New Tools Deconstructivist architects made un-
paralleled use of computer-aided design (CAD),
which by the 1980’s was a common tool in all archi-
tectural firms. For deconstructivist architects, com-
puters were an important design aid, permitting
three-dimensional modeling and animation that
supported their desire to create very complicated
spaces. Similarly, the ability to link computer models
to production activities allowed the manufacturing
of mass-produced elements at reasonable cost. While
the computer made the designing of complex shapes
easier, though, not everything that looks odd is
“deconstructivist.” It was the use of new technologies
in ways that were connected to postmodern and
post-structural theoretical frameworks that enabled
deconstructivist architects to revolutionize people’s
experiences of their built environments in the 1980’s.
Impact As an expression of postmodern attitudes,
deconstructivist architecture was as much about the-
ory and cultural change as it was an approach to
building design. Although in some ways deconstruc-
tivism as a movement was at the fringes of 1980’s ar-
chitecture, it significantly changed the shape of the
American built environment.
Further Reading
Frampton, Kenneth.Modern Architecture: A Critical
Histor y. 3d ed. London: Thames & Hudson, 1992.
Basic, classic reference, updated to include post-
modern developments in architecture.
Jencks, Charles.The New Moderns: From Late to Neo-
Modernism. New York: Rizzoli International, 1990.
Collects a wide-ranging set of essays and inter-
views whose breadth makes this a first-rate re-
source.
Johnson, Phillip, and Mark Wigley.Deconstructivist
Architecture. New York: Little, Brown, 1988. Exhi-
bition catalog that includes a helpful introduc-
tory essay by Wigley.
Macrae-Gibson, Gavin.The Secret Life of Buildings: An
American Mythology for Modern Architecture.Cam-
bridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1985. Theory-based close
look at seven important buildings completed in
the 1980’s.
Wigley, Mark.The Architecture of Deconstruction: Der-
rida’s Haunt. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1995.
Examination of the theoretical roots of decon-
structivist architecture.
J. R. Donath
See also Architecture; Art movements; CAD/
CAM technology; Cyberpunk literature; Gehry,
Frank; Neoexpressionism in painting; Virtual reality.De Lorean, John
Identification American automobile executive
and entrepreneur
Born January 6, 1925; Detroit, Michigan
Died March 19, 2005; Summit, New Jersey
An American automobile executive turned flamboyant
business entrepreneur, John De Lorean started the De
Lorean Motor Company, which produced the DMC-12, a
futuristic sports car. As a controversial, larger-than-life per-
sonality, De Lorean was the central figure in a highly publi-
cized drug-trafficking trial at which he was found not
guilty due to entrapment.
John De Lorean, a one-time General Motors automo-
bile executive, founded the De Lorean Motor Com-
pany (DMC) in 1975. He established his factory near
Belfast, Northern Ireland, and received partial finan-
cial support for his company from the British govern-
ment, which invested more than $150 million in an at-
tempt to reduce the unemployment rate in Northern
Ireland, then more than 20 percent. By 1981, the De
Lorean manufacturing plant in Northern Ireland
employed nearly twenty-five hundred people.
Beginning in 1981, DMC manufactured the
DMC-12, later called simply the De Lorean, an avant-
garde, stainless-steel sports car with doors that, when
opened, looked like “seagull wings.” Almost from
the start, the company experienced budgetary and
engineering problems. In October, 1981, the com-
pany manufactured only two thousand cars, and it
had trouble selling even that many because they
were expensive. By early 1982, poor sales resulted
in some very serious financial problems for the com-
pany. De Lorean desperately sought to acquire an
infusion of cash to keep his company afloat. In mid-
June, 1982, after several meetings with men he be-
lieved to be members of an organized crime ring, De
Lorean agreed to participate in a deal involving ille-
gal narcotics. The men turned out to be undercover
agents working for the Federal Bureau of Investiga-
tion (FBI).
On October 19, 1982, De Lorean was arrested in a
Los Angeles, California, hotel room and charged
with eight counts ranging from conspiracy to smug-278 De Lorean, John The Eighties in America