Frank Gehry’s winning egotism

A retrospective in Los Angeles examines the architect as artist

By Jonathan Griffin

Last year, at a press conference for an architecture prize in Oviedo, northern Spain, a journalist politely asked Frank Gehry the question that many of us would like to ask him. How does he respond to the critics who accuse him of making “showy architecture”?

Gehry, who is 86 and, these days, a rather wizened version of his former self, simply extended his middle finger.

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