Il sito destinato ad accogliere il nuovo museo presenta una irregolare geometria triangolare. La risposta dello studio FOA è consistita nella progettazione di una struttura dalla base esagonale che si sviluppa in altezza cambiando forma in maniera graduale, e pressoché impercettibile, a ciascun piano, fino a chiudersi in una copertura quadrata. Ne risulta una dinamica architettura che presenta sei sfaccettature geometriche, alcune dalla superficie piana, altre inclinate, la cui combinazione dà vita ad una geometria astratta.
Rivestita prevalentemente in acciaio nero lucido, la facciata del futuro MOCA rifletterà il paesaggio urbano circostante, trasformandosi continuamente a seconda della luce e del tempo nelle diverse ore del giorno e nelle diverse stagioni. L’utilizzo del vetro verniciato nero conferirà uniformità al progetto, mentre di sera le luci all’interno daranno vita ad un pattern dinamico che si alternerà alla superficie nera.
L’atrio d’ingresso offrirà ai visitatori una immediata visuale del movimento dinamico della struttura man mano che si sviluppa in altezza. Questo spazio guiderà al foyer, alla caffetteria, ai negozi e ad una sala polifunzionale a doppia altezza. Di qui i visitatori potranno accedere ad una scala monumentale oppure all’ascensore che li condurrà ai piani superiori.
English
The new MOCA, which will be forty-four percent larger than the Museum’s current, leased facility, will demonstrate that a museum expansion need not be large in scale to be ambitious in all respects. Devised for both environmental and fiscal sustainability, the design for the four-story building is at once technically inventive, visually stunning, and highly practical.
FOA has responded ingeniously to the project’s roughly triangular site by designing a building with a hexagonal base that, with imperceptible changes in the shape of each story, rises to a square roof. Viewed from the exterior, the building will appear as an inventive massing of six geometric facets, some flat, others sloping at various angles, all coming together to create a powerful abstract form.
Clad primarily in mirror-finish black Rimex stainless steel, the façade of the new MOCA will reflect its urban surroundings, changing in appearance with differences in light and weather. Window glazing will be tinted to assimilate with the reflective skin so that during the day the building will read as a unified volume, while at night interior lights will create a dynamic pattern on the dark surface.
Three of the building’s six facets, one of them clad in transparent glass, will flank a public plaza. This will provide a public gathering place and also serve as MOCA’s “front yard,” and will be the setting for seasonal programming. From here, visitors and passersby may look through the transparent facet, site of the Museum entrance, into the ground floor, a space intended for socializing and for civic and cultural events.
While the building’s dark exterior will offer almost no hint of the interior massing and structure, the experience inside will be notably transparent. Upon entering MOCA, visitors will find themselves in an atrium from which they may visually grasp the dynamic shape and structure of the building as it rises. This space will lead in turn to the Museum’s lobby, café, and shop, and to a double-height multipurpose room that will house public programs and other events. From here, visitors may take the Museum’s staircase—itself a monumental sculptural object—or an elevator to the upper floors.
Because MOCA is a non-collecting institution—one of the few such contemporary art museums in the country—its new building does not need to accommodate collection galleries. In order to achieve maximum flexibility for the museum’s diverse exhibitions, the main gallery has been sited at the top of the building. There it will be structurally unencumbered, needing only to hold the lightweight roof, the underside of which will be fully visible from the gallery. Moveable walls will enable the 6,000-squarefoot space to be divided into a variety of configurations. This floor will also
contain a gallery designed specifically for new-media work and a lounge with a view of the city, where visitors can relax, reflect on what they have seen, and read about the exhibitions.
Ms. Snyder notes, “As Cleveland’s only museum of contemporary art, MOCA is committed to presenting exhibitions that break new ground, showing the work of emerging artists from across the globe as well as from our own region. Flexibility is key to a program that, like ours, embraces aesthetic, conceptual, and cultural diversity, and displays works in a great variety of mediums and genres. We are thrilled with the gallery space planned for the new Museum.”
While the main exhibition gallery is on the top floor, all four floors of the Museum contain space for either exhibitions or public programs, with the second and third floors combining public and “back of house” functions. The second floor, for example, will house both exhibition workshops and a 1,500-square-foot public gallery, to be used for more intimately scaled exhibitions; consonant with the openness that is characteristic of the building’s interior, visitors approaching this gallery by stair will also be able to glimpse the workshops. The third floor, home to MOCA’s administrative offices, will also include spaces for classes, lectures, and other educational programs.
In keeping with the ways in which contemporary visitors engage with art, the new building will have wi-fi throughout, enabling the use of wireless devices for on-demand learning. MOCA anticipates that the building will receive LEED silver accreditation.