Chicago Underground Practice
Chicago Underground Practice
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  • 2012
    • its Liquid
    • Future Prentice
    • The Monumental Competition
    • Arch Triumph
  • 2013
    • Triangle Fire Memorial
    • CAAD: Curtains UT Competition
    • Change the Face
    • Reimagine the Astrodome
    • Fairy Tales I
  • 2014
    • CAAD: Curtains Photo Competition
    • Face On Publication
    • Designing for Free Speech
    • Lucas Museum of Narrative Art
    • Hello Nature
  • 2015
    • Crimes of Architecture
    • Army of Angels
    • 44 Vaults
    • Grand Central Time
    • Authenticity
    • Citizens of Spaceship Earth
    • It was a Very Good Year
    • Imagination takes Power
    • State of the Art of Architecture
    • A Dinosaur, a Colossus and a Giant
  • 2016
    • Black Holes of Architecture
    • Snell's Window
    • Bipolar City
    • Moneta's Museum
    • SPAN City
    • Stream of Glass
    • PoPA: Pavilion of POP Art
    • SLoB
    • Woman's Work
    • Love Child
    • SLoB 2.0
    • TEMPLE of アッコロカムイ
  • 2017
    • Jane's Edge
    • Last H20 on Mulholland
    • SUPPORT
    • Fresh Meat IX
    • House of Morfar
    • Broadway Billboard
    • The Propaganda of Desire
    • Posters for Change
    • Under the Dome
    • The Unsolicited Sideshow
  • 2018
    • Drawing Precedents
    • Extruded Village
    • City of the Morfar
    • OBJECTIVE
    • Building Curriculum Curriculum Building
  • Home
  • About
  • Mission
  • Contact
  • News
  • 2012
    • its Liquid
    • Future Prentice
    • The Monumental Competition
    • Arch Triumph
  • 2013
    • Triangle Fire Memorial
    • CAAD: Curtains UT Competition
    • Change the Face
    • Reimagine the Astrodome
    • Fairy Tales I
  • 2014
    • CAAD: Curtains Photo Competition
    • Face On Publication
    • Designing for Free Speech
    • Lucas Museum of Narrative Art
    • Hello Nature
  • 2015
    • Crimes of Architecture
    • Army of Angels
    • 44 Vaults
    • Grand Central Time
    • Authenticity
    • Citizens of Spaceship Earth
    • It was a Very Good Year
    • Imagination takes Power
    • State of the Art of Architecture
    • A Dinosaur, a Colossus and a Giant
  • 2016
    • Black Holes of Architecture
    • Snell's Window
    • Bipolar City
    • Moneta's Museum
    • SPAN City
    • Stream of Glass
    • PoPA: Pavilion of POP Art
    • SLoB
    • Woman's Work
    • Love Child
    • SLoB 2.0
    • TEMPLE of アッコロカムイ
  • 2017
    • Jane's Edge
    • Last H20 on Mulholland
    • SUPPORT
    • Fresh Meat IX
    • House of Morfar
    • Broadway Billboard
    • The Propaganda of Desire
    • Posters for Change
    • Under the Dome
    • The Unsolicited Sideshow
  • 2018
    • Drawing Precedents
    • Extruded Village
    • City of the Morfar
    • OBJECTIVE
    • Building Curriculum Curriculum Building
Picture
Obama Presidential Library


The American dream can become an architectural dream, a dream that can be realized by an individual or by a building. 

This mythical achievement is accomplished everyday by ordinary people in America. Once the American dream is realized by individuals and through buildings alike, we have reached our frontier. This ever-changing model of the frontier continuously reshapes who we are as a country, and Barack Obama is the forty-fourth president to carry on this tradition of democracy. The Barack Obama Presidential Library and Museum with its cantilevered vaults symbolizes the democracy of an architectural dream in the City of Chicago, and for the United States of America.

The cantilevered vaults of the Barack Obama Presidential Library and Museum support two interconnected entities. The vaults metaphorically support both the president and the people of the country simultaneously. Without one or the other the ideals of the country and the architecture it represents are fundamentally unstable. The vaulted structure of the facades also links the interior and exterior spaces into one unified and stable whole. The multiple shifting volumes demonstrate the delicate balance required in structuring a successful country that an architecture can also embody. The vaulted exterior structure transfer their loads to multiple interior walls in order to anchor a visually gravity defying structure. This architectural mirage is the American dream made physical in the Barack Obama Presidential Library and Museum as a demonstration to the public of what can be achieved in this country.
Location: Chicago, IL. US
T. Joseph Surjan - design scientist & writer
S. Hjelte Fumanelli - project architect & digital modeling
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