several family members were excellent yachtsmen, and the young Jørn, who was born in 1918, became a good sailor himself. Until about the age of 18, he considered a career as a naval officer. It wasabout this time, while still in secondary school, that he began helping his father at the shipyard, studying new designs, drawing up plans and making models. This activity opened another possibility—that of training to be a naval architect like his father. However, yet further influences were introduced during summer holidays with his grandparents. There he met two artists, Paul Schrøder and CarlKyberg, who introduced him to art. One of his father’s cousins, Einar Utzon-Frank, who was a sculptor as well as a professor at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, provided additional inspiration. Jørn took an interest in sculpting. At one point, he indicated he might want to be an artist, but was ultimately convinced that architectural school would be the best career path. Even though his final marksin secondary school, particularly mathematics, were poor, his excellent freehand drawing talents were strong enough to win his admission to the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen. He was soon recognized as having extraordinary architectural gifts. When he graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in 1942, because of World War II, he, like many architects of that time, fled to neutral Swedenwhere he was employed in the Stockholm office of Hakon Ahlberg for the duration of the war. Following that he went to Finland to work with Alvar Aalto. He had begun to admire the ideas of Gunnar Asplund, as well as Frank Lloyd Wright while still in school. Utzon acknowledges that Aalto, Asplund and Wright were all major influences. Over the next decade, he traveled extensively, visiting Morocco,Mexico, the United States, China, Japan, India, and Australia, the latter destined to become a major factor in his life. All of the trips had significance, and Utzon himself describes the importance of just one: “As an architectonic element, the platform is fascinating. I lost my heart to it on a trip to Mexico in 1949, where I found a rich variety of both size and idea, and where many platforms standalone, surrounded by nothing but untouched nature. All the platforms in Mexico are placed very sensitively in the landscape, always the creations of a brilliant idea. They radiate a huge force. You feel the firm ground beneath you, as when standing on a great cliff. Let me give you an example of the power in this idea. Yucatan is a flat lowland area covered by an impenetrable jungle whicheverywhere attains a certain height. The Maya people used to live in this jungle in villages surrounded by small cultivated clearings. On all sides, and also above, there was the hot, humid, green jungle. No great views, no vertical movements. But by building up the platform on a level with the roof of the jungle, these people had suddenly conquered a new dimension that was a worthy place for the worshipof their gods. They built their temples on these high platforms, which can be as much as a hundred metres long. From here, they had the sky, the clouds and the breeze, and suddenly the roof of the jungle was transformed into a great, open plain. By means of this architectonic device they had completely transformed the landscape and presented their eyes with a grandeur that corresponded to thegrandeur of their gods. The wonderful experience of going from the denseness of the jungle to the vast openness above the platform is still there today. It is like the liberation you feel up here in the Nordic lands when, after weeks of rain, cloud and darkness, you suddenly emerge into the sunlight again. ” The idea of the platform would manifest itself in many of Utzon’s designs over the years,...