New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Theatre

History –

• Lincoln Center Performing Arts Library and Museum was designed in conjunction with Vivian Beaumont Theater by Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill and completed in 1965.
• Eero Saarinen & Associates designed Vivian Beaumont Theater.
• Although originally intended to be separate buildings, the two architects collaborated to create a more successful pattern for both purposes in i building than either could compose individually.
• While a design that acquired a pocket-sized degree of infighting between the architects was scrapped in 1960, their relationship, unlike those of other Lincoln Eye architects, was marked by a peaceful sense of agreement.
• In 1998, a renovation of the Lincoln Center Performing Arts Library and Museum was begun. Completed in 2001, this projection was made possible through a $38 million donation by Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman, the at present namesakes of the building.

Original Design –

Eero Saarinen's Vivian Beaumont Theater and Gordon Bunshaft's Lincoln Center Performing Arts Library and Museum, though divide spaces on the interior, were designed equally a cohesive and flowing unification of two very similar exterior structures. While Saarinen produced the working drawings for the building, Bunshaft'south influence was also evident.  Sadly, Saarinen died in 1961, and then he was unable to see the completed building in 1965, however, his influence upon the design through Bunhsaft's execution is unmistakable.

The theater and library and museum combination does non forepart on the main Lincoln Center Plaza, its site, located due north of the Metropolitan Opera House and far w of the Combo Hall, fronts on Lincoln Center Plaza N, which was also designed by Saarinen and Bunshaft and is located betwixt Vivian Beaumont Theater and Combo Hall.  Additionally, a human foot bridge introduced in 1969, crossing 60-5th Street to the Julliard School, is accessed near the northern façade of the building.  Lincoln Center Plaza Due north, less austere than its large southern neighbor, Lincoln Center Plaza, is lined with trees along the southern edge, or the north wall of the Metropolitan Opera House.  These copse, lit from below at dark, requite the space a pleasant intimacy.  At its eye is a 120-human foot by 80-foot reflecting pool and resting in this pool is Henry Moore's Reclining Figure statue.  This lounging female figure, at 16 anxiety tall, is based upon the pre-Columbian goddess Chacmool.  This sculpture was near-unanimously well-received, as the woman seemed to be taking a relaxing bath, further compounding the amity and warmth of the infinite.  Additionally, an Alexander Calder sculpture populates the plaza near the entry to the library and museum.  The sculpture, composed of a series of spindly steel plates, resembles a spider to most.  However, the piece is titled Le Guichet, meaning 'ticket window' in French.  This championship is representative of the small opening cut in one of the "spider'southward legs."  A ticket window is much more than thematically linked to Lincoln Heart for the Performing Arts.  While this sculpture was initially poorly received, its habitation within the plaza is fitting and its placement compliments this public infinite.  Overall, Lincoln Center Plaza North was praised for incorporating a refreshingly gimmicky format, distinctly reflective of twentieth century pattern principals.

The Lincoln Center Performing Arts Library and Museum meanders around the larger trunk of Vivian Beaumont Theater.  Its entry fronts on Lincoln Centre Plaza Northward, while the remainder of the building wraps behind the theater, fronting on Amsterdam Artery between Sixty-fourth and Lx-fifth Streets with a secondary entrance, and over the theater'due south roof, forming a ring around the theater's stagehouse.  The eastern entry façade, a two-story drinking glass and steel framed design, discretely slips between the Metropolitan Opera Firm and Vivian Beaumont Theater.  Like the related theater, the library and museum'south design is stark and restrained and based entirely in International Way modernism.  Nonetheless, it tin can exist argued that the crammed and crowded entry's placement and orientation creates a cluttered nature that is inconsistent with the International Style.

The edifice's interior is entirely separate from that of Vivian Beaumont Theater, despite their cohesive appearance from the outside.  Upon entering the library and museum from Lincoln Heart Plaza North, the functional nature of the building is axiomatic.  This was Gordon Bunshaft's intention.  Through quality and simple design, he was able to create a consolidated center for arts information for the city of New York, a feat for which Bunshaft was about-universally praised.  Notably, at the entry level from the plaza, the infinite is divers by a stunning, eighty-pes-long travertine apportionment desk and a children's library which includes a small, oval-shaped theater.  The mezzanine level is divers by its continuation of Vivian Beaumont Theater's coffered, exposed-concrete ceiling, linking the 2 spaces, and its glass walls on the western and northern façades.  Gordon Bunshaft'south minimal design for the Lincoln Center Performing Arts Library and Museum, within and out, is commended for its functional simplicity equally a fantastic educational resource for all New Yorkers.

Past Renovations –

• In 1998, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman, long-time trustees of Lincoln Center, pledged $38 meg toward the renovation of the Lincoln Center Performing Arts Library and Museum. The renovation targeted a technological upgrade for the library, providing the building with computers on each floor and instilling an electronic cataloguing system.  Additionally, the library'south individualized reading rooms for specific enquiry divisions were consolidated into a single reading room with a more than open concept.  With this, the infinite for housing the library and museum'south special collections and screening room were left carve up but as well renovated.  The gallery infinite for the museum was also consolidated into two galleries at the Lincoln Center Plaza North entrance and the Amsterdam Avenue entrance.  While the renovation's technological upgrades were necessary to the part of the library, the alterations to the interior spaces seemed without purpose and were criticized for removing the sense of intimacy that once divers the library.

Farther Reading –

• Stern, Robert A. Thou., et al. New York 1960: Architecture and Urbanism between the Second World War and the Bicentennial. Taschen, 1997.
• "New York Public Library for the Performing Arts." Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 22 Apr. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Public_Library_for_the_Performing_Arts#2001_renovati on.

martinezthattery.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.landmarkwest.org/nyplpa/

Share this post