The list of potential Denver neighborhoods for a museum devoted to famed abstract-expressionist painter Clyfford Still has been narrowed to four, and a decision is expected by summer’s end.
Project director Dean Sobel said Tuesday that the finalists are: the Central Platte Valley, Civic Center, Golden Triangle and LoDo. No specific sites within those areas have been identified except for the McNichols Building, the former home of the Denver Central Library on the north edge of Civic Center.
“The committee is not necessarily thinking about all these locations today but trying to make assumptions about what they’ll feel like in four or five years when we’ll, hopefully, be close to opening this building to the public,” Sobel said.
Denver drew national headlines in August 2004 with its announcement that the artist’s widow, Patricia A. Still, had agreed to give the city 750 paintings and more than 1,400 works on paper from his estate.
The exact size and cost of the museum have not been set, but Sobel said original estimates are largely on the mark: 25,000 square feet and a cost of $7 million to $10 million plus a $10 million operations endowment.
Both the Golden Triangle and Civic Center sites are attractive because they offer easy access to the Denver Art Museum and Denver Central Library. And the Central Platte Valley, primarily the area between 15th and 20th streets, is slated to be the future home of the Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver.
LoDo does not contain any cultural institutions, Sobel said, but it has other draws.
“It is a location where there is such urban vitality and probably the largest foot traffic of all these sites,” he said.
Fine arts critic Kyle MacMillan can be reached at 303-820-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com.
