Contemporary Museum Architecture and Design showcases 18 diverse essays written by people who design, work in, and study museums, offering a variety of perspectives on this complex building type. Throughout, the authors emphasize new kinds of experiences that museum architecture helps create, connecting ideas about design at various levels of analysis, from thinking about how the building sits in the city to exploring the details of technology. With sections focusing on museums as architectural icons, community engagement through design, the role of gallery spaces in the experience of museums, disability experiences, and sustainable design for museums, the collected chapters cover topics both familiar and fresh to those interested in museum architecture. Featuring over 150 color illustrations, this book celebrates successful museum architecture while the critical analysis sheds light on important issues to consider in museum design. Written by an international range of museum administrators, architects, and researchers this collection is an essential resource for understanding the social impacts of museum architecture and design for professionals, students, and museum-lovers alike.
Museums are among the iconic buildings of the twenty-first century, as remarkable for their architectural diversity as for the variety of collections they display. But how does the architecture of museums affect our experience as visitors? This book proposes that by seeing space as common ground between architecture and museology, and so between the museum building and its display, we can illuminate the individuality of each museum and the distinctive experience it offers - for example, how some museums create a sense of personal exploration, while others are more intensely didactic, and how the visit in some cases is transformed into a spatial experience and in other cases into a more social event. The book starts with an overview of the history of museum buildings and display strategies, and a discussion of theoretical and critical approaches. It then focuses on specific museums as in-depth case studies, and uses methods of spatial analysis to look at the key design choices available to architects and curators, and their effects on visitors’ behaviour. Theoretically grounded, methodologically original, and richly illustrated, this book will equip students, researchers and professionals in the fields of architecture, museum studies, curating, exhibition design, and cultural studies, with a guide for studying museums and a theoretical framework for their interpretation.
In the long period of adapting to social development, museums have become cultural complexes with multiple functions. With the development of society, the functions of museums are also changing with new functions, forms and solutions continually emerging. The projects featured in this book are focusing on architecture and interior, light and indoor climate and sustainable features in art museums supported with case studies, full colour photographs and architectural plans throughout.
A characteristic trait of the maritime museums is that they are often located in a contemporary and/or historical environment from which the collections and narratives originate. The museum can thereby be directly linked to the site and its history. It is therefore vital to investigate the maritime museums in terms of relationships between landscape, architecture, museum and collections. This volume unravels the kinds of worlds and realities the Nordic maritime museums stage, which identities and national myths they depict, and how they make use of both the surrounding maritime environments and the architectural properties of the museum buildings.
From the Louvre to the Bilbao Guggenheim and Tate Modern, the museum has had a long-standing relationship with the city. Examination of the meaning of museum architecture in the urban environment, considering issues such as forms of civic representation, urban regeneration, cultural tourism and the museumification of the city itself. Ranging from the seventeenth century to the present day, case-studies are drawn from Europe, South America and Australia. Contributions written by J.Birksted, V.Fraser, H.Lewi, D.J.Meijers and others.
Recent decades have witnessed an explosion of museum building around the world and the subsequent publication of multiple texts dedicated to the subject. Museum Architecture: A new biography focuses on the stories we tell of museum buildings in order to explore the nature of museum architecture and the problems of architectural history when applied to the museum and gallery. Starting from a discussion of the key issues in contemporary museum design, the book explores the role of architectural history in the prioritisation of specific stories of museum building and museum architects and the exclusion of other actors from the history of museum making. These omissions have contemporary relevance and impact directly on the ways in which the physical structures of museums are shaped. Theoretically, the book places a particular emphasis on the work of Pierre Bourdieu and Henri Lefebvre in order to establish an understanding of buildings as social relations; the outcome of complex human interactions and relationships. The book utilises a micro history, an in-depth case study of the ‘National Gallery of the North’, the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool, to expose the myriad ways in which museum architecture is made. Coupled with this detailed exploration is an emphasis on contemporary museum design which utilises the understanding of the social realities of museum making to explore ideas for a socially sustainable museum architecture fit for the twenty-first century.
Exploring the intersections of art, architecture, and design, at both renowned institutions and cutting-edge contemporary collections. Museum interior spaces must be as carefully designed as their façades—if not more so—to meet the needs of both the art on display and the viewers. The design and construction of art museums in America thus is a complex process, and one rarely undertaken lightly. The architect must design a building that effectively supports the art exhibited. The museumgoers’ interaction with the art must be enhanced by the architecture, while amenities such as restaurants, cafes, gift shops, and accessible and convenient restrooms ensure their comfort. Finally, the storage of works of art not on display must be accounted for in the building design. American Art Museum Architecture: Documents and Design explores all aspects of, and approaches to, museum architecture—the aesthetic, the practical, the innovative, and the functional. Architectural historian Eric M. Wolf delves into the archives of some of the country’s premier institutions not only to explore the design decisions made at their founding, but also to understand how those institutions have continued to evolve along with their collections, up to the present day. Wolf examines the gradual development of six major museums: the Frick Collection, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York; the Menil Collection in Houston, the Georgia O’Keefe Museum in Santa Fe, and the Art Institute of Chicago. He explains how each museum was originally conceived, how the architecture reflected or modified that original conception, and how the buildings have been reconsidered or revised in later years, as the nature of art, art display, and museum-going has evolved. Extensive archival plans, documents, and photographs enhance the narrative. American Art Museum Architecture also considers the unique architectural challenges often posed by contemporary art. Conceptual art, video installations, and large-scale pieces are increasingly found in permanent collections, at small galleries and encyclopedic institutions alike. Museums built decades ago may have to renovate in order to accommodate such pieces, while newer museums devoted to contemporary work must tackle new architectural challenges when considering how best to house this work. Encompassing both grand nineteenth-century institutions and avant-garde contemporary art collections, American Art Museum Architecture is a timely and fascinating exploration of the ever-changing relationship between architecture and art.
Since the opening in 1997 of the Guggenheim Bilbao, designed by Frank Gehry, museum architecture has enjoyed worldwide attention on an unprecedented scale. That single watershed project demonstrated to municipalities that architecture has the power to transform the image of an entire city, thus making the turn of the twenty-first century the unofficial age of the museum building. New Museums examines the boom in high-design museum projects in detail, beginning with the Guggenheim Bilbao’s groundbreaking role in the development of contemporary museum architecture. It continues with a beautifully illustrated tour of 30 examples of the most innovative and exciting museum architecture around the world, including Tadao Ando’s Museum of Modern Art in Fort Worth, Zaha Hadid’s Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati, Renzo Piano’s Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas, and many others.
Dynamic artificial light in museums In galleries and museums, one’s perception of art, space, and atmosphere is largely determined by lighting. But which light settings should art and museum experts and exhibition designers choose, and on what basis are those choices made? Pioneering LED technologies make customized lighting scenarios possible, turning artificial light into an interactive material in museum architecture – not only in terms of design practice, but also in terms of real-time spatial experiences. Computer-controlled lighting technologies are breaking boundaries, allowing the individual to take full control of lighting design. Light Up explores the potential of dynamic artificial lighting technologies in museum architecture, offering new insights into the use of light in exhibition spaces. How LED technologies can be used to develop customized lighting scenarios Studies in the real context of art institutions as well as programming of interactive light simulations Documents the research project “White Cube Teleporter”
