Collections : [Avery Drawings & Archives]

Georges Ivanovich Gurdjieff (d. 1949) was a Greek-Armenian philosopher who lived and taught his "fourth way" in France. He was born sometime between 1866 and 1877 in Alexandropol, Armenia, which was then a governorate of the Russian Empire. After 1912, he began to instruct a group of students on esoteric knowledge (the source of which he never revealed but which he allegedly garnered after extensive travel throughout Asia), turning these into a type of philosophical system that today could be described as "self-help." After relocating to France, he established the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man, began writing his manuscripts, and engaged students in sacred music and "movements." He gathered a significant following of writers, artists, and other members of the intelligentsia from the 1920s-1940s, including this collection's co-creators, namely P.D. Ouspensky, Alfred R. Orage, and Solita Solano. Gurdjieff wrote three volumes explaining his system, which were published posthumously. Applicable to architectural researchers are Gurdjieff and Olgivanna Lloyd Wright's life-long relationship. Olgivanna lived and studied at the Institute for a number of years before immigrating to the United States. She structured much of the life at Taliesin around Gurdjieff's philosophy, and the group often performed his "movements."