Quote of the Day: Michael Kimmelman
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| Bruce Goff's design for a never-built Las Vegas hotel |
"[Bruce] Goff worked on some 500 projects before his death, nearly 130 of which were ultimately built, an astonishing total for someone who, during his last years, worked out of a spare room in a borrowed house in Tyler, Tex. that he shared with his cat and mother.
"David G. De Long, Goff’s biographer, writing in the show’s catalog, recalls visiting Goff at that house, watching him sketch and tend to his correspondence from a glass-topped desk adorned with Christmas ornaments and a vase of peacock feathers. Each afternoon at half past four, De Long remembers, Goff quit to watch 'Star Trek' reruns."
—Michael Kimmelman's New York Times review of the Art Institute of Chicago's "Bruce Goff: Material Worlds"
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| Bruce Goff's Japanese Pavilion as seen from Peter Zumthor's David Geffen Galleries, 2025 |
Comments
> give Zumthor's
> behemoth a run
> for its money.
Too bad some of the window panes weren't curved as they originally were going to be. Of course, that would have added to the cost.
Pre-2020, the Pereira/Hardy-Holzman-Pfeiffer structures were a mish-mosh and didn't make navigating spaces coherent. They always looked like the museum had run out of money. The first level of the Ahmanson, in particular, with the dark tile floors and lower ceiling height always felt (visually and vibe-wise) uncomfortable.
However, too much gray concrete in the Geffen may be regrettably another version of that. I hope not, but Govan and his staff may not do the right thing.
One artwork already installed and shown in photos, Todd Gray's "Octavia's Gaze," makes the background look like it needs to be a lighter color. Gray's piece is obviously contemporary too (frames stitched together), so it should presumably fit better than older works will. Which means that the tinted concrete walls of other galleries had better work, and what will be draperies had better make more floor space flexible too.