“Review of *Kindergarten Chats and Other Writings*, by Louis Sullivan”

AboutIn a short notice within the Burlington Magazine's "Literature of Art" review roundup, J. Rykwert assesses the Wittenborn "Documents of Modern Art" edition of Sullivan's *Kindergarten Chats and Other Writings*, edited by Isabella Athey. Rykwert situates Sullivan within the American tradition descending from Walt Whitman, finding his prose style "turgid" and marked by an "unjustified self-praise" that has obscured his real importance, yet judges the volume an adequate and valuable source-book for Sullivan's architectural doctrines when read alongside the essays it collects. He singles out "The Tall Office Building Artistically Considered" and "Ornament in Architecture" as essential for understanding Sullivan's formalization of the skyscraper and his revolutionary approach to ornament, and notes that Sullivan's influence in Europe came almost entirely through his "great disciple" Frank Lloyd Wright. Rykwert closes by praising Athey's editing and Wittenborn's publication as an important addition to an already valuable series. The review appears amid a page of unrelated short book notices (on Elizabethan portraiture, English architecture, and Islamic and European pottery) typical of the Burlington's review section format of the period.

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