After having to relocate its facilities due to seismic issues, the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archives, collectively known as BAM/PFA, will open its new home on January 31, 2016 in Downtown Berkeley. Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, the $112M project integrates a preexisting art deco building, the former printing plant of neighboring UC Berkeley, into a 35K sq ft new structure. All in all, the new BAM/PFA will include two theaters, a performance space, cafe, four study spaces (the museum has a strong connection with UC Berkeley's film and art departments), an "art-making lab", and a reading room.
Given its hybrid exhibition/screening requirements, BAM/PFA's total gallery space is relatively small at 25k square feet – compared to Snøhetta's SFMOMA across the bay at 130K, or Renzo Piano's new Whitney at 50K. The museum's inaugural exhibition, "Architecture of Life", will "explore the ways that architecture—as concept, metaphor, and practice—illuminates aspects of life experience", and will include 200+ pieces by artists, architects and scientists, including (to name a few): Louise Bourgeois, Buckminster Fuller, DS+R, Toyo Ito, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Rosie Lee Tompkins, James and John Whitney, and Lebbeus Woods, among others.
BAM/PFA's original imposing brutalist structure, designed by Mario Ciampi in 1970, was found to be non-compliant with earthquake safety standards in 1997. Getting the building to code would compromise the gallery space too much, and the PFA had already moved out in 1999. The new DS+R building will house the two entities once again under the same roof. What will happen to the building is up to UC Berkeley.
5 Comments
BORING
I love whales, but I've always thought these striations on their bodies are icky.
I think it might just be the renderings that look boring. I like the juxtaposition of an existing structure and DS&R's fluid "whale skin".
renderings like these make me nostalgiac for physical models. even crappy oma-type assemblages.
Yeah, I agree, midlander. That beached whale rendering is totally immaterial.
And I'm going to go ahead and say it: my disappointment with DSR over the Folk Art Museum demolition has clouded my ability to fairly judge anything they do. It's all ugly, IMHO.
Block this user
Are you sure you want to block this user and hide all related comments throughout the site?
Archinect
This is your first comment on Archinect. Your comment will be visible once approved.