James Polshek

James (Jim) Stewart Polshek is the chief architect of the Clinton Library. He is the founder of the Polshek Partnership and former Dean of the Columbia University School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation (1972-1987). With his partner Richard Olcott, Polshek in August 1999 won the bid for the Library, a design he called the "Bridge to the 21st Century."

Bill Clinton selected the design after examining a twenty-four foot annotated drawing prepared by Polshek and his firm. Polshek had initially designed a translucent building that would jut out over the Arkansas River, but the "Secret Service nixed that," he said. "The concern was that a ship with explosives could pull up underneath. But when you get to the end of the building, you'll feel like you're out on the river." In the end Polshek created a gallery - forty feet in height - located at the halfway point in the museum exhibition space. On clear days visitors can take in a view of downtown Little Rock to the west as well as six bridges across the river. Polshek called the gallery "a place to inhale."

Polshek's work is often described as Modernist, and the Clinton Library falls into that category. He studied under I. M. Pei in Paris. He describes his approach to such buildings: "I will never be defensive about taking human comfort seriously ... so that there is more nurturing and less swaggering." The Clinton Library was also designed with lots of glass to exaggerate the president's own sense of probity. Explained Polshek, "In a political way, and for reasons that have never been explicitly stated, he's very concerned about openness, which is why he wanted there to be so much daylight." Polshek prefers to work closely with those who pay for his services, rather than impose a favored architectural philosophy.

Polshek's father was a businessperson in Akron, Ohio. Polshek himself began his education in hopes of becoming a psychiatrist, but changed directions in earning a Yale University master's degree in architecture. He started his first firm in 1963, designing first a textile factory and then a Japanese research laboratory.

Polshek, six partners, and 130 employees are responsible for award-winning designs for the Rose Center for Earth and Space at the American Museum of Natural History, the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University, the main entrance of the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Scandinavia House, the Santa Fe Opera Theater in New Mexico, the Flushing branch of Queens Borough Public Library, the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation museum in Connecticut, and the College Point, Queens, New York Times printing plant. In all of the firm's projects, says Polshek, "We have a reputation for being responsible. I like that, even if it sounds less than exciting." Polshek works out of the Greenwich Village office of Polshek Partnership in New York City.

References

• Fred A. Bernstein, "Archive Architecture: Setting the Spin in Stone," New York Times, June 10, 2004.
• Celestine Bohlen, "Built for Substance, Not Flash: James Stewart Polshek Says Architecture Should Serve People Instead of Egos," New York Times, January 22, 2001.
• David W. Dunlap, "New York Firms Chosen to Design Clinton Library," New York Times, August 9, 1999.
• James Herrera, "Architects in Sync," Town and Country, (June 2001): 93-96.
• Julie V. Iovine, "Spin Masters Molding Myth With T-Square," New York Times, December 14, 2000.