In Chicago, Tadao Ando Turned a Residential Building into an Art Gallery

At a first glance, nothing seems to have changed at 659 W Wrightwood Avenue. The red-brick façade with its Art Deco detailing still looks out onto the street. On closer inspection, however, there is a new floor perched just above the original roof of the building.

Tadao Ando, a former boxer turned master of contemporary architecture (he received the Pritzker Prize, the most prestigious award in the field, in 1995), completely transformed the structure of the building. It has changed from having four classic storeys to three floors with a covered terrace.

A mix of metal, brick and reinforced concrete

The space, named Wrightwood 659, is owned by entrepreneur Fred Eychaner and art historian Dan Whittaker. The interior is composed of metal, brick, large windows and reinforced concrete, making it a classic ‘Tadao Ando’ structure, and it now houses a gallery dedicated to socially and politically engaged art and architecture.

The first of its temporary exhibitions (the gallery does not have its own collections) celebrated the career of its creator in Ando and Le Corbusier: Masters of Architecture, which took place in December 2018. This was an illustration of the admiration that the Japanese architect harbours for the creator of the Cité Radieuse, who had a particular influence on his concrete work.

More information about Wrightwood 659 (2018), a project by architect Tadao Ando, can be found on the building’s website.