Oswald Mathias Ungers

Oswald Mathias Ungers was born in Kaisersesch in the Eifel region. From 1947 to 1950 he studied architecture at the University of Karlsruhe under Egon Eiermann. He set up an architectural practice in Cologne in 1950, and opened offices in Berlin in 1964, Frankfurt in 1974 and Karlsruhe in 1983.

He was a professor at the Technical University of Berlin from 1963 to 1967 and served as the dean of the faculty of architecture from 1965 to 1967. In 1968 he moved to the United States, where he became the chair of the department of architecture at Cornell University from 1969 to 1975. In 1971 he became a member of the American Institute of Architects. He was also a visiting professor at Harvard University (1973 and 1978) and the University of California, Los Angeles (1974/75). He returned to Germany in 1976, becoming a visiting professor at the University of Applied Arts Vienna (1979/80) and a full professor at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf (1986).

Oswald Mathias Ungers died on 30 September 2007 from pneumonia. He was married to Liselotte Gabler (1926–2010) and had one son (Simon Ungers) and two daughters.

Ungers' buildings are characterized by strict geometrical design grid. Basic design elements of his architecture are elementary forms such as square, circle or cube and sphere, which Ungers varied and transformed in his designs. As an architectural theorist and university lecturer, Ungers developed what his critics called "quadratism", his admirers "German rationalism". In doing so, he resorted to the teaching of Jean-Nicolas-Louis Durand who had published in 1820 his pattern books with geometric prototypes for "any building".[1] In his formal language, Ungers explicitly referred to elementary architectural design elements that are independent of contemporary tastes. His historical role models in the history of architecture come mainly from Roman-Greek antiquity. His work was therefore occasionally criticized as formalistic. In connection with his construction on the Frankfurt Messe grounds, there was often talk of a "new clarity". Like hardly any other architect, Ungers has remained true to his once chosen formal language for decades. He was one of the leading theoreticians of Second Modernism.

Well-known students of Ungers include Max Dudler, Jo. Franzke, Hans Kollhoff, Rem Koolhaas, Christoph Mäckler, Jürgen Sawade and Eun Young Yi.

Ungers Archive for Architectural Research contains his architecture library, which he began building in the 1950s, as well as the architect's entire artistic legacy.[2] The library focuses on architecture tractate, works on the emergence and further development of perspective and publications on theory of colour. The library includes the first edition of Vitruv's De Architectura Libri Decem of 1495 as well as rare editions such as the Staatliche Bauhaus in Weimar 1919-1923 and publications of the Russian avantgarde, for example Von zwei Quadraten by the architect El Lissitzky. Together with his estate it is housed in the library cube of Ungers' listed building in Belvederestraße 60, Müngersdorf and is available to the scientific public for research purposes.

• 1958-1959 Haus Ungers 1 in Cologne-Müngersdorf
• 1979–1984 German Architecture Museum in Frankfurt
• 1980–1983 Messe Torhaus in Frankfurt
• 1981-1984 Konstantinplatz in Trier
• 1983–1991 Badische Landesbibliothek in Karlsruhe
• 1986 Former main building of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven
• 1993–1996 Friedrichstadt-Passagen (Quartier 205) in Berlin
• 1994 Residence of the German ambassador in Washington D.C.
• 1994–1995 Haus ohne Eigenschaften in Cologne
• 1995 Museum of Contemporary Art in Hamburg
• 1998–2001 Dorotheenhöfe, Berlin
• 2001 Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne
• 2006 Entrance to the ruins of a Roman bath in Trier

Proposed or under construction

• In 2000, he won an architectural competition to redesign the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. His controversial plan proposes large alterations to the building complex which has remained unchanged since 1930. The rebuilding is scheduled to end in 2022.

• 
  Museum of Contemporary Art in Hamburg
• 
  Messe Torhaus in Frankfurt
• 
  Badische Landesbibliothek in Karlsruhe
• 
  Wallraf-Richartz Museum in Cologne
• 
  Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven
• 
  Deutsches Architekturmuseum in Frankfurt
• 
  Domestic relations court in Berlin-Kreuzberg

• Entwerfen mit Vorstellungsbildern, Metaphern und Analogien. Anmerkungen zu einem morphologischen Konzept, in: Architektur 1951-1990, Stuttgart, 1991
• Morphologie. City Metaphors, König, 1982
• Die Thematisierung der Architektur, 1983, published by Technische Universität Dortmund and Walter A.Noebel, Niggli Verlag, 2009, ISBN 978-3-7212-0698-2
• The Dialectic City, Skira Editore, 1997

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Oswald Mathias Ungers.

• Official homepage of the Ungers Archives for Architecture
• Obituary in The Times, 8 October 2007
• Obituary in The Guardian, 18 October 2007