By Nina Burleigh 2/20 4:11pm

The Bombshell

Abu Dhabi illustration

Louvre, Guggenheim and NYU Accept Millions From Abu Dhabi but Remain Silent on Human Rights

Three of the Western world’s premier cultural institutions—New York University, the Guggenheim and the Louvre—are in various stages of setting up shop on Sa’adiyat (“Happiness”) Island in Abu Dhabi, forming what has been described as a “highbrow cultural theme park” in the desert city-state. The deals that the Guggenheim and NYU cut with the emir are not news. Petro-potentates started collecting liberal institutions as the latest Western must-have a decade ago.  Read More

By Matt Chaban 4/13/12 3:07pm

Kings of Queens

It's all around us. (Guggenheim)

A Priest, Das Racist and the Guggenheim Walk Into a Jackson Heights Coffee Shop: SO-IL Creates Latest stillspotting Installation

Queens has been kind to the architects at SO-IL. The small Brooklyn-based firm is run by husband and wife Florian Idenburg and Jing Liu (the name stands for Solid Objective-Idenburg Liu, though any Beastie Boys referents are not lost on them).

Their first major success, not counting Mr. Idenburg’s time designing the New Museum for Japanese firm Sanaa, was P.S. 1’s Pole Dance pavilion two summers ago, arguably the best installation in the Young Architecture Program’s dozen years. This     spring, another pavilion, this one for the Frieze Art Fair, will open on Randall’s Island (yes, technically part of Manhattan, but it certainly feels more like Queens with its big, open spaces and proximity to Astoria). And now, in their most ephemeral and ambitious effort yet, SO-IL is—very quietly—taking over Jackson Heights with the Guggenheim for four weekends starting tomorrow.

Welcome to Transhistoria, the latest installment in the Guggenheim’s stillspotting program.

“How can we look at cities without constantly begin accosted by them,” said David van der Leer, an assistant curator for architecture at the Guggenheim. Read More