NYC museum renovations

NYC has seen a spate of museum upgrades in recent years. My visit coincided with reopenings of two, and the start of one. MOMA reopened last fall, and I love the new layout. There is a beautiful atrium, and when I visited, they took full advantage of the space to display a series of paintings on metal by one artist that spanned the full three walls of the space (the fourth side is a balcony). The audio guides are now free with admission (good thing given the price) and they sometimes include commentary by living artists whose works are displayed.

The Morgan reopened this spring and now features a new entry way by Renzo Piano. This space is very subdued but there is a glass elevator, which is kind of amazing. Even the doors are glass. There's more about the Morgan in a previous entry. You can also see another glass elevator at the Apple store on 5th Ave., around 60th.

The Guggenheim is currently swathed in scaffolding and netting but they have a very large exhibit of Zaha Hadid's work. She is a very avant garde architect, who hasn't had a lot built until recently. I'm still not sure if I like her architecture but the beautiful paintings that she creates as concept drawings were worth seeing. She also does a very interesting bas-relief out of card stock for some early concept models. This exhibit also highlighted how completely inappropriate this building is to display almost any kind of art. The pathways were crowded and narrow, made even more so by the layout of architectural models.