So I get to talk about museums and apartments, musuems and apartments. MAD and MoMA, Meier and, well, someone else. Everyone loves to quote the numbers, dizzying in their largness. This many millions, that many square feet, or floors, or doo dads. Big sales for a Rothko and a Jasper Johns drawing this week, another record per square foot loft, a discussion that centers almost exclusively on the three quarters of a billion dollars raised for MoMA capital campaign, with absolutely no discussion on the impact on the collection (and very little recap on the dust up over the attempt to jettison some of the more ‘frustrating’ elements of the museum due to — get this — a lack of space in the new facility). Oh, and it will get more expesive for us to see.
And of course, you are going to have to pay for the privilege, since all this beauty has yet to be captured and released by Timothy Hursley or Paul Warchol (hell, they won’t even print a plan — or is that rights-managed too?). The New Yorker runs two reviews this week, by Updike and what-his-name but only one photo (none online). Over in the Times, Ouroussoff gives us some details on the Whitney with a sketch and real rough form model.
The text of both reviews hold far more detail, the usual amount of insidery superiority (‘I am now telling you about something you cannot see, peon’), with no real documentation. The Updike piece is accompanied by one extravagant shot of the atrium, which was provided to finally to validate what every breathless art work suck-ass has been panting about for months. Big, big, BIG!! Well, yes, looks pretty big, that lobby. Bigger than the Tate Modern? Maybe not, so let’s stop talking about size as the only marker of value in design. Unless of course, its continued presence in reviews is akin to what you go through when a bad photographer shows you work, and you stuggle to find something to praise, and you end up with ‘Well, the mattes look great’.
I can’t add anything about quality, since I’m not one of the art elite — and really, it’s great, I’m sure. Was that ever in doubt? Eventually, I’ll get around to seeing a really big room next time I’m good and stoned and in midtown. What did they hang in that commanding atrium? Water Lilies. And Barnett Newman. Yep.
Over at the Whitney, they really must have put the screws to Piano. Or he simply demonstrated that he is the artsy version of David Childs (sans stealing bad student work from crits). The form model we are presented is so mundane, it’s hard to determine what he actually did. And I’d be curious to see how his solution, in massing, differs from what Richard Gluckman (who is the go-to guy when you want really fussy, well-executed museum/gallery modernism that is threatening to absolutely no one — and he is a good architect to boot) proposed, before he was summarily canned.
What’s interesting is the form model presents what one might think to be a minor intervention, compared to the OMA model (or the Graves abomination from the 80’s), with the ‘Guggenheim solution’: make a blank tall tower with similar coloration and a slightly different material and stick it as far back on the site as you can. But it’s actually rather drastic, since a new entry is being proposed as well. Given how compact the Whitney is, relocating the entry to the south will have a dramatic impact on internal circulation, resulting in what looks to be a narrow hotel-like atrium with wings springing from each side clad in restrained, tasteful materials. But who can tell? The review is unclear, there aren’t photos, and it isn’t our business anyway, as long as the color of the cladding doesn’t upset the biddy preservationist crowd.
But get ready: MoMA is going to clean up next week. You’ll all be talking about it. Dust off your thesari for the cleverest synonym for big, and practice your best arch faux intellectualism. It must be good — it was really expensive. (Thanks to Curbed for the linkage)
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Robber Barons give back to the community — at $20 per.
So I get to talk about museums and apartments, musuems and apartments. MAD and MoMA, Meier and, well, someone else. Everyone loves to quote the numbers, dizzying in their largness. This many millions, that many square feet, or floors, or doo dads. Big sales for a Rothko and a Jasper Johns drawing this week, another record per square foot loft, a discussion that centers almost exclusively on the three quarters of a billion dollars raised for MoMA capital campaign, with absolutely no discussion on the impact on the collection (and very little recap on the dust up over the attempt to jettison some of the more ‘frustrating’ elements of the museum due to — get this — a lack of space in the new facility). Oh, and it will get more expesive for us to see.
And of course, you are going to have to pay for the privilege, since all this beauty has yet to be captured and released by Timothy Hursley or Paul Warchol (hell, they won’t even print a plan — or is that rights-managed too?). The New Yorker runs two reviews this week, by Updike and what-his-name but only one photo (none online). Over in the Times, Ouroussoff gives us some details on the Whitney with a sketch and real rough form model. The text of both reviews hold far more detail, the usual amount of insidery superiority (‘I am now telling you about something you cannot see, peon’), with no real documentation. The Updike piece is accompanied by one extravagant shot of the atrium, which was provided to finally to validate what every breathless art work suck-ass has been panting about for months. Big, big, BIG!! Well, yes, looks pretty big, that lobby. Bigger than the Tate Modern? Maybe not, so let’s stop talking about size as the only marker of value in design. Unless of course, its continued presence in reviews is akin to what you go through when a bad photographer shows you work, and you stuggle to find something to praise, and you end up with ‘Well, the mattes look great’.I can’t add anything about quality, since I’m not one of the art elite — and really, it’s great, I’m sure. Was that ever in doubt? Eventually, I’ll get around to seeing a really big room next time I’m good and stoned and in midtown. What did they hang in that commanding atrium? Water Lilies. And Barnett Newman. Yep.
Over at the Whitney, they really must have put the screws to Piano. Or he simply demonstrated that he is the artsy version of David Childs (sans stealing bad student work from crits). The form model we are presented is so mundane, it’s hard to determine what he actually did. And I’d be curious to see how his solution, in massing, differs from what Richard Gluckman (who is the go-to guy when you want really fussy, well-executed museum/gallery modernism that is threatening to absolutely no one — and he is a good architect to boot) proposed, before he was summarily canned. What’s interesting is the form model presents what one might think to be a minor intervention, compared to the OMA model (or the Graves abomination from the 80’s), with the ‘Guggenheim solution’: make a blank tall tower with similar coloration and a slightly different material and stick it as far back on the site as you can. But it’s actually rather drastic, since a new entry is being proposed as well. Given how compact the Whitney is, relocating the entry to the south will have a dramatic impact on internal circulation, resulting in what looks to be a narrow hotel-like atrium with wings springing from each side clad in restrained, tasteful materials. But who can tell? The review is unclear, there aren’t photos, and it isn’t our business anyway, as long as the color of the cladding doesn’t upset the biddy preservationist crowd. But get ready: MoMA is going to clean up next week. You’ll all be talking about it. Dust off your thesari for the cleverest synonym for big, and practice your best arch faux intellectualism. It must be good — it was really expensive. (Thanks to Curbed for the linkage)