“The new buildings are
startling, even shocking in appearance.
They follow no set architectural formula; each designer offers his own
idea of how to house the museum’s updated functions. The temptation to turn a structure into a
personal statement occasionally has provided irresistible.” -Ada Louise Huxtable from her essay “What
Should a Museum Be?”
What is the higher purpose of the museum? Should it showcase art or architecture? Should it purely be a space that displays art
or should the museum be a work of art itself?
Over the past couple years, as I looked more into the work of famous
architects around the world, I have come across many extremely unique museum
designs. The museums themselves have
become somewhat of a piece of art themselves.
When I think about a typical museum, I think about plain,
square galleries with white walls that showcase art. The design of the space is somewhat basic in
order to highlight the art being displayed.
Some could argue that the museums being built today are, in a way,
upstaging the art within them. The
architecture rather than the art is becoming the main attraction. Have museums become flashy spectacles? When we look up the definition of a museum it
states that a museum is a building in which objects of historical, scientific,
artistic, or cultural interest are stored and exhibited. From this definition we can gather that the
function of a museum is purely to display different works. As Lange states, perhaps it is not possible
to evaluate the building without considering the question of how well it
functions as a showcase for art.
On the other hand, it is important for a museum to be able
to attract people to view the work inside.
As Huxtable states in “What Should
a Museum Be?”, a building should be interesting enough to attract visitors,
after all a museum without people is not a museum at all. According to Webster’s definition of a
museum, a museum is a building in which interesting and valuable things are
collected and shown to the public.
Without the public there is no museum.
And how do we get the public to show up?
By creating a building that is interesting enough for people to want to
visit. The “Bilbao effect” refers to the
marketing potential for a museum and its city when a famous architect creates
an eye-catching design. Oftentimes, I
think the “Bilbao effect” can have a negative connotation. Many complain that the art is taking a back
seat to the dynamic architecture.
Guggenheim Bilbao Museum (1997)
When we have the debate about art vs. architecture, we are
often referring to modern museums such as Gehry’s Guggenheim Bilbao. However, we often don’t look back at the
first museums. The purpose of many of
the first museums was national prestige or preservation of heritage. Many of these museums, such as the Musei
Capitolini, emphasized classicism. They
often had great halls, columns, pediments, etc.
When we look at the picture below of the Musei Capitolini, it isn't exactly
a plain white gallery. The room has
intricate details, with a patterned floor and elaborate ceiling. Perhaps the argument could be made that this
museum doesn't exactly take a back seat to the art and showcase the works the
way it should. Perhaps a contributing
factor to the debate of art vs. architecture in museums today is the fact that
these museums are no longer the classical museums they used to be. They are taking on different forms then the
usual classic design which might cause people to believe that these buildings
are just too radical.
Musei Capitolini (1734)
As Lange mentions, in order to critique a museum, you have
to think of it both as an interior, focused on displaying its collection, and
an exterior that is a part of the urban ensemble. I think that a healthy balance between art
and architecture is what we should strive for when designing a museum.
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