Word: wrighting
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When the trustees decided a decade ago that they could not manage without considerable additional space, they turned to Charles Gwathmey and Robert Siegel, architects whose work (sleek, handsome, rather restrained) is not exactly Wrightian. On the 35-ft. sliver of land behind Wright's museum, Gwathmey Siegel would build the Guggenheim an addition. Ever since, the firm has been accused by a slightly hysterical mandarin consensus of desecrating the Guggenheim, of wanting to make a toothpick from a piece of the True Cross; the first design, a huge tower that brazenly cantilevered a pale green box out over Wright...
...public fracas surrounding the expansion, it was always the exterior of Gwathmey's new $24 million slab that got all the attention; the $22 million interior renovation of Wright's building (which cost $7 million in 1959) was mentioned only passingly. Now that the work is finished and the doors are open, that fever ratio should reverse itself: the slab is a bland and only slightly annoying intrusion, while Gwathmey's intelligent, intricate, loving work inside is a revelation, making it a far, far better museum than it has ever been...
...uncomfortable truth is that the Guggenheim has been problematic not just for curators but for visitors: the interior could be oppressive and maddeningly hermetic. Now, for the first time, the museum has complexity as well as sheer monomaniacal power. You can still keep to Wright's relentless ramp, but now you can also break away at four different levels into the new building and wander the loftlike galleries freely. Gwathmey has opened up the place, clearing away clutter and creating dozens of new architectural moments -- glimpses of Central Park, comfortably arm's-length views of the great ramp itself, details...
...been reinvigorated, allowed to have its punch line. For years the top section of the ramp was partitioned off and turned into a large closet. Now visitors can go all the way to the grand summit, and curators have been given back the best, roomiest gallery space in Wright's building...
Frank Lloyd Wright's masterwork gets a splendid overhaul...