Mar 24
Mar 23
MoMA Acquires the @ Symbol
Posted in: Uncategorized
Sure you can look at it right now, sitting there in front of you on your keyboard, but sometimes it takes a modern art museum to make you aware of its significance. So it is with the “@” symbol, which New York’s Museum of Modern Art has just acquired for its permanent collection. If your immediate reaction is, “How can you collect a symbol?!” then you have fallen right into Senior Curator Paola Antonelli‘s trap. She explains as such:
The acquisition of @ takes one more step. It relies on the assumption that physical possession of an object as a requirement for an acquisition is no longer necessary, and therefore it sets curators free to tag the world and acknowledge things that “cannot be had” — because they are too big (buildings, Boeing 747’s, satellites), or because they are in the air and belong to everybody and to no one, like the @ — as art objects befitting MoMA’s collection. The same criteria of quality, relevance, and overall excellence shared by all objects in MoMA’s collection also apply to these entities.
That’s just the quick start, before Antonelli jumps in to explaining the history of the symbol, including how it became so ubiquitous (an increasingly more so over the past, say, twenty years). What’s more, Alice Rawsthorn doubles the efforts to explain the acquisition in her recent NY Times piece, “Why @ Is Held in Such High Design Esteem.”
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Mar 19
City of Fresno Catches Major Heat for Trying to Save Its Metropolitan Museum
Posted in: Uncategorized
The now shuttered Smithsonian-affiliate, the Fresno Metropolitan Museum, was already in trouble with Ansel Adams‘ family for trying to auction off his donated work to help pay off their bankruptcy debt, and now the museum is at the center of another complaint, lashed out at the City of Fresno for their spending of $15 million to try and save the museum six months ago, when it first hit serious sink-or-swim problems. While it’s certainly a noble and valued thing for a city to try and save a local museum, the court officials say they way the local government handled the effort was an absolute mess:
There was no business plan, no appraisal on the property — which appraised last year at $10.5 million — and no investigation into why the project was already 100% over budget by the time the city came to the rescue.
It blames former Mayor Alan Autry, the city council, and the city manager’s office for the lack of oversight. But some council members and the assistant city manager say the museum’s board of directors also deserves some of the blame.
“They led a lot of people to believe that they had the financing in place, it would just be a matter of months and unfortunately with the economy, we saw a significant downturn in the economy,” said [Assistant City Manager Bruce Rudd]. “It was a perfect storm.”
While their hearts were certainly in the right place, and maybe that will still win them some political points, it’s one museum closure that’s certainly riddled with something more than just sorrow-tinted fond memories.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Mar 18
Construction Kicks Off on Zaha Hadids Broad Art Museum
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Speaking of “a Hadid” and wealthy Californians’ art collections, it’s official now in East Lansing, Michigan: they’ve broken ground on Zaha Hadid‘s Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum on the campus of Michigan State University. As we’d let you know back in December when it was first announced, the groundbreaking event (meaning they broke ground; nothing happened to change the course of human history or anything) was held on Tuesday, with both Hadid and the two Broads in attendance with their ceremonial shovels in tow. And now that things have finally kicked off, the building is expected to take a full year, possibly two, to complete. It will be Hadid’s second museum in the US, but strangely, both have been commissioned in the Midwest and not on the all-important coasts, something the Detroit Free Press thought to get a comment from the starchitect about:
Asked why Michigan and Ohio have proved more hospitable to her work than trend capitals like New York and Los Angeles, Hadid said, “I think maybe people assume that New York or other places are less conservative, and I don’t think it’s an accurate reading. So maybe other cities have more ambitions, and can make it happen.
Staying with Hadid in the Midwest for a second, if you’re interested to see her before she jets back to her office in London, she’ll be doing a stopover at the University of Pittsburgh on March 22nd to give a lecture at the design school there. Details here.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Mar 18
SFMoMAs Starchitect-Heavy Shortlist for New Fisher Wing Leaked
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Perhaps you’ll remember last September when a thunderous hooray was issued from inside the hallowed halls of SFMoMA when it was announced that their courting had paid off and they would be receiving the coveted and massive Donald Fisher modern art collection. That hooray kept going all the way out to February when the museum released a statement that they’d managed to raise $250 million, largely from “core members of [its] board,” in order to build a new wing to house Fisher’s collection. And now it looks like they’re going to spend every last dime of that haul, as Curbed SF received a leaked, top secret shortlist of what architects the board has decided to approach to design it. As you likely guessed, it’s starchitects galore, from Renzo Piano to Rem Koolhaas‘ OMA. Only six names of the eight finalists (or, rather, those SFMoMA are just offering it to) have been leaked, but we’re figuring the two still hidden are your regular big shots, like a Hadid or a Foster. Bustler has some additional info on the future building and architect hunt, should you want to read on.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Mar 12
Mixed Reactions to News of Dale Chihuly Museum Planned for Base of Space Needle
Posted in: Uncategorized
Like with most big projects, the good comes with the bad. The news that the area around the base of Seattle’s iconic Space Needle is set to get spruced up with a new $15 million museum, celebrating the work of glass artist Dale Chihuly, is good because it means more construction work, jobs for museum employees, additional visitors to the area. On the negative side, it means they’re going to have to tear down the Fun Forest, “a small children’s fun park,” which never seems like a good karma kind of thing to do (especially when it’s called something as heartwarming as “Fun Forest”). What’s more, there are critics like Knute Berger who think “Chihuly is to art what Starbucks is to coffee.” And although Berger doesn’t mind Owen Richards Architects’ plans for the new museum at all, he sums up the whole business with: “Seattle likes schlock that pretends to be better than it is.” Post-grunge and the novelty of the expensive cup of coffee having long since worn thin, the city has been suffering from something of an image problem of late, like when the AIA said how dull its design-focus is. But we maintain that at least they’re trying, between the mayor’s plan to ban further ugly developments (though that was pre-financial bust) and this new, handsome museum (regardless of your opinion of what it holds inside). So, like we said at the start, you take what you can get, right?
