Exhibit runs through January 16, 2015

A special reception to celebrate the University Libraries exhibit, “Ralph Rapson: A Legacy in Architecture and Design,” will be held Monday, December 8, beginning at 5:30 p.m.

Rapson, former dean of the University of Minnesota School of Architecture (1954-1984), was the designer of iconic Twin Cities buildings such as the original Guthrie Theater, Cedar Square West, and the Rarig Center for the Performing Arts.

“Not only did he design a number of buildings, he taught an entire generation of architects to design buildings — so his influence is deep and far reaching,” said Jane King Hession, curator of the exhibit and author of “Ralph Rapson: Sixty Years of Modern Design.”

Behind the scenes look at the process of architecture

Exhibit designer Darren Terpstra, University Libraries, said visitors to the exhibit will get a behind the scenes look at the process of architecture.

“You’ll see simple, hand-drawn sketches that are very fast and rudimentary and then you see cleaner drawings and then you see elevations and models and photographs and finally, the finished product.”

“He could draw like nobody else and Ralph’s drawings are very engaging,” Hession said. “Not only do they clearly show what his architectural visions were, but they show how people would use these buildings.

Rapson’s legacy is ‘all around us’

Still a practicing architect when he died in 2008 at the age of 93, Rapson’s modernist style influenced generations of architects. This exhibit is a retrospective of his many building and furniture designs.

“The thing about Ralph Rapson’s architecture is that it’s all around us in the Twin Cities,” Hession said. “So, we hope that people will come to the exhibit and make connections with what’s in the environment in Minneapolis.”