Who is the American architect whose design has been selected for the master plan of the “Shenzhen 4 Tower in 1” and was named by Time magazine as America’s Best Architect for “buildings that satisfy the spirit as well as the eye”?

He was born on December 9, 1947 in Bremerton, Washington, graduated from the University of Washington, and pursued architecture studies in Rome in 1970.

In 1976, he joined the Architectural Association in London, and later established offices in New York City. He has been teaching in Columbia University since 1981.

The success of his architecture derives from his sculptural shapes, his interest in the poetics of space, color, and material, as well as his fascination with scientific phenomena. His work refers to urban history and the potentials of modern science.

He is called “a virtuoso of light,” and his works reveal a kind of basic research of the connections between light and space and their perception. The lighting of the interiors and the orchestration of varied shades of color in dialogue with the spatial layout results in a convincing whole. This is direct, empirical architecture that supplies a wealth of fundamental perceptual material, creating experiences with his buildings.

His work has evolved from an earlier concern with typology to a concern with a phenomenological approach; that is, man’s existentialist bodily engagement with his surroundings. The shift came about partly due to his interest in the writings of philosopher Maurice Merleau Ponty, and the architect-theorist Juhani Pallasmaa.

His best-known works include the much-celebrated Bloch Building addition to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, the Kiasma Contemporary Art Museum in Helsinki, Finland, the Simmons Hall at MIT in Massachusetts, the Chapel of St. Ignatius at Seattle University, and the Bellevue Arts Museum in Washington. He has also designed Linked Hybrid Housing in Beijing, a Hybrid Building in Florida, the Planar House in Arizona, and the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York City.

More recently, his firm was selected as the winning firm for the design for the master plan of the Shenzhen 4 Tower in 1 competition by unanimous decision. This competition was for an office tower complex around the new Shenzhen Stock Exchange Headquarters in Shenzhen’s Futian commercial business district. His design included four towers connected by a horizontal linking structure.

In 1998, he was awarded the prestigious Alvar Aalto Medal, and two years later was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

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Answer: Steven Holl