Architectural photographer Roland Halbe has sent us his photos of an archeological museum in Cordoba, Spain, designed by Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos. (more…)
A rendering of the Clyfford Still Museum, designed by Brad Cloepfil of Allied Works Architecture
Be Still our hearts! Yesterday saw the groundbreaking ceremonies for the Clyfford Still Museum, which will serve as a cantilevered concrete home for the more than 2,400 works bequeathed to the city of Denver by the artist’s fiercely guarded estate (now believed to encompass a whopping 94% of Still’s output, heavy on the breathtaking monumental abstraction). Designed by Brad Cloepfil of Allied Works Architecture, the 31,500-square-foot building will feature light-filled exhibition spaces on the upper level and an education center and state-of-the-art conservation laboratory on the lower level. The museum also won’t want for starchitect-designed neighbors. Located in the heart of Denver’s Civic Cultural Complex, the Clyfford Still Museum will be near the Denver Art Museum’s new Daniel Libeskind-designed Hamilton Building and the Denver Public Library, renovated and expanded by Michael Graves & Associates.
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Smithsonian head G. Wayne Clough must be really disappointed. After the museum’s rotten, seemingly never-ending financial scandals in 2007, and the occasional residual reminders about that lousy year in 2008, this year had turned out pretty money-related scandal free. Sure, it wasn’t all tops, with hiring freezes, raise and bonus cutoffs, and leaked emails about layoffs. But those seemed to fade into the background with all the goodness, from the selection of the National Museum of African American History and Culture architects to their fun tour video with Ben Stiller. So here we are, just days away from making it safely through 2009, and then it comes out that $12.3 million in museum property has been stolen or has gone missing since 2005, according to the Washington Post, and most all of it in internal employee theft. These unfortunately beans were spilled to a congressional committee late last week by the museum’s inspector general, who said the blame rests largely on its management, who didn’t have much of a system in place to keep track of museum property or just didn’t want to do it (we think some blame might also be good to place on the people who actually took the $12.3 million worth of stuff). There were also some revelations about misappropriated maintenance funds and asbestos and…well, you know, Clough, maybe 2010’s your year.
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With all the talk in California about where it will be and who will he pick to design it, we’d nearly forgotten all about Eli Broad‘s other new museum, the one at Michigan State University, designed by Zaha Hadid. MSU is Broad’s alma mater and he and his wife have thus far given close to $30 million to see the museum built and have enough money available for operations and to start up its collection. Likely to finish a lot sooner than whatever winds up happening in his own backyard, a date has been chosen when ground will finally be broken and construction will begin:
The university will break ground on the museum on March 16, 2010. Eli Broad, who donated the naming gift for the project, and Zaha Hadid, the internationally known architect who designed the building, are expected to attend.
The groundbreaking will be followed by 23 months of construction and a 2012 museum opening.
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(Photo: Philip Greenberg)
Have you been holding off on visiting the Guggenheim’s swell Kandinsky exhibition for fear of becoming famished mid-climb, before reaching the artist’s geometric period? Fear not, ravenous fans of abstraction, because now the museum can feed your hunger for great art and modern American cuisine. Today is opening day at The Wright, the intimate new restaurant located on the museum’s ground floor and lined in a site-specific sculptural installation by British artist Liam Gillick.
Designed by Andre Kikoski Architect, the 1,600-square-foot space was inspired by Wright’s original museum design. “We sought to create a work that is both contemporary and complementary,” says Kikoski, who riffed on the Guggenheim’s iconic architecture with design features including a curvilinear wall layered with illuminated fiber-optics, a bar topped in seamless white Corian, an undulating banquette, and a layered ceiling canopy of taut white membrane (yum!).
As for the menu, it’s modern American fare through the eyes of chef Rodolfo Contreras, with signature dishes such as seared diver scallops, gently cooked shrimp, and crab meat with sea urchin sauce; slow-roasted suckling pig, quince, and violet mustard (isn’t that the title of another Gilick work?) in apple bacon jus. Vegetarians can opt for The Wright Salad, which features green market vegetables and gently cooked egg truffle. Meanwhile, those Guggenheim visitors that insist on starting at the top will want to begin with dessert: spiced pumpkin and chocolate cake with a scoop of pumpkin seed oil ice cream.
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Precisely a year after announcing the curatorial team for its 2010 biennial, the Whitney Museum of American Art is making the holidays of 56 artists that much merrier (if George Condo can ever be described as merry). The museum has just revealed the artists that will be included in the 2010 biennial, named simply “2010,” which will run from February 25 through May 30. “The artists selected for this year’s exhibition reflect diverse responses to the anxiety and optimism of the past two years,” noted curators Francesco Bonami and Gary Carrion-Murayari in a statement issued this morning. “‘2010’ does not privilege any one medium or aesthetic style, but rather assembles a wide range of individual gestures, personal histories, and improvised encounters that speak to a sense of openness and community.” And speaking of improvised encounters, we’ll refrain from listing all the names—from David Adamo to Robert Williams—in favor of sharing with you Pierce Jackson‘s charming video version:
Previously on UnBeige:
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Back in August, there was something of a mysterious cloud hanging over Providence, Rhode Island. At the Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art, Hope Alswang, its director had suddenly and without warning announced that she was resigning immediately. She wasn’t talking, everyone was caught off guard, and the reasons behind it all remained a mystery. We’d only heard mention of it again later that month, in a brief passage in this AP report about the university’s president, John Maeda, and his second year in the position. But now, some four months later, the Boston Globe‘s Geoff Edgers has done some brilliant reporting in trying to get to the bottom of the matter. In it, it paints a picture of Alswang and Maeda clashing from the start, with neither one of them coming out of the piece looking very clean. It’s a great inside look at the mysterious situation itself (neither party has still said much of anything), but also a far more candid peek at Maeda’s first year at the head of RISD than we’d ever previously been privy to.
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If you were planning a trip to New York, you might want to start thinking about reconsidering, perhaps instead going to someplace where there are things to see and do, like Toledo or Guam. You haven’t been able to see massive amounts of sports memorabilia in New York since this February when the Sports Museum was forced to shut down (followed shortly thereafter in Los Angeles, too), and now you won’t be able to see piles of pop music collectibles either. It’s just been announced that The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Annex NYC, an off-shoot of the Cleveland-based museum, will be shutting down in just under a month, after just over a year of existence, apparently due to very sparse visitor numbers. Here’s the announcement from the Annex’s site:
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Annex NYC will conclude its stay in New York on January 3 at 8PM. The Rock Annex is exploring opportunities for a tour that would bring exclusive artifacts to music fans and rock enthusiasts around the world. Fans have just one more month to experience the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Annex NYC, showcasing rare artifacts from legendary artists including Springsteen, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones, Michael Jackson and its featured exhibit, John Lennon: The New York City Years.
The Cleveland Leader, who predicted the Annex wouldn’t work when it was first opened, now writes “Don’t Say I Didn’t Warn You.”
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Rick Mather Architects of London have completed an extension to the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology at Oxford University in the UK. (more…)
It might not be directly affiliated, but with a name so general, there’s sure to be no hard feelings. The Design Museum Holon in Israel has announced that they will finally be opening the doors of their magnificent new building, designed by friend of the Design Museum in the UK, Ron Arad, at the end of January. The museum will seek to bring attention to both Israeli and international design, the first major effort in the country to build a very large central hub to celebrate design. We’ll be excited to see what they wind up exhibiting, but in the interim, we’re just excited to see the building finished, as it’s a real beaut. Lots of images and videos of both renderings and construction available over at the Israeli Design Center and here’s a short overview of Arad’s planning for the structure:
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