This story was originally published on DenverPost.com on Dec. 26, 2004.
In October 2001, ARTnews magazine’s cover trumpeted an article
extravagantly but not inappropriately titled “The Incredible
Growing Art Museum.”
“It is a multibillion-dollar effort, a sustained growth spurt the
likes of which the art world has never seen,” wrote Blake Eskin in
the piece.
He was referring to an unprecedented explosion in museum
construction underway then and still continuing. At the time, more
than 70 major new buildings and expansions were at some stage of
development worldwide, according to an accompanying inventory.
Some of the projects have since been canceled, but dozens of others
are completed or in the throes of construction.
“Architecture for Art,” a stunning large-format book with 221
color photographs by Paul Rocheleau, highlights the best of these
recent projects, as well as earlier museums from the 20th century
that have withstood at least a preliminary test of time.
Among the latter are Frank Lloyd Wright’s revolutionary Guggenheim
Museum in New York City, perhaps the most widely known museum
building in this country, and Louis I. Kahn’s unassuming and
timeless Kimbell Art Museum in Forth Worth, Texas.
Rocheleau conceived the idea for the book while visiting the
all-too-little known Des Moines (Iowa) Art Center, which has one of
the most extraordinary building complexes of any cultural
institution in the country.
Its original 1948 prairie-modernist building by Eliel Saarinen has
since been supplemented by a supple concrete addition by I.M. Pei
that juts into an adjacent rose garden and by a prototypical
white-enameled wing by Richard Meier.
The earliest inclusion in the book is the original structure of the
Museum of Modern Art in New York City. It is an ideal starting
point, because of the groundbreaking nature of the institution and
its inevitable impact on every American art museum since.
The book is organized alphabetically with eight works in progress
tucked into the back, including a generous, six-page spotlight on
Daniel Libeskind’s $90.5 million addition to the Denver Art Museum,
scheduled to open in 2006.
In all, 36 museums are featured, and it is hard to fault the
choices, which are well-balanced geographically, stylistically and
historically, with even a few surprises thrown in, such as the
Henry Art Gallery at the University of Washington in Seattle.
Each museum is given a flattering spread, with short essays from
the institution’s director and one of its key architects as well as
a smattering of quotations from art and architecture critics.
This is fine as far as it goes, but there is little consistency
among the submitted texts, and missing in most cases are basic
facts about the buildings, such as dates of construction or square
footage.
Even more detrimental is the lack of a keen-eyed, detached critical
voice running through the book and providing needed third-party
analysis of each selection. After a preface by the book’s editor
and a short introduction by Wim de Wit, the two are not heard from
again.
That said, this book is still a valuable resource. Even if the
commentary is weak, few if any books have more handsomely showcased
in one volume the best American art-museum architecture of the past
70 years.
This story was originally published on DenverPost.com on Dec. 26, 2004.
