Though the “Renegades: Bruce Goff and the American School of Architecture” exhibition at the Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art had to close early due to the Spring 2020 COVID-19 quarantine, it is now available online in a fully immersive online, interactive version.
“Now you can take a virtual reality tour of the exhibition on any web browser,” Angela Person, assistant professor of architecture, said in a recent interview with KGOU. “You can move through the space, and it feels like you’re visiting the museum in person. And if you want to take a closer look at something, all you do is click it and you can view it up close.”
The online version of the exhibition was made possible through a collaborative partnership between Angela Person; Somik Ghosh, associate professor of construction science; and Haley Sandell and Avery Hightower; members of the Gibbs College communications team.
To access the full tour, please click the link below.
Renegades: Bruce Goff and the American School of Architecture, January - March 2020
The American School refers to the imaginative school of design and practice that developed under the guidance of Bruce Goff, Herb Greene and others at the University of Oklahoma in the 1950s and ‘60s.
Students were taught to look to sources beyond the accepted canon of Western architecture and to find inspiration in everyday objects, the natural landscape and the designs of Native American tribes. The results of this pedagogical experiment—the fantastic environments imagined on paper and through built works—are characterized by experimental forms, attention to context and material resourcefulness. The architects of the American School have long been characterized as renegades, iconoclasts and apostates.
Visitors at the exhibition Renegades: Bruce Goff and the American School of Architecture at the Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art view the “Bruce Goff” panel of the exhibition in January. Photo courtesy of Rene Peralta.
Renegades: Bruce Goff and the American School of Architecture tells this story of dramatic change in three sections. Moving Past the Beaux-Arts and Bauhaus, the first section, highlights the evolution in American architecture schools at the time. The second section, “Do Not Try to Remember”: The American School Curriculum, showcases the curriculum and student work produced at OU as well as the work of faculty at the time. The American School Legacy, the third section, highlights the contextual, resourceful and experimental built works of American School architects around the world.
The Gibbs Design in Action Awards (GDAA) program, led by Dr. Wanda Liebermann, has announced its 2026–2027 funded student projects. The initiative supports design and research work that addresses social, cultural, and economic issues in the built environment through collaboration with faculty and community partners.
The OU Institute for Quality Communities (IQC) 2024 collaboration with the Historic Threatt Filling Station has been recognized in the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City's newly released Byways Report: The Scenic Route to Rural Prosperity – a story-driven publication exploring how road trip culture and place-based tourism can fuel economic growth in rural communities.
The Gibbs College of Architecture is pleased to announce that Camille Germany, Chief of Staff, has been named the 2026 recipient of the university-wide Jennifer L. Wise Good Stewardship Award.
