BGuthrie Photos: NY -- NYC -- Museum of Modern Art -- 1st Floor -- Exhibit: Energy

NY -- NYC -- Museum of Modern Art -- 1st Floor -- Exhibit: Energy:

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Description of Pictures: Energy
Through January 26, 2020
Energy is the indispensable fuel of life for all species. For humans, it has become almost an addiction. The search for new sources of energy and the exploitation of existing ones have driven progress, formed and informed cultures, transfigured landscapes, and ignited wars. Throughout the 20th century, everything from objects to buildings and entire cities was conceived to maximize immediate output and productivity. Modern architecture and design were powered by electricity, and linked to energy production and distribution. In order to secure energy, we have deforested, drilled, mined, extracted, removed mountaintops, and terraformed the planet.
In the 21st century, many designers have become aware of their role and responsibility in these disruptive activities, and have adjusted their practices accordingly. If in the past design led us to devour energy at an ever-growing rate, design can now help us conserve it and behave more responsibly. The objects presented here engage with energy in its myriad forms—from thermal and kinetic to electrical and even reproductive. They represent its sourcing, deployment, consumption, and preservation. They showcase the technological advancements of the past decades, while proposing alternatives for a future in which resources might not be as readily available.

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Copyrights: All pictures were taken by amateur photographer Bruce Guthrie (me!) who retains copyright on them. Free for non-commercial use with attribution. See the [Creative Commons] definition of what this means. "Photos (c) Bruce Guthrie" is fine for attribution. (Commercial use folks including AI scrapers can of course contact me.) Feel free to use in publications and pages with attribution but you don't have permission to sell the photos themselves. A free copy of any printed publication using any photographs is requested. Descriptive text, if any, is from a mixture of sources, quite frequently from signs at the location or from official web sites; copyrights, if any, are retained by their original owners.

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[1] MOMA1E_191221_01.JPG	[2] MOMA1E_191221_03.JPG	[3] MOMA1E_191221_06.JPG
[4] MOMA1E_191221_08.JPG	[5] MOMA1E_191221_11.JPG	[6] MOMA1E_191221_13.JPG
[7] MOMA1E_191221_19.JPG	[8] MOMA1E_191221_23.JPG	[9] MOMA1E_191221_27.JPG
[10] MOMA1E_191221_30.JPG	[11] MOMA1E_191221_33.JPG	[12] MOMA1E_191221_35.JPG
[13] MOMA1E_191221_37.JPG	[14] MOMA1E_191221_46.JPG

Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. MOMA1E_191221_01.JPG: Energy Energy is the indispensable fuel of life for all species. For humans, it has become almost an addiction. The search for new sources of energy and the exploitation of existing ones have driven progress, formed and informed cultures, transfigured landscapes, and ignited wars. Throughout the 20th century, everything from objects to buildings and entire cities was conceived to maximize immediate output and productivity. Modern architecture and design were powered by electricity, and linked to energy production and distribution. In order to secure energy, we have deforested, drilled, mined, extracted, removed mountaintops, and terraformed the planet. In the 21st century, many designers have become aware of their role and responsibility in these disruptive activities, and have adjusted their practices accordingly. If in the past design led us to devour energy at an ever-growing rate, design can now help us conserve it and behave more responsibly. The objects presented here engage with energy in its myriad forms -- from thermal and kinetic to electrical and even reproductive. They represent its sourcing, deployment, consumption, and preservation. They showcase the technological advancements of the past decades, while proposing alternatives for a future in which resources might not be as readily available.
2. MOMA1E_191221_06.JPG: Thinking Machines Corporation, Danny Hillis, Tamiko Thiel, Gordon Bruce, Allen Hawthorne, Ted Bilodeau CM-2 Supercomputer, 1987
3. MOMA1E_191221_08.JPG: Richard Malone with Richard Malone Jumpsuit Specimen, 2017 Malone grew up in rural Ireland and identifies strongly with his working-class roots. For this piece, he was inspired by the functional clothing worn in construction sites. Looking into historical jumpsuits that were assembled from one piece of cloth, Malone employed a recycled stretch-acrylic fabric found in a factory near his studio in London, which he steamed, split, and sculpted. The result is a one-size-fits-all unisex garment that alludes not only to the jumpsuit's rich history in labor, but also to a future in which garments and fabrics are reused and recycled.
4. MOMA1E_191221_13.JPG: Massoud Hassani Mine Kafon wind-powered deminer, 2011 The Mine Kafon Wind-Powered Deminer is designed to roll across the ground, detonating land mines in the process. In Qasaba, Afghanistan, Hassani's hometown, leftover mines, remnants of conflicts, often injure or kill civilians. When the deminer blows across a minefield, exploding any ordnance present, it reclaims the space as safe and usable. At about 155 pounds (or around seventy kilograms), the deminer is approximately the weight of an average human adult. It is constructed modularly: when it detonates a mine, only a few of its 175 bamboo arms are blown off, allowing it to complete multiple detonations before needing repairs. When repairs do become necessary, a GPS chip embedded in the device's core guides the deminer along a safe path out of the field. Components are made from biodegradable materials, so unsalvaged pieces do not further pollute the environment. The design was inspired by the wind-powered racing toys that Hassani and others from his hometown built as children. Since first developing the deminer during his studies at Design Academy Eindhoven in the Netherlands, Hassani has continued to pursue efficient solutions to the problem of land mines. He field-tests iterations of the Mine Kafon deminer with the support of the Dutch Ministry of Defense and has released a set of freely accessible instructions for creating your own from discarded materials like tires or oil canisters.It's weird how everything looks like the Covid-19 virus after awhile.
5. MOMA1E_191221_19.JPG: Ingo Maurer Porca Miseria! Chandelier, 1994 The Porca Miseria! Chandelier is both a revolt against the slickness of contemporary design and Maurer's celebration of cinematic slow-motion explosions, like those seen in Michelangelo Antonioni's film Zabriskie Point (1970). The production of this piece is limited to just ten a year, as the construction of each lamp requires the effort of four people. The builders break plates with a hammer or simply drop them on the floor. The pieces, broken arbitrarily, determine the arrangement of the final design.
6. MOMA1E_191221_23.JPG: Samuel Cabot Cochran, Benjamin Wheeler Howes, SMIT Sustainably Minded Interactive Technology, LLC GROW (Prototype), 2005 GROW is a hybrid wind and solar energy delivery device that uses film photovoltaics with piezoelectric generators; it converts sunlight into electricity while also transforming mechanical energy into electrical energy. Its organic and dynamic form replicates climbing ivy, and its "leaves" are flexible photovoltaic panels. The leaves catch sunshine to generate solar power; their fluttering generates wind power. Due to its light weight, this device can be easily mounted on vertical surfaces such as building fa�ades to produce energy. The designers use recycled and reclaimed materials wherever possible, and, GROW's lifespan and sustainable methods will minimize its environmental footprint.
7. MOMA1E_191221_30.JPG: International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) Power symbol, 2002 Electricity is one of the first things that come to mind when we think of energy. The power symbol is an efficient example of interface design, directly mediating our relationship with machines. It powers devices, homes, cities, and, metaphorically here, this Museum, declaring it fully "on," engaged with present-day concerns, productive, and in constant action. The earliest binary power switches were marked with an I and an O to denote, respectively, a closed electrical circuit (device on) and an open circuit (device off). In 1973, these two symbols were combined into one now-familiar icon, initially referred to as "standby setting." Thirty years later, an international committee of scientists and engineers recommended that this symbol should stand for its more commonly accepted meaning: "power."
8. MOMA1E_191221_33.JPG: Dr. Adnan Tarcici Solnar Tarcici Collapsible Solar Cooker, c.1970 In 1955 in Lebanon, "one-third of a worker's salary [was] spent for fuel … while from eight to nine months a year the sun shines all day," said Tarcici. A professor, designer, and United Nations delegate, Tarcici dedicated his life to solar energy and has numerous patents for solar-cooker designs under his name. This solar cooker collapses into a portable box that also serves as its spine.
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Wikipedia Description: Museum of Modern Art
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, USA, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been singularly important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world. The museum's collection offers an unparalleled overview of modern and contemporary art, including works of architecture and design, drawings, painting, sculpture, photography, prints, illustrated books and artist's books, film, and electronic media.

MoMA's library and archives hold over 300,000 books, artist books, and periodicals, as well as individual files on more than 70,000 artists. The archives contain primary source material related to the history of modern and contemporary art. It also houses an award-winning fine dining restaurant, The Modern, run by Alsace-born chef Gabriel Kreuther.

