Following up – Wright and Wrong Choices for the Guggenheim.
From the New York Times City Room blog
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/20/guggenheim-will-remain-light-gray/
November 20, 2007, 1:32 pm
Are Guggenheim’s True Colors Shining Through?
By Sewell Chan
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum will remain light gray.
The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission decided today that the Guggenheim should maintain the same off-white paint shade that it has had since 1992, when a major expansion of the museum by Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects was completed, rather than the original light brown.
The spiraling museum on Fifth Avenue, a 1959 masterpiece by the architect Frank Lloyd Wright, is in the midst of a $29 million renovation. As part of the project, conservators stripped away 11 layers of paint from the original building’s exterior and found that it was originally coated with vinyl paint in the brown shade known as buff. Some critics believe the more striking brown hue more closely matched the intent of Wright, who was not especially fond of the color white. But the original color was only used for a few years; since the early 1960s, the Guggenheim has been clad in various shades of off-white.
After a lively discussion that included a presentation by Thomas Krens, director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, the commission voted, 7 to 2, in favor of the contemporary light gray (a paint known as Tnemec BF72 Platinum), over the original light brown (a shade very similar to Benjamin Moore HC-35).
Mr. Krens said the light gray is “the color that’s most commonly associated with the building” and “seems to work well” with the surrounding neighborhood and with the 1992 expansion, which added a limestone building behind Wright’s spiraling building.
“There is no color czar at the Guggenheim,” Mr. Krens said jokingly, noting that the building has undergone many changes over the last 48 years. Yet, he added, “I have to say that if I were to dial up Frank Lloyd Wright right now and ask him what his preference might be, he might well choose the original color.”
The local community boards and museum patrons surveyed online were about evenly split between the two colors, Mr. Krens said, concluding, “I would say this is a very close call.”
The commission’s chairman, Robert B. Tierney, said he agreed with Mr. Krens. He noted the uncertainty over what Wright truly intended, and said the use of light gray “recognizes the evolution of the Guggenheim” over the years.
Another commission member, the preservationist Roberta Brandes Gratz, noted that Wright — who died in 1959 — could often be fickle. “Who knows what he would have been pleased with?” she asked. “He was just the kind of character who might have changed the whole color if he’d seen it on site.” (Mr. Krens had noted that Wright at one point proposed painting the building Cherokee red.)
Two commission members dissented.
“I find that I have to side with Frank Lloyd Wright on this one,” said one of them, the architect Stephen F. Byrns. “He was the greatest architect in our country in the 20th century. The museum is one of his masterworks.”
He added: “The chemical analysis clearly shows that the original colors were darker. It did get lighter over time. People’s tastes change, but I don’t think this is a question about people’s taste. I don’t think it’s about Gwathmey at all. I think it’s about Frank Lloyd Wright.”
The other dissenter, the architect and urban designer Pablo E. Vengoechea, also described the original color as bolder. “I’ve heard arguments that the lighter color is less jarring, less controversial and so forth,” he said, “but I think that that really doesn’t persuade. This building was designed to stand out.”