We watched this documentary about Louis Kahn and about his accomplishments duirng his lifetime. Louis Kahn was a world famous architect who was renowned for the Exeter Library, Salk Institute and Bangladeshi Capitol Building. During his lifetime Kahn had three different families at the same time. At first I didn’t really understand why Nathaniel Kahn was doing a documentary about his father. However when I discovered that he always hoped that someday this father would come live with his mother, I understood why he travelled the world visiting his father’s buildings and meeting Louis’ colleagues, students, wives and children. Louis Kahn died bankrupt and alone after a heart attack in New York City’s Penn Station. His body laid unclaimed for three days until his identity was established. Going back to the article and journal write we did today in class about ethics, I think Louis Kahn did live his life around his ethical views. Ethics is a philosophical belief of knowing from right or wrong and living a good life. Louis was from a poor Jewish origin. However this origin helped shaped his actions in life. I would say that he had the immigrant work ethic and drive to succeed because in society today we see immigrants working very hard in farms, fields, factories, etc. just to help their families live better lives. For Louis, on the other hand, his ethics helped him win a university scholarship but his ethnicity was discriminated and was blocked entry from Philadelphia’s best architectural circles. However Kahn didn’t let that stop him from expressing his creative side and from there, he found a new direction for his architecture after touring the ancient Greek, Roman and Egyptian ruins. However even being the world famous architect still led him bankrupt in the end. In my opinion ethics is just a personal justification instead of a universal truth. Referring back to the journal we did in class today about having ethic lessons to be a graduation requirement, I don’t think that it will help shape who a person is. I mean you do need ethics to be a co-worker, student, teacher, employer and etc. but I think ethics can be learned in the outside world where you make your own decisions whether you think that it is wrong or right. Going back to the documentary about Louis Kahn, he made so many great architectures in his lifetime but those buildings don’t really show who he personally is and reflect the life he lived just to design those buildings. In my opinion I thought that this documentary was pretty dry although I liked looking at the different designs and architecture that Kahn created when he was still alive. His architectures are one of a kind and different from the architectures during his time. However today there are also architectures that were inspired by his buildings and designs which really makes him world famous. He didn’t just have architectures in the U.S. but also in India which really shows how far he has come to accomplish something that, I am guessing, makes him happy.Labels: Movie Reflection, Writing