Seduced by Form: Aesthetics of Spectacle in Contemporary Art Museum Architecture

Author: Yvonne Nowicka-Wright (OCAD University)
Year: 2013 (MA research paper)
Source type: article (thesis)
Raw file: raw/articles/nowicka-wright-2013-seduced-by-form.md

Summary

An MA research paper examining the "radical structural reshaping" of art museum architecture over the last three decades, arguing — via Debord's theory of the spectacle — that museum buildings from the Pompidou Centre to Bilbao, Graz, and Denver have been "positioned ... as objects of art; atmospherically enhanced and theatrically staged masterpieces." It treats the "WOW factor," atmospheric effects, and the "Bilbao effect" as the signature of an "ethos of spectacle" that shifts museums from education to entertainment, tied to the "experience economy" and consumerism.

Key Claims

• The ethos of spectacle: "A new type of monumental ethos was being forged, the ethos of spectacle, denoting a paradigm shift towards seductive architectural forms that has come to symbolize contemporary art museums"; the shift from "austere functionality (privileged in the 1960s) to spectacular, multi-sensory 'flash and bravura' works of art (by the late 1990s)," with "the cult of image as its guiding principle."
• From container to spectacle: the museum built its identity as an "iconic monument" or a "tactical instrument"; the "relationship between content and container ... has become precariously unbalanced"; the museum building itself has become "the most elaborate 'exhibit'." Specially (Wright's Guggenheim, then Pompidou, then Bilbao) — the building attracts audiences "before they even entered."
• The WOW factor and the Bilbao effect: the "WOW! factor," atmospheric and theatrical staging, and the "Bilbao effect" became strategic (the "experience economy," strong "spectacularized corporate identity.") "Reflecting the consumerist society accustomed to spectacle," museum buildings are "more than just physical structures."
• Critical concern: "such a sensorial play subverts the art museum's historically reflective and intellectual character by shifting audiences' attentions from educational significance to the performative and entertaining."
• Digitization: CAD/CATIA and material technologies enable the "stunning and structurally most complex iconic buildings" — often dismissed by Hal Foster as belonging to a "digital period."

Connections

Concepts: Spectacle · Iconic Architecture · Atmosphere · Consumerism
Authors: Yvonne Nowicka-Wright · Guy Debord · Frank Gehry
Debates: Spectacle vs. Function
Related source notes: The Society of the Spectacle (Debord) · Creating the Bilbao Effect · [Seduced by Form — see also Vittorio Vestsi]

Direct Quotes

"A new type of monumental ethos was being forged, the ethos of spectacle."

"[S]uch a sensorial play subverts the art museum's historically reflective and intellectual character by shifting audiences' attentions from educational significance to the performative and entertaining."

"They reflect the consumerist society accustomed to spectacle ... Yet, they exist in an idealized architectural state as objects d'art, masterpieces."

Open Questions

• Does the "spectacularized" museum (and its "WOW factor") inevitably subordinate the art to the architecture, and can a museum rebalance container and content against the market's demand for spectacle?