Inside the box

New museum building squares up space for art, education, community

Mary Voelz Chandler, Rocky Mountain News

Published August 23, 2007 at midnight

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Two months away from opening, the new Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver is shaping up as a series of boxes within a box, galleries opening into hallways that encircle areas devoted to art.

Spaces for education have been built on almost every floor, from the Whole Room on the first floor to the Idea Box on the fourth.

The museum will open Oct. 28, after a week of activities. They include an early peek for students, a gala, a community day, and a panel involving artists in the inaugural show "Star Power: Museum as Body Electric."

"We're trying to invert the idea of importance," director/curator Cydney Payton said. "We'll let students in first. They represent our foundation and public engagement."

The museum is on track to meet its completion date and has reached about 83 percent of its capital campaign, Payton said. Almost $15.6 million is in hand toward a construction goal of $15.9 million. Officials hope to have all the construction money at the opening, then will roll out a campaign for a $3 million endowment.

The staff now numbers 15 and will grow to a maximum of 25 or 26 full- and part-time employees at the time of the opening. Call the outlook here cautious.

"We are a prudent organization with an eye on sustainability," Payton said.

Membership is about 2,100, and the museum is projecting about 50,000 visitors in the first calendar year of the new structure. (In 2006, the museum attracted 20,000 visitors.)

A recent tour through the active construction site, with Seth Goldenberg, deputy director of external affairs, revealed a building strong on spaces for the community, educational pursuits and art - all built around a four-story atrium. Interior walls are up and being finished; natural light enters many of the spaces via a T-shaped skylight.

The new building will more than quadruple the space MCA/Denver had in its former home in Sakura Square, so it can house more public events and allow galleries to rotate shows on a cycle of from three months to six months. A look at some of the building's details:

• Exterior and approach: The gray glass skin is basically complete, although some areas of clear glass still await installation to offer views of downtown and the mountains throughout the building. Stone-wielding vandals have cracked a few panels.

An inner layer of white plastic monopan will be installed at the end of construction. The lightweight material looks like thick spun-sugar wafers; panels will be set about 18 inches inside the glass, and the cushion of air inside will help modulate the temperature inside the structure.

The entry will be open to the street for several yards. As visitors enter on a ramp, they will get a glimpse of the gift/book shop, then turn a corner to find a glass door that opens using motion sensors, leading to an information/admissions desk. When the museum is closed, a metal mesh door inside will fall into place.

"It's a museum without a front door," Goldenberg said.

The entry will carry the name of museum founder Sue Cannon.

Throughout, floors are black steel, as are the stairs and parts of walls on either side of each stairway.

• Lower level: The first floor will include staff offices, kitchen and the Whole Room. Payton called it the "Swiss Army knife of the museum" because it can serve education and community events. It will have a sprung floor for performances.

• Entry level: The second floor includes a gift shop; a gallery for works on paper that enters onto the hallway called the promenade (with walls available for art); and a new media gallery. A door at the back of the building allows for art to be moved in, and sits on the site's fire lane, which will be turned into a work of art by Clark Richert.

• Third floor: This holds a large-works gallery, space for photography, and a project gallery tied to both the exhibition program and education program, Goldenberg said.

• Fourth floor: This area is devoted to the Idea Box, reached by a ramp from below. A low window looking onto the city is at child height, and the entire area juts out over the museum's back wall.

• The roof will include a members' pavilion, a cafe with indoor and outdoor seating, an installation by ceramist Kim Dickey and landscape architect Karla Dakin, and green space.

Museum of Contemporary Art/Denver

• The opening: Oct. 28, preceded by a week of activities

• Where: 15th and Delgany streets

• Size: 27,000 square feet

• Construction cost: $15.9 million

• Architect: David Adjaye, of Adjaye/Associates, with Davis Partnership Architects

• Inaugural show: "Star Power: Museum as Body Electric," with work by Carlos Amorales, David Altmejd, Candice Breitz, Rangi Kipa, Wangechi Mutu, Chris Ofili and Collier Schorr

• Information: 303-298-7554; mcartdenver.org

Adjaye on gray

London-based architect David Adjaye was in Denver recently to tour the museum, as we see it today.

As in, how did the glass skin become a dark gray, rather than the clear indicated by the model? Adjaye said aesthetics played a role, as did requirements for the gold LEED certification for which the museum is working.

But it's also comfort.

"When the glass was light, there was too much light," said Adjaye, now working on projects in New York, Minneapolis, Moscow and Beijing.

"The light level was so translucent you'd have to wear sunglasses inside."

Chandlerm@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2677

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