Frank Gehry brandishes middle finger at news conference in Spain
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Frank Gehry brandished his middle finger at a journalist and used off-color language at a news conference Thursday in Oviedo, Spain.
The Los Angeles architect has been in Spain this week to receive the 2014 Prince of Asturias Award for Arts, which was presented Friday by King Felipe VI.
Gehry was reportedly asked by a journalist at the news conference if his work was “showy.”
El Pais reported that the architect raised his middle finger and responded by saying: “In this world we are living in, 98 percent of everything that is built and designed today is pure ---.”
The architect later apologized for the obscene gesture, but photographs of him flipping off the reporter already had begun circulating on news wires and blogs.
Gehry said that he was jet-lagged and that the reporter had caught him at a “bad moment,” according to reports.
The 85-year-old architect was recently in France, where he attended the opening of his newest building, a private art museum for the Louis Vuitton Foundation.
He also was honored by the Pompidou Center in Paris with a retrospective of his work running through Jan. 26.
Twitter: @DavidNgLAT
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