The Dancing house, Prague

The Dancing house Prague, with Curvy windows of different shapes, Tančící dům, is also known as the fred and ginger house, Prague, CZECH... more

by Neale And Judith Clark

Title

The Dancing house, Prague

Artist

Neale And Judith Clark

Medium

Photograph - Photography

Description

The Dancing house Prague, with Curvy windows of different shapes, Tančící dům, is also known as the fred and ginger house, Prague, CZECH REPLUBLIC, EU, EUROPE

The Dancing House (Tančící dům), or Fred and Ginger, is the nickname given to the Nationale-Nederlanden building on the Rašínovo nábřeží (Rašín Embankment) in Prague, Czech Republic. It was designed by the Croatian-Czech architect Vlado Milunić in cooperation with Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry on a vacant riverfront plot. The building was designed in 1992 and was completed four years later in 1996.[1]

The non-traditional design was controversial at the time because the house stands out among the Baroque, Gothic and Art Nouveau buildings for which Prague is famous. The then Czech president, Václav Havel, who lived next to the site for decades, had avidly supported this project, hoping that the building would become a center of cultural activity.

Gehry originally named the house Fred and Ginger (after the dancers Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers – the house resembles a pair of dancers) but this nickname is now rarely used.The style is known as deconstructivist ("new-baroque" to the designers) architecture due to its unusual shape. The "dancing" shape is supported by 99 concrete panels, each a different shape and dimension. On the top of the building is a large twisted structure of metal nicknamed Mary'.

In the middle of a square of buildings from the eighteenth and nineteenth century, the Dancing House has two main parts. The first is a glass tower that narrows at half its height and is supported by curved pillars; the second runs parallel to the river and is characterized by undulating mouldings and unaligned windows.

The famous dancers Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers are represented in the structure. A tower made of rock is used to represent Fred. This tower also includes a metal head. A tower made of glass is used to represent Ginger.

This design was driven mainly by aesthetic considerations: aligned windows would make evident that the building has two more floors, although it is the same height as the two adjacent nineteenth century buildings. The windows have protruding frames, such as those of paintings, as the designer intended for them to have a three-dimensional effect. The winding mouldings on the façade also serve to confuse perspective and diminish contrast with the surrounding buildings.

Alamy reference RYGY69

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December 20th, 2019