----------------------------Original message----------------------------
What about architectural models? Any good charrette should have them. We'd
love to see those too!
Wendy Botting
Assistant Curator, Visual Resources
College of Architecture, Art & Planning
Cornell University
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At 06:31 PM 5/12/97 EDT, you wrote:
>----------------------------Original message----------------------------
>Are you making slides of those drawings available? I know
>several slide libraries would love to have them.
>Maryly Snow
>UC Berkeley
>Architecture Slide Library
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>>
>> ----------------------------Original message----------------------------
>> On April 10, 1997 The Museum of Modern Art announced that Jacques Herzog &
>> Pierre de Meuron, Yoshio Taniguchi, and Bernard Tschumi would participate
>> in the next phase of the process to determine an architect for the Museum's
>> expansion and renovation project. These architects were chosen from a
>> field of ten (which included Dominique Perrault) who were invited to take
>> part in a charrette, or problem-solving design exercise, to present design
>> concepts for the Museum.
>>
>> The three finalists are currently engaged in the competition leading to
>> preliminary architectural designs for the new Museum. The charrette
>> submissions by all ten architects are currently on display at the Museum.
>>
>> Eumie Imm Stroukoff
>> Associate Librarian, Reference
>> The Museum of Modern Art Library
>>
>>
>>
>> ----------
>> From: Eric Fenster[SMTP:[log in to unmask]]
>> Sent: Sunday, May 04, 1997 2:14 PM
>> To: Multiple recipients of list ARLIS-L
>> Subject: Botched French National Library
>>
>> ----------------------------Original message----------------------------
>> So, French architect Dominique Perrault is in the running to do
>> MOMA's extension. Good luck to the administrators and future users
>> of this prestigious establishment if the result turns out to
>> resemble that of the French National Library (BNF) in Paris!
>>
>> Should that happen, employees and visitors would be well advised to
>> show up wearing masks, helmets, thermal underwear and, in winter,
>> cleated soles. Hip boots will be useful when it is necessary to
>> rescue collections from floods like the one the BNF had last
>> January, during which the detection systems failed to function.
>>
>> It is well known that the naming of the BNF's architect was a
>> political choice and that Mr. Perrault was picked by the French
>> President's chief of staff, but does MOMA face the same constraints?
>> Despite the warnings of many professionals, the BNF's architect finished
(fin
>> inter t
>> he staircase becomes as slippery as an ice skating rink and can only be
climbe
>> (After the library's president fell on one, the speed was slowed to
>> a crawl.)
>>
>> The heating and cooling system has to be entirely redone. In order
>> to satisfy his "esthetic" preferences, the architect chose to
>> install pipes of inadequate caliber. Employees have to bring
>> individual heaters not only in winter but in the summer when the
>> outside temperature may be 28C (82F). Everywhere, the air is
>> glacial. The public entrances are open to the outside, allowing an
>> invasion of cold and snow. The method of creating vestibules is
>> being discussed, and it appears necessary to go around just about
>> everywhere constructing supplementary structures to correct Mr.
>> Perrault's errors of youth.
>>
>> Mr. Perrault didn't foresee the air currents his towers would
>> generate and which make it difficult for the three hapless elevators
>> at the foot of each tower to close their doors. Not only that, the
>> lifts' machinery on the roof will not function in hot weather. Three
>> elevators would already be few for an 18-storey building, but they
>> also cover five underground levels. Long waits provoke staff to take
>> the staircases, but since those were expected to be employed mainly
>> in emergencies, cheap plastic door handles were installed and many
>> have now broken off from use.
>>
>> Each month there is a test of the emergency electrical generators.
>> These run on diesel fuel, but since the ventilation system is
>> defective the fumes arrive in the offices and the staff has to be
>> evacuated. Mr. Perrault claims to be seeking a solution! His first
>> suggestion was to conduct the tests when the wind was blowing the
>> other way.
>>
>> Another "flaw," and perhaps not the least was Mr. Perrault's failure
>> to make provision for BOOKS, a small matter of course for the
>> architect of a library. The thousands of books that arrive each day
>> and their temporary storage in the offices of the staff who
>> processes them encountered a total void in Perrault's functional
>> notions.
>>
>> Perrault's attack on books was multi pronged. His choice of linoleum
>> to cover the kilometers of corridors where heavy carts would pass to
>> transport the millions of books arriving from the old library almost
>> defeated that process. The linoleum was quickly turned into ruts
>> over which the carts would not move and it has to be removed. Should
>> books actually make it to the shelves, Perrault had a fail-safe
>> mechanism. The glass towers as originally designed would be
>> beautifully transparent. The party was spoiled by enough pressure by
>> those concerned by what the sun would do to the books that a wall of
>> wood was finally placed inside the glass perimeter.
>>
>> Poor Mr. Perrault. His other attempt at openness was to plant a
>> fully grown forest at which users of the research reading rooms
>> could gaze but upon which no human could set foot. Unhappily,
>> account had not been taken of the comings and goings of people in
>> the corridor between the desks and the picture window. A wooden
>> barrier had to be thrown up to block the view.
>>
>> Dominique Perrault is certainly an ace when it comes to making
>> models, but for MOMA it would be prudent not to rely too much on the
>> advice of the clique. The financial abyss that the French taxpayer
>> has accepted with resignation might not be to the taste of the
>> Museum's administrators.
>>
>