writes Christopher Knight, LAT art critic, about the startling new addition to the Denver Art Museum by Daniel Libeskind. He adds, "Nearby, beneath one severely pitched museum wall, a monumental painted metal sculpture of a dustpan and broom, "Big Sweep," by the Pop art duo of Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen seems poised for the futile task of sweeping the place into history's dustbin."
11 Comments
hmmm, who couldn't have seen that one coming? an architect thinking his building is more important than the art that it houses. good one danny.
danny has done more for the undoing of architects than anyone else. that building is a bomb. yikes
yeah, it ain't the bomb that's for sure.
I think the writer of the article makes a good point about work that was intentionally created for the plain white box interior - which presupposes walls perpendicular to floors - not working when it becomes unmoored from orthangonal spaces.
On the other hand, did I sense indignation in this sentence: Every tilted wall, sharp point and obtuse or acute angle visible on the building's exterior is replicated in the interior rooms, where art is displayed., as if the author feels that a wacky envelope surrounding an interior made of plain white boxes would be acceptable?
I don't like the DAM design because its exterior is aggressive and looks like it's toying with gravity and I've personally never been a fan of that attitude as an aesthetic. I do think the plain white box interior has been around for so long that it's acceptable to explore different contexts in which to view art, but this project does seem to have a relationship with the objects that is overly confrontational.
i agree with your points lb.
christopher knight of los angeles times. he usually endorses architecture that is an ego-less host, a secondary to art as far as his reviews go.
over the years i've read him throwing punches to many new museums. and naturally, his favorite museum is 'temporary contemporary' (now called geffen contemporary), an interim museum that was converted from an old box like commercial building by frank gehry in 80's, while waiting for isozaki's la moca. that was probably the architect's most restrained project ever, due to the temporary nature of its purpose and thus the budget. the space always works beautifully with art installations and takes the role mr knight likes about museum buildings (the building since become a darling of many people and became a permanent venue).
when it comes to trashing buildings like DAM, mr knight gets really poetic with such metaphors like the dustbin, which i quoted with a smile.
Oh yes, a very well-written and convincing argument, whether I agree with all he says or not. Several pointed and funny criticism-phrases.
And yes I remember the Temp-Contemp back in the 80s. A big open slightly industrial space a la the Coenties Slip spaces of the 60s is still the ideal exhibition space for so much art. Partly because the art of the last 40 years has been made with those types of spaces in mind.
I was madly in love with a little Rem project that I'm not sure is still in existence: the Vegas Hermitage, with its Cor-ten walls and paintings of great masters hung with big magnets: perverse in a way that wasn't threatening.
another less hyped but better designed museum, beautifully remodeled in 1996-99 by greg walsh and frank gehry team;norton simon museum.
anyway, today's 'museums as good business and city gentrifier' stuff is probably will go bust in few years. with all the real estate development support around them, they are too vulnerable to market flactuations.
to argue the other side of the coin, the museum addition is there to attract new visitors, and get others excited about visiting. I'm sure denver will get a fair number of interested architects and students traveling to visit the building, that otherwise would probably not have visited denver.
As liberty bell stated, (I'm paraphrasing) if you make a dynamic form for your building and put rectilinear boxes inside, you get criticized for not expressing the form on the interior of the building. If you express the form of the building on the interior it's bad for the art. Honestly, I think most americans outside of NY or LA never go to the art museum. A building like the new DAM will probably pull in many new visitors, first as residents eager to see the new interesting thing, and then as a place they take friends and family when they come to town. This audience will probably care very little how much the gallery spaces compete with the art, (I could be totally wrong on this having not visited the space) but getting more of john q. public out to visit an art museum and become more connected to viewing art can't be a bad thing.
segment on this building at the end of the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on PBS, tonight, 5 October
would like to know more about the museum condos from the slide show. seem restrained for libeskind and, just possibly, pretty good. too bad that they'll never get the coverage because overshadowed by the dam.
would like to know more about the museum condos from the slide show. seem restrained for libeskind and, just possibly, pretty good. too bad that they'll never get the coverage because overshadowed by the dam.
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