ZAHA HADID – “Queen of the Curve”

Zaha Hadid – Queen of the Curve

Born in 1950 and descending from Abbasids, a dynasty which invented algebra and promoted Arabic as an international scientific language, Zaha was destined to become a genuine Persian Queen. She was about to amaze the world with her art stories, of surreal associated with mathematics and architecture, in a symbiosis never experienced until that time.

photo source: Guggenheim.org

Her personality exploded late, forged from skill, tears, sweat and her anti-misogynous feelings. After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from American University in Beirut, she decides to continue her studies with the London Architectural Association, until her 1977 graduation. At that time only 6% of graduates were women and the dominance of male element in European architecture is decisive.

Zaha Hadid, a female and Muslim in a Christian world works hard as drawing board architect during 18 years. In all this time, she paints, establishes Zaha Hadid Architects in London and begins to promote her innovative ideas (Peak – Hong Kong 1983, Kurfurstendamm 70 Berlin 1986). 1993 marks the introduction of her first important architectural work, in Wein am Rhein, Germany and her ideas shake up the audience.

photo source: archdaily.com

In 1994, she is declared winner of the competition to design Cardiff Bay Opera House. Sadly, this project remains uncompleted, due to misunderstanding from local politicians, confused with the project and her innovative ideas. She quits working for United Kingdom, her adoptive country, until 2011 when she design The Riverside Museum of Transport and Travel, in Glasgow. Nevertheless, at that time she was already famous, the first woman to win The Pritzker Prize (in 2004) for her amazing contribution to the architecture field.

Her unique feminine spirit reveals steadily but progressively. She becomes a mentor for an entire generation of architects and her style gets to be the most copied from all contemporary architects. Extensive mathematical studies help her find the algorithms for rejecting gravity laws so that her curves become free.

photo source: messner-mountain-museum.it

"Now I can believe in buildings that float" she declared for an interview that defined her approach to style. The air curves were not her innovations, but her influence and achievements were so overwhelming that righ now, basically everyone identifies the seemingly impossible aerial curves and twisted roof lines with Zaha Hadid.

This an intense innovation, in an epoch controlled by straight lines and harsh materials and a world based exclusively on utility, a world of order and control. She reassesses her space and shaped it by showing its ability to determine people to move.

photo source: buildipedia.com

                                                                                Zaragoza Bridge Pavilion, Spain

Her works are not only about buildings per se but also about location and construction, with innovation in technology, materials, process of production and the act of building by itself. They said that "the Hadid mark on a building is unmistakable: concrete, glass and steel associated in old, futuristic shapes that play with curves". She designed mega architectural projects in Quatar, China, Russia, Mexico, USA, besides The London Aquatic Center, The Guangzhou Opera House and some symbolic buildings in Saudi Arabia, South Korea and Azerbaijan.

photo source: nytimes.com

                                                                                Guangzhou Opera House, China

photo source: archdaily.com

                                                                                Heydar Aliyev Center - Baku, Azerbaijan

Besides buildings, she also designs a bag for Fendi, dishes for Lalique and a perfume bottle for Donna Karan, while collaborating with Harrods. Awarded by the Royal Institute of Arts with the Stirling Grand Prize, Zaha Hadid receives the Royal Gold Medal Riba, as the first woman to get it independently.

Her exceptional achievements and innovative concepts made her famous and fame bring along plenty of money. By 2014-2015 Zaha Hadid’s turnover was 48 million pound, while reaching 372 employees. In 2016 she dies in Miami from a heart attack at 65 years old, still working on the only residential project ever designed, with fresh concepts such as: floors intersected like the teeth of a saw, air filtered by oxygen in every apartment, access to elevators directly from the apartment and smart glass windows for bathrooms.

photo source: architecturaldigest.com

Zaha Hadid’s need for conveying avant-garde ideas is perfectly matched by natural stone, with its innate perfection. The gentle curves of her marble flowers agitate the latent conflict between their intrinsic vulnerability as living elements and the constant hardness of natural stone.

Marble tables are gathered in 4 fluid fixtures that leave an interior vacuum between them. Durability of this material is contrasting with the fluidity of shapes that leak slowly and relentless into the ground which supplied it in the first place.

photo source: jacopospilimbergo.com

With her death Zaha Hadid, leaves an outstanding architectural legacy, backed up by her feminist legacy. In their turn, those 2 legacies were inherited from her Sumerian roots.