The local paper for Downtown wn PICASSO & JACQUELINE < CITY ARTS, P. 10
WEEK OF JANUARY
1-7 2015
OTDOWNTOWN.COM
OurTownDowntown @OTDowntown
2015 PEOPLE TO WATCH
LOOKING TO A NEW YEAR The beginning of the new year is a time to take stock and size up what - and who - is ahead. To ring in 2015, we picked a group of people we think will have a big impact on our community. They’re not all household names -- in fact, some of these people may be new to you -- and we know they’re not the only people who will make a splash in 2015. But we expect to hear a lot from them, and know you will, too. Happy New Year! - The Editors
REVIVING THE ART WORLD DOWNTOWN MUSEUMS Adam D. Weinberg, Director of the Whitney Museum of American Art BY GABRIELLE ALFIERO
After more than three years of construction, the wait for the new Whitney Museum of American Art is nearly over. And no patron of the arts may be more eager than the museum’s director, Adam D. Weinberg. “I’m very excited to see how the works look in the space,” Weinberg said. “We’ve been imagining [it] for the longest time.” The museum, which inhabited its hulking Marcel Breuer building on Madison Avenue and 75th Street for nearly 50 years, is preparing for the opening of its new Renzo Piano-designed home in the Meatpacking District that will double the museum’s exhibition space. The 220,000-square-foot building on Gansevoort Street between Washington Street and the Hudson River (next to the popular High Line park) will open to the public on May 1 with a massive exhibition of its permanent collection, which has grown from 2,000 works in 1966 to
more than 21,000 today. Museum curators have spent the past two years studying the enormous collection. “So much [of the permanent collection] has not been in public view,” said Weinberg about the inaugural exhibition. “This is a chance to showcase work that has never been seen or rarely been seen, and show off what we have.” The path to the new space has been a lengthy one. The museum first signed a letter of intent with the city to acquire the Gansevoort Street lot in 2006, after failed attempts to expand at the Upper East Side space, the New York Times reported in 2010. The Whitney broke ground on the new lot in 2011, around the same time museum officials announced that the Metropolitan Museum of Art would present programming in the uptown building once the Whitney vacated. For Weinberg, who’s served as director of the institution for the last 12 years, the move downtown represents a return to the museum’s roots. Sculptor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney founded the museum on West Eighth Street in 1930, after presenting contemporary art in her Greenwich Village studio for
15 years. “We feel really excited to be back in the neighborhood,” Weinberg said. “It feels right because, I think, while the Whitney is an international museum, it’s a museum deeply grounded in its location and history. We are a museum of American art and a museum that feels profoundly connected to the city of New York and actually to the Village.” Piano’s design nods to the neighborhood’s industrial history, Weinberg said, with recycled timber floors, salvaged factory beams, limestone and concrete, and incorporates elements of the nearby High Line—horticulturalist Piet Oudolf, who worked on the development of the elevated park, is collaborating on the Whitney’s landscape design. “It doesn’t pretend to be a factory,” Weinberg said of the design. “On the other hand, it doesn’t try to be overly refined.” They also hope to be the city’s first LEED-certified museum. The Whitney had long ago outgrown the uptown space, Weinberg said, adding that the new building will mod-
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In Brief GOVERNORS VETO BILL TO REFORM PORT AUTHORITY The governors of New York and New Jersey jointly vetoed legislation Saturday aimed at overhauling the Port Authority and proposed instead a series of reforms they said would go further in bringing accountability to the agency. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie announced their vetoes of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey legislation in a joint statement. “While neither governor is approving the legislation as passed, they are urging their respective legislators and the Port Authority to work with them,” the statement said. The bill — which had the unanimous support of the New York and New Jersey legislatures — would have overhauled the troubled agency by requiring an independent annual audit, creating an inspector general’s office, restricting lobbying and creating a whistleblower protection program. It also would have required Port Authority board members to swear they’ll act in good faith. The Port Authority, which had a $2.9 billion operating budget in 2014, oversees airports, bridges and tunnels in New York and New Jersey, including John F. Kennedy International Airport, the George Washington Bridge, the World Trade Center sites, the Holland Tunnel and Newark airports. The bill was designed to clean up an agency long known for dysfunction and scandals, including most recently the lane closures at the George Washington Bridge that ensnarled Christie’s administration.
FUNDS SECURED FOR EAST RIVER ESPLANADE Whitney Museum of American Art’s director Adam Weinberg. Photo by Marco Anelli. © 2013 Marco Anelli
Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, City Council Member Ben Kallos, Manhattan Borough