Forward
"History moves; the still waters are made swift," Jose Ortega y Gasset wrote in the thirties of the new
art. Now late in the century as architecture moves from the abstract to a narrative style, the waters are
again made swift. As the old style recedes it is time to reexamine more of the work of the second
quarter of the century in Southern California.
It has been a privilege to live through two periods of change. In retrospect, the similarities are greater
among my four subjects than was apparent thirty years ago. Their designs are based on the module
(from the Japanese), which gives them unity and also controlled costs. But the economies never
detracted from the architecture. The four guarded their talents through the period before modern
design was acceptable, and in their small offices lavished time on their modest number of clients.
All four lived through the Depression and the Second World War, which instilled the conviction that
architecture is a social art.
California has been diligent in reclaiming its architectural past but there is much left to document,
from Thornton Abell to John Lautner, from Clark and Frey to Quincy Jones, from Maynard Lyndon to
Carl Maston. Before the passion of this age for research abates I hope all the bodies will be found
while they are warm.
J.R. Davidson does not really belong with the second generation as he was older than Schindler
and arrived in Los Angeles before Richard Neutra; he is here because there is no other convenient
place for him. I have put him first because he is the oldest of the four, the others following according
to age. Ain was the first to be written about and as that section has more digressions into California
lore it may well belong first.
Esther McCoy . THE SECOND GENERATION . Gibbs M. Smith, Inc. Peregrine Smith Books . Salt Lake City . 1984