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More posts about songs, buildings, and food
Posted by Mike Sugarbaker at 9:22 am on 3/19/2007
Hi. Nope, not dead.
A while ago I finally had occasion to visit the new De Young Museum in San Francisco. I remember being excited when the final design was approved; the sketches depicted a big brown carapace of a building, brutal and shapely, not as accepting and inclusive of us humans as you might wish for a publically-funded museum to be, but pretty exciting as a piece of art on its own terms.
Getting there was another story. While rounding the corner to see it for the first time was pretty great, with palm trees and the observation tower combining for a nice Jurassic Park the-natives-will-soon-kill-us-on-their-altar effect, it became clear as we approached the front door that the building in the sketches wasn’t the building in front of me.
The second-skin thing, where the outer bronzed shell shows the real wall behind it through pockmarks and corrugations, didn’t actually work at that scale. It was too tight and controlled, too much like a simple half-tone over a basic, boring modern building. The looming arms over the outdoor courtyard worked pretty nicely, as did the tower on the right, but none of the actual museum had that same sense of drama and danger.
All that is a shame, but what really pissed me off was the main signage, which you get a glimpse of here:
Helvetica? Freaking Helvetica? In giant letters on the front wall for all time? Way to cut off a building’s balls. I mean, if you’re going to be big, square and elitist, at least use a nice imperialist serif, preferably in all caps. You know, commit to the shit.
But anyway, in other news, my favorite band Low demonstrates how music videos continue to change in the age of YouTube with the clip for “Breaker,” the first single from their new album.
August 11th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
Hi Mike!
Adriane Fowler and I are reading your blog from Vassar Alumnae House. 4 others from the original cast from Helicon circa 1991-1995 are behind me in the library reading old copies of the mag we secreted away from the office in Raymond Basement yesterday (it looks amazing!). I wish we could have rounded you and some of the other later-year people to join us! I think we may do this again, so e-mail me if you want to be involved.
I agree with you about the De Young, btw. I live in the Bay Area and just a few months ago managed to get there, and really didn’t know what to think.
Helvetica indeed.
Blessings of wordliness,
Sara