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Mar 11
Who Stole Teddy Roosevelts Walrus Tusk?
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Theodore Roosevelt once said that “The first requisite of a good citizen in this Republic of ours is that he shall be able and willing to pull his weight.” The second requirement? That he not filch walrus tusks. But that’s just what some not-so-good citizen has done! UnBeige has learned that a walrus tusk belonging to the twenty-sixth president was stolen last month from Sagamore Hill, Roosevelt’s historic home in Oyster Bay, New York. The 15-inch-long tusk—one of a pair—was apparently removed from the fireplace mantel in the second-floor guest room of the house sometime between February 9th and February 22nd. The National Park Service (NPS), which manages the national historic site, is working with local authorities to investigate the tusk-snatching and has requested that the tusk be added to the FBI’s national stolen art list.
Meanwhile, you good citizens can pull your weight by keeping an eye out for anyone who speaks softly and carries a big tusk. Teddy’s is 15 inches long with a circumference of 5.5 inches. Look for a rough outer surface that has been polished and a tip that has been carved and sharpened. A reward of $1,000 is being offered to anyone with information leading to the tusk’s return. If you have information on the whereabouts of the tusk, contact NPS special agent Jeffrey Pascale at 215-597-9978.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Mar 05
Talking to Bill Moggridge Before His Cooper-Hewitt Take Over
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As we told you back in early January, IDEO founder and design legend Bill Moggridge landed the job to take over as director at the Cooper-Hewitt. Now that we’re on the heels of that finally happening, with his ascension to the throne occurring sometime later this month. But before the takeover, Moggridge sat down with Architectural Record to answer a few questions about what he’s planning to bring to the museum and how he sees it operating under his command. From his few short replies, it sounds like there’s a promising new future ahead for the museum, as he pushes it to spread its message and influence. Here’s a bit:
WH: What appealed to you about the Cooper-Hewitt directorship?
BM: The Cooper-Hewitt is the only national [non-specialized] design organization. If you look at other countries, they have design councils, design business associations, and design research institutes, as well as design museums. The opportunity to make the Cooper-Hewitt much more of a national organization — something that could serve as an umbrella connecting the AIGA and the AIA and so on — is very exciting.
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Mar 05
Ansel Adams Family Goes After Bankrupt Fresno Museum to Block Auction of Donated Prints
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Ansel Adams‘ son Michael has found himself in a similar position to that of the Georgia O’Keefe estate last year as they fought Frisk University to stop them from selling off donated paintings by the artist. Following their familiar plight of a forced closure due to a lack of funding, the Fresno Metropolitan Museum is now in the process of auctioning off its collection to help pay off its bankruptcy debts. These auctions are set to include several of the famous photographer’s prints, which Michael Adams and his family are now trying to fight. The issue, an likely upcoming court battle, is over whether Adams himself originally donated the prints without any strings attached, or if there was some other form of agreement made:
…Adams’ son Michael Adams, and his wife, Jeanne, contend that a “declaration of gift” signed by the family and Met officials at the time specifically removed from the document any permission for the Met to dispose of the prints. A sentence that said Met directors would be “at liberty to use or dispose of this property at their … discretion” was stricken, the complaint says.
But also in the original agreement, a copy of which is attached to the complaint, Adams agreed to “irrevocably” give all rights to the work to the Met. One of the Adamses attorneys, Melody Hawkins, said she could not comment on the agreement. Fresno bankruptcy lawyer Riley Walter, who represents the museum, could not be reached to comment.
The O’Keefe estate, you might recall, ultimatelywound up on the losing side of this kind of fight, even with a similar declaration of “this is just a loan” (though in far more complicated legalese).
New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.
Feb 25
Animal Collective x Danny Perez: Transverse Temporal Gyrus
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Neither live concert nor art exhibit, Transverse Temporal Gyrus is a site-specific sonic installation featuring Baltimore-hailing band Animal Collective and experimental artist Danny Perez as part of the Guggenheim Museum’s 50th anniversary celebration.
Through sound and video projection, the environment of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed building becomes psychedelic, distorted and luminous, all designed to pique the senses. Band members and performers will use props and costumes to add to the ambiance of the looping pre-recorded music. “The core elements and colors are worked into the piece in order to unite this room of sound with the inside of your brain,” asserts Animal Collective.
Building off the raw space provided by Contemplating the Void: Interventions in the Guggenheim Museum, the collaboration will transform the museum’s open environment with constant motion at the core of the concept.
The night of immersive performance art will be held 4 March 2010 from 9pm to 12am. Tickets are currently sold out.
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