It is a porous, flexible design, says LACMA Director Michael Govan. “The visitor chooses the path,” he says, instead of “the museum leading you by the nose.”
The topline: Other than necessary mechanical systems and bathrooms, the building’s entire second story will be devoted to galleries, a total of 110,000 square feet of exhibition space. The galleries are composed of two dozen rectilinear spaces — basically, boxes — arranged in clusters and surrounded by interstitial spaces that will also display art.1
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The biggest question mark has hovered over the form and nature of the galleries — a troubling mystery given that the museum’s core mission is the care and display of art. This has been made more urgent because the layout not only will break with the traditional regional and chronological display of encyclopedic museums but it also has to inhabit a highly unusual form.
The newly released schematics reveal that the galleries will come in one of three forms: “core,” “courtyard” and “terrace.”
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- 1. Other services, among them the museum’s education department, shop and three restaurants (including a new wine bar), will be at ground level. As will a 300-seat theater in the section of the building on the southern side of Wilshire.
