Hitchcock, Henry-Russell (1903–87). American architectural critic and historian. In 1929 he published
Modern Architecture, the first English-language book on the subject, and in 1932 he and Philip
Johnson organized the celebrated exhibition at MoMA, NYC, entitled ‘Modern Architecture
International Exhibition’, which brought European architects such as Le
Corbusier,
Gropius,
Oud, and
Mies van der Rohe to the notice of the American public. In the same year Hitchcock and Johnson published
The International Style: Architecture since 1922: the term
International Style had been coined by Alfred H. Barr (1902–81—Director of MoMA, who had invited Hitchcock and Johnson to organize the exhibition) and Hitchcock. Having written about F. L.
Wright (1928, 1942), Oud (1931), and H. H.
Richardson (1936), Hitchock turned his attention to C19 architecture with the magnificent
Early Victorian Architecture (1954) and
Architecture: Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (1958). Later still he wrote perceptively about South-German
Rococo, especially the practitioners, the
Zimmermann Brothers (1968), and near the end of his life his first book on German
Renaissance architecture was published (1981). The scope of his scholarship and interests was vast, and his output enormous. In 1983
In Search of Modern Architecture: A Tribute to Henry-Russell Hitchcock was published, edited by Helen Searing. He was a pioneer of research into C19 architecture, and impressive, both as a man and a scholar.
Bibliography
Hitchcock (1931, 1938, 1939, 1954, 1966, 1966a, 1966b, 1968, 1968a, 1973, 1976, 1977, 1981, 1993);
Hitchcock & and Johnson (1966);
Hitchcock & and Seale (1976)
