The Yale University Art Gallery was Louis Kahn's first major commission and is considered one of his early masterpieces. Kahn designed the building while he was a critic at Yale's School of Architecture. The gallery introduced several new concepts for Kahn, including clear separation of spaces, symmetry, and a vocabulary based on triangles and circles. The modular concrete and brick building featured an innovative triangular staircase and a distinctive concrete roof structure that housed lighting and ventilation. The Art Gallery of Yale University established Kahn as an important architect and demonstrated his emerging style.

1. BY LOUIS KAHN

2.  The Art Gallery of Yale University
was the first major commission for
Louis Kahn and is considered his
first masterpiece.
 The architect designed it during their stay at
the School of Architecture at the university,
which had been invited as a critic.
 This building was the first of three art
museums that Kahn would design
throughout his career .

3.  Opposite the British Art Center. (one of
the last buildings of Kahn)
 1111 Chapel Street, New Haven,
Connecticut, USA.

4. With theYale Art Gallery, Louis Kahn
sets new concepts such as,
Symmetry
Clear separation between space and
space
A new vocabulary based on the triangle
and the circle.
The triangle as a figure appears on the
stairs and as structural concept in the
construction forged rosettes

5.  The building is constructed of brick, concrete, glass and
steel became a significant departure from neo-gothic style.
 Dominant in the Campus of the University.
 From the street, the building is perceived as a facade of
brick, windowless, monolithic, is the southwest facade.
 It was the extension of an existing building in an empty
corner is connected with the old building through the
alignment of facades.
 The glass front entrance and make a style utterly opposed to
the existing architecture.
 It is in the walls facing the northeast and northwest where
several pieces are rectangular glass curtain wall.

7.  The building's interior is characterized
by a system of precast concrete roof that
houses the gallery lighting and
ventilation.
 The roof, at the time, was an innovative
structural engineering hollow concrete
tetrahedrons, which combine a number
of functions and give the interior a rich
and changing quality

9.  It was conceived as a unique, modular,
consisting of two prismatic,
 Two rectangles of 43x25 meters the
highest.
 Two areas served by a central core where
there are facilities, elevators and stairs,
spaces servants.
 The exhibition rooms are created using
modular panels that subdivide the space

10.  The entrance stairway at
Yale is located at the
bottom of a space formed
by the recession of the flat,
white wall which gives
access to a door built of
glass. From the outside
access to a hall that is
diverted to the open
spaces of the first floor.

11. The staircase is a
triangle of three
stages involved in
a cylinder and
that is not
reflected to the
outside

12.  The staircase is topped with a
triangular element repeats
concrete floor.
 With a key role for the entry of
light as in the edge of the silo,
between it and the roof of the
main gallery is covered by
curved blocks glass allow light to
fill the cylinder, leaving the
triangular structure of the roof as
a black void against the light.
 Although this triangular ladder is
the most recognized and studied
the gallery, the building has
another staircase at the opposite
end

13.  Modulated rectangular structure of concrete
that is not only supporting but also
contributes to the image of the building
 The Art Gallery of Yale University, was first
used concrete roof structure consists of a
tetrahedron with special armor that exposes
the light fixtures and duct air conditioning. It
also reduces the height of the floor-to-floor,
channeling the air through the structure.

14.  The concrete structure is seen on the roof
making a hollow triangles solution, which
eliminates the false ceiling.
 The enclosure is made through brick
walls and curtain walls, glass and steel.
 The amounts of these curtains of glass-
cage form a pattern that descend from
the cornices of the terrace to ground
level being locked inside the formwork

15.  Inside most raw materials are no longer
calling attention to the concrete walls
where they hang the works of art.
 The horizontal bands on the brick
facades are limestone.