Homes of Their Own: A Case Study of Richard Neutra’s Early Career

Danielle Peltakian
History of Art
UC Riverside

This Master’s thesis examined the early career of Vienna-born architect Richard Neutra. The grantee argued that Neutra’s early European housing projects foreshadowed his work in Los Angeles, through which he continually explored the function and social aim of modern architecture near and within an urban setting. By examining Neutra’s participation in both European and American housing exhibitions in the 1930s, as well as several private commissions, the thesis constructed a stronger, international framework for his early work, which was dubbed “California” Modern as early as 1932. This frame led the grantee to question and reconsider the term itself, as well as the relationship between European and Californian housing programs.