Nathaniel Kahn seeks to understand the life of his father, the architect Louis I.

NEWYORKER: My Architect

The Vitra exhibition starts with a detailed biographical display and regular showings of previously unseen film footage shot by Nathaniel Kahn, Louis's son and the director of "My Architect, " the movie about his father.

WSJ: Ancient Modernism | 'Louis Kahn: The Power of Architecture' | Vitra Design Museum, Germany | By Colin Amery

But it is the people Nathaniel Kahn finds, the things they say, and the sensitivity and drama of the architectural photography that make this film so richly evocative, its emotional impact matched by its visual beauty.

WSJ: Seeking the Father, Finding the Architect

Seated in Kahn's Assembly Building in Dacca, Bangladesh, a professor of architecture, Shamsul Wares, tells Nathaniel that his father "was no ordinary man, " and gives a passionate recital of how the architect's vision conjured great buildings out of desolate, empty land.

WSJ: Seeking the Father, Finding the Architect