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Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings
Explores Worldwide Boom in Museum Building
Frist Center Friends of Architecture Group Formed
NASHVILLE, TENN. – (March 31, 2009) – Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings will open to the public in the Frist Center for the Visual Arts’ Upper-Level Galleries May 29, 2009 and will remain on view until August 23, 2009.
Organized by Art Centre Basel, the exhibition is a survey of the latest museum architecture in the United States, Europe, Asia and Australia. Eighteen unique designs are represented by models, sketches, computer renderings, photographs and animation—all of which provide fascinating insight into the creative processes of many of the world’s major architectural firms. The buildings themselves are at various stages of development. Some have been completed and are already open to the public, some are in the process of being constructed and some have not yet gotten off the ground—and may never come to fruition because of financial constraints.
While the Frist Center is not included in the exhibition, Frist Center Associate Curator Trinita Kennedy thinks that the adaptive use of Nashville’s historic post office complements the show well. “In this day and age, as the world becomes more complex and global, museums are no longer simply repositories of the world’s great art,” Kennedy commented. “As people seek connections … to the past … to ideas … to each other, museums are central to those explorations as they become places of conversation, study, discourse and celebration.”
“We have seen that here in Nashville,” she continued, “as we have watched the Frist Center become a place where art fosters education, creativity and the sharing of ideas.”
These new and expanded roles often call for the creation of buildings that address a new, broader functionality or additions to existing facilities in order to meet new needs.
“Tensions can, and often do, emerge between the specialized needs of museums and the desire for architects to make an aesthetic statement,” Kennedy said.
“Museum building projects in this exhibition include those that are beautifully integrated into their surroundings and several that are set in stark (and sometimes shocking) opposition to their surroundings,” Kennedy noted. “There are buildings by ‘starchitects,’ (such as Frank Gehry, Renzo Piano, Zaha Hadid and Daniel Libeskind).”
Not only does this exhibition illuminate the relationship of architecture to the exhibition of art, it also explores the relationship between architecture and the environment. In the Stonehenge Visitor Centre and Interpretive Museum, architects Denton Corker Marshall drastically altered their original design to adapt to the landscape, and Tadao Ando buried his Chichu Art Museum in the earth of Naoshima, Japan, out of respect for the pristine panorama of the island on which it is located.
On the other hand, the biomorphic structure of Kunsthaus Graz in Graz, Austria, stands in sharp and deliberate contrast to neighboring historic buildings. It was conceived as a structural bridge where past and future meet and is called by locals “the friendly alien.”
Among the projects profiled in the exhibition:
The expansion of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City (Taniguchi and Associates); Kunsthaus Graz am Landesmuseum Joanneum, Graz, Austria (Spacelab Cook-FournierGmbH); the Paul Klee Centre, Berne, Switzerland (Renzo Piano Building Workshop); the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (Frank Gehry Partners, LLP) and the expansion of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO (Steven Holl Architects).
The exhibition is accompanied by a catalog to which Frist Center Executive Director Susan H. Edwards, Ph.D., contributed the foreword.
Frist Center Friends of Architecture Group Formed
Museums in the 21st Century is supported by the Friends of Architecture, a new interest group at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts. The effort is led by Dan France, vice president, Messer Construction Co., the company responsible for the original construction of the historic Nashville Post Office in 1933 and 1934.
“What a wonderful statement we can make as a discipline and as a community by recognizing and celebrating the significance of one of Nashville’s crown architectural jewels,” France said. “We are receiving tremendous interest from Middle Tennessee’s architectural community and others who appreciate the important role architecture plays in our environments.”
Museums in the 21st Century
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PROGRAM INFORMATION
Thursday, June 4 Gallery Talk: Museums in the 21st Century:
7:00 p.m. Concepts, Projects, Buildings
Meet at the Information Desk
Free with the purchase of gallery admission
Join Trinita Kennedy, associate curator at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, for a tour of this exhibition.
Thursday, June 18 Urban Design Forum
5:30 p.m.
Auditorium
Free
The Urban Design Forum was established to encourage open discussion and debate about civic design in Nashville and around the world. On the third Thursday of each month, the Urban Design Center invites members of the design community to discuss topics relevant to the built environment. In June, Trinita Kennedy, associate curator at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, will offer a short presentation on a selection of building projects included in Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings.
Friday, June 19 ARTini
7:00 p.m.
Meet at the Information Desk
Free with purchase of gallery admission
Join Kim Jameson, evaluation and community engagement director at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, as she discusses one or two projects included in the Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings in relation to her own experience with a museum building project.
Friday, July 10 ARTini
7:00 p.m.
Meet at the Information Desk
Free with purchase of gallery admission
Join Lori Anne Parker, Ph.D. candidate in philosophy and editor at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, as she discusses the Japanese architectural projects included in Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings.
Tuesday, July 14 CityTHINK
11:30 a.m. Nashville Civic Design Center lunchtime presentation
Auditorium
Free
This lunch-hour presentation, held on the second Tuesday of each month, focuses on civic issues related to transportation, green building, public art, urban design projects, and more. In July CityTHINK will be held at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts as part of the program offerings for Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings. A panel of architectural and museum experts will discuss and critique the building projects included in the exhibition.
Saturday, August 15 Lecture: Christine Kreyling,
6:30 p.m. Architecture, Urban Planning Critic
Auditorium
Free
Christine Kreyling, freelance writer and author, well known and highly respected for her knowledge of architecture and urban planning, will discuss projects in Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings that feature historical buildings with modern additions. She will also focus on how the Frist Center for the Visual Arts’ building, once the main post office for Nashville, was transformed into an arts center while still maintaining its beautiful art deco architectural elements.
EXHIBITION CREDITS
The exhibition Museums in the 21st Century: Concepts, Projects, Buildings was conceptualized and coordinated by Art Centre Basel, Basel, Switzerland.
SPONSOR CREDIT
Union Station, a Wyndham Historic Hotel is the Hospitality Sponsor of the exhibition.
VISITOR INFORMATION
Accredited by the American Association of Museums, the Frist Center for the Visual Arts, located at 919 Broadway in downtown Nashville, Tenn., is an art exhibition center dedicated to presenting the finest visual art from local, regional, U.S. and international sources in a program of changing exhibitions. The Frist Center’s Martin ArtQuest Gallery features more than 30 interactive stations relating to Frist Center exhibitions. Gallery admission to the Frist Center is free for visitors 18 and younger and to Frist Center members. Frist Center admission is $8.50 for adults, $7.50 for seniors and military and $6.50 for college students with ID (college students are free Thursday and Friday evenings). Discounts are offered for groups of 10 or more with advance reservation by calling 615.744.3246. The Frist Center is open seven days a week: Mondays through Wednesdays, and Saturdays, 10 a.m.–5:30 p.m.; Thursdays and Fridays, 10 a.m.–9 p.m. and Sundays, 1–5:30 p.m., with the Frist Center Café opening at noon. Additional information is available by calling 615.244.3340 or by visiting our Web site at http://www.fristcenter.org.
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