Michael Graves (1934-2015) American, Postmodernist Ice Bucket. Frosted acrylic ice bucket with original tag on base. Signed. 

Condition: Commensurate with use. Missing original metal tongs. 

Size: 13 x 9 x 10 in. 

#242 #4357 . 

Michael Graves was born on July 9th, 1934 in Indianapolis, Indiana. He was encouraged from a young age to pursue his interests in mathematics and engineering. He graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 1958 with a Bachelors in Architecture. He pursued a Masters in Architecture as well, graduating from Harvard University in 1959. He spent a year working for George Nelson, where he was exposed to the work of fellow designers Charles and Ray Eames and Alexander Girard. In 1960 Graves won the American Academy in Rome’s Prix de Rome, and spent the next two years working at the academy in Italy which completely transformed his style and outlook. He returned to America to become a professor of architecture at Princeton University, where he taught for four years. He established his own architectural firm, Michael Graves and Associates, in 1964 in Princeton, and later the Michael Graves Design Group. During a career that spanned nearly fifty years, he and his firms designed more than 350 buildings around the world, and an estimated 2,000 household products. Graves produced both high end and mass consumer product designs for several companies, including Alessi in Italy and Target and J. C. Penney in the United States. He was a member of The New York Five and the Memphis Group, and is recognized for his massive influence on New Urbanism, New Classicism, and other Postmodern architectural movements. He was trustee of the American Academy in Rome and was the president of its Society of Fellows from 1980 to 1984. He received the American Prize for Architecture, the National Medal of Arts in 1999, as well as the Driehaus Architecture Prize in 2012. He also received a fellowship of the American Institute of Architects as well as its highest award, the AIA Gold Medal, in 2001. Although he retired from Princeton as the Robert Schirmer Professor of Architecture Emeritus that same year, the university had a standing rule that faculty was not allowed to practice their profession on campus, and so Graves was never commissioned to design a building for them. Following his partial paralysis from the waist down in 2003 due to a spinal cord infection, Graves became an internationally recognized advocate of health care design. In 2014 he helped to establish the Michael Graves College, which utilized part of Kean University in Union Township, New Jersey. He died in his home on March 12th, 2015, with his humanistic approach to architecture, urban planning, and functional wares still a prominent influence on many contemporary designers.

Commensurate with use. Missing original metal tongs.