Ieoh Ming Pei, an ideal life and an ideal architect of the century gone by, breathed his last earlier this month after a brilliant life of 102 years. Personally, this funny looking, gentle, affable 1930s Chinese import to the land of promise and opportunity, USA, was no less than a God ever since I was introduced to his life and work in my early days as an architecture student. My introduction to Pei through, of course, his Magnum Opus in the Glass Pyramid at the Louvre Museum in Paris, led me to find out more about the life and works of this Chinese-American architect, and understand the philosophy he espoused. In whatever I have found till date – from the Chinese schoolboy who dreamed the American dream to the way he pursued and lived that dream with steadfast yet gentle commitment, his sagely patience at handling the challenges in his career to his calm and contented enjoyment of his successes, his resolutely firm adherence to his own convictions in any design to his innovative flexibility in resolving issues, the simultaneous sagacity and humour, humility and authority that his personality exuded – all make him worthy of reverence and emulation. To have this opportunity to pay this written tribute to this genius is, indeed, an unforeseen pleasure.
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