History:

The idea for The Museum of Modern Art was developed in 1928 primarily by Abby Aldrich Rockefeller (wife of John D. Rockefeller Jr.) and two of her friends, Lillie P. Bliss and Mrs. Cornelius J. Sullivan. They became known variously as "the Ladies", "the daring ladies" and "the adamantine ladies". They rented modest quarters for the new museum and it opened to the public on November 7, 1929, nine days after the Wall Street Crash. Abby had invited A. Conger Goodyear, the former president of the board of trustees of the Albright Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York, to become president of the new museum. Abby became treasurer. At the time, it was America's premier museum devoted exclusively to modern art, and the first of its kind in Manhattan to exhibit European modernism.

Goodyear enlisted Paul J. Sachs and Frank Crowninshield to join him as founding trustees. Sachs, the associate director and curator of prints and drawings at the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, was referred to in those days as a collector of curators. Goodyear asked him to recommend a director and Sachs suggested Alfred H. Barr Jr., a promising young protege. Under Barr's guidance, the museum's holdings quickly expanded from an initial gift of eight prints and one drawing. Its first successful loan exhibition was in November 1929, displaying paintings by Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cezanne, and Seurat.

First housed in six rooms of galleries and offices on the twelfth floor of Manhattan's Heckscher Building, on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 57th Street, the museum moved into three more temporary locations within the next ten years. Abby's husband was adamantly opposed to the museum (as well as to modern art itself) and refused to release funds for the venture, which had to be obtained from other sources and resulted in the frequent shifts of location. Nevertheless, he eventually donated the land for the current site of the museum, plus other gifts over time, and thus became in effect one of its greatest benefactors.

During that time it initiated many more exhibitions of noted artists, such as the lone Vincent van Gogh exhibition on November 4, 1935. Containing an unprecedented sixty-six oils and fifty drawings from the Netherlands, and poignant excerpts from the artist's letters, it was a major public success and became "a precursor to the hold van Gogh has to this day on the contemporary imagination".

The museum also gained international prominence with the hugely successful and now famous Picasso retrospective of 1939-40, held in conjunction with the Art Institute of Chicago. In its range of presented works, it represented a significant reinterpretation of Picasso for future art scholars and historians. This was wholly masterminded by Barr, a Picasso enthusiast, and the exhibition lionized Picasso as the greatest artist of the time, setting the model for all the museum's retrospectives that were to follow.

When Abby Rockefeller's son Nelson was selected by the board of trustees to become its flamboyant president in 1939, at the age of thirty, he became the prime instigator and funder of its publicity, acquisitions and subsequent expansion into new headquarters on 53rd Street. His brother, David Rockefeller, also joined the museum's board of trustees, in 1948, and took over the presidency when Nelson took up position as Governor of New York in 1958.

David subsequently employed the noted architect Philip Johnson to redesign the museum garden and name it in honor of his mother, the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Sculpture Garden. He and the Rockefeller family in general have retained a close association with the museum throughout its history, with the Rockefeller Brothers Fund funding the institution since 1947. Both David Rockefeller, Jr. and Sharon Percy Rockefeller (wife of Senator Jay Rockefeller) currently sit on the board of trustees.

In 1937, MoMA had shifted to offices and basement galleries in the Time & Life Building in Rockefeller Center. Its permanent and current home, now renovated, designed in the International Style by the modernist architects Philip Goodwin and Edward Durell Stone, opened to the public on May 10, 1939, attended by an illustrious company of 6,000 people, and with an opening address via radio from the White House by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Artworks:

Considered by many to have the best collection of modern Western masterpieces in the world, MoMA's holdings include more than 150,000 individual pieces in addition to approximately 22,000 films and 4 million film stills. The collection houses such important and familiar works as the following:
La Boh�mienne endormie (The Sleeping Gypsy – Zingara che dorme) by Henri Rousseau, 1897

* The Sleeping Gypsy by Henri Rousseau
* The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh
* Les Demoiselles d'Avignon by Pablo Picasso
* The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dal�
* Broadway Boogie Woogie by Piet Mondrian
* Campbell's Soup Cans by Andy Warhol
* The Seed of the Areoi by Paul Gauguin
* Water Lilies triptych by Claude Monet
* The Dance by Henri Matisse
* The Bather by Paul C�zanne
* The City Rises by Umberto Boccioni
* Love Song by Giorgio De Chirico
* Number 31, 1950 by Jackson Pollock
* Broken Obelisk by Barnett Newman
* Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth
* Self-Portrait With Cropped Hair by Frida Kahlo
* Painting (1946) by Francis Bacon
* Two Children Are Threatened by a Nightingale by Max Ernst

It also holds works by a wide range of influential American artists including Cindy Sherman, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Jasper Johns, Edward Hopper, Chuck Close, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Ralph Bakshi.

MoMA