Something About the Maturation of a Point of View

“How I got started on this project is that I’m an Instagram junkie,” began Phyllis Lambert, architect, photographer, and founding director of the Canadian Centre for Architecture. “I approached a talented, young multimedia artist,” she continued, relating how became the curator of her new book that is also the subject of her lecture, Observation Is a Constant That Underlies All Approaches (Lars Müller). Cyrenne, Lambert explained further, combed through thousands of photographs that she took over a period spanning six decades and multiple media and instruments. Together, they selected the roughly 300 images that make up the book.

“My first use of the camera was around 1954 when the Seagram Building was being thought of,” said Lambert, recounting the way in which the photographic camera became her preferred tool for observation. “That same year, while spending time […] in Rome, I began to use the camera to observe, to see how a building sits on the land, how it relates to the land around it, to other buildings.” She soon became a gearhead: “At one point, I was carryi…