Last night, the Los Angeles County Museum held a public scoping meeting in advance of preparing an environmental impact report (EIR) for a planned Peter Zumthor-designed building. The Zumthor building would replace four existing structures and result in a net reduction of space amounting to approximately 24,571 square feet.
The meeting, which was well-attended but provided scant new information on the project, primarily consisted of a pitch for the building by LACMA’s director Michael Govan. “I thought it would be helpful to personally explain the genesis of the project and some of the facts of the project,” he stated.
Explaining that adapting the existing buildings would be cost-prohibitive, Govan went on to praise Zumthor’s design. Describing the planned building as “something permeable and transparent”, “exciting and innovative”, Govan stated that he believed other museums would follow their lead in creating “visibility into the museum”.
One of the most controversial parts of the plan, the bridge that would span Wilshire Boulevard was described as “very practical” an “very beautiful aesthetically”. Critics worry that the bridge would disrupt the view down the iconic boulevard, but Govan claimed that a “kink” in the boulevard, precisely where the bridge will be located, already prohibits a straight-shot view down Wilshire.
For the most part, all the information that Govan presented is already available online. He stressed the “nonhierarchical” floor plan that’s designed around the multicultural collection of the museum. Additionally, Govan praised the amount of light that the glazed exterior walls will provide right adjacent to darker, light-controlled galleries, noting that Zumthor has designed the museum so that “you can have delicate works and still see outside.”
Govan concluded that he was thrilled by the “chance to seize this moment for something historic.”
For more on the planned Zumthor building, follow these links:
4 Comments
Wow. Nine hours have passed since this was posted and no one has moaned about the design or the planning or the phenomenology in the comments yet.
Here, I'll be the first.
This entire project has been a disaster from day one and has only gotten worse with every proposed redesign iteration. No matter how much one tries to polish a turd, it's still a turd!
There is no configuration of this horrid, turd-like blob that on any level and under any set of sensible criteria makes any sense at all. It fails financially (I'm highly confident of this. The $600 million figure that's been reported is almost certainly going to be a low ball figure and the true costs of development will balloon much, much higher), aesthetically (I mean, my God; just look at it! The word "coprolite" comes to mind! And we all still have very little clue as to what the interior spaces will look like), "programmatically" (If that's the right "word")(LACMA would be losing significant square footage of gallery space for displaying art if The Blob is built. Someone please try to convince me how that would be a good thing?), and defensively ( it's a very easy target to destroy for terrorists because of its span across Wilshire).
If you don't like the original LACMA campus and would like to see it replaced, that's fine. A lot of people feel that way too. I, personally, would like to see the original campus kept, preserved, upgraded (with complete interior re-modeling) and so on ( lots of others feel that way as well). But, there have GOT to be far better design concepts than this proposed hideous, desiccating, black slug!
Let our world-renowned community of L.A. based architects have a crack at it. Why should this whole city be held hostage by Govan's fetishistic, Zumthor fan-boy obsession and his stubborn and strident ego?!
Here's what should happen:
(1) Govan is fired, and he returns to New York where he's better suited.
(2) Zumthor is fired, and he can go to decompress in his Vals spa.
(3) Either start from scratch for a new museum concept (employing our brilliant local architects who actually understand L.A. Not Gehry, though. I love his stuff but I'm also a bit burned out be his flamboyant designs), or, as I previously mentioned, restore the original campus buildings (or some other concept that keeps the original buildings.---my preference).
"...employing our brilliant local architects who actually understand L.A."
yeah!
They should get Joey G-Money!!
more of this?
and less of this?
or,
more of this,
and less of this,
I'm a proponent of the Zumthor design. It has a sleek, mid-century modern boomerang feel to it, which I think pays homage to Southern Californian architectural history. I also think it's smart how the design references the shape and color of the landmark La Brea tar pits next to LACMA.
Financially, the cost of fixing the current state of the buildings is more than half of what it would cost to make the new building. Also, one must consider the energy efficiency of the new building and how economically feasible that will be in the long run.
I guess my only concern is the lowered amount of square footage and how that will impact the gallery and storage space of their collection.
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