Around here, we're used to famous architects whose personal lives cast a shadow over the buildings they designed. But not even Frank Lloyd Wright tried to pull what Louis Kahn once did: kept three separate relationships going with three separate women, only one of whom was his wife. Until his death in 1974, Kahn was the epitome of the architect's architect -- a visionary whose visions were all of buildings from ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, ancient Rome. But like so many great artists, Kahn wasn't much of a family man. He was too busy investigating the nature of stone, brick, concrete and wood, that and spending half the night with one of his mistresses.
Nathaniel Kahn's documentary My Architect is an attempt by Kahn's illegitimate son to understand his father's life and work, and if he has a lot more success with the work than with the life, that's to be expected. Kahn died when Nathaniel was 11; before that, he would see the boy maybe once a week, usually late at night. Alas, this was just enough to set off a lifetime of yearning. The sense of loss is palpable as Nathaniel visits the buildings that brought Kahn fame, if not fortune. And the people he talks to -- fellow architects, family members, even the cabbie who used to haul Kahn around Philadelphia -- have this way of rubbing it in without meaning to. One of them mentions that Kahn spent Christmas with him one year, even watched cartoons with his children.
Nathaniel doesn't exactly wallow in self-pity, but neither does he wrestle with the demons that may have led him to make the documentary. He's calm, almost sedate, and you start wishing he would play up the melodrama a little more. His mother, in her brief interviews, seems both resigned and hopeful, still convinced 30 years later that Kahn was about to leave his wife for her. But, for whatever reason, Nathaniel can't bring himself to challenge her, even though he appears not to agree with her. Does he want to get to the bottom of things or not? Louis Kahn was known for his ability to shed light throughout an interior. If only his son had shed more light on his father's interior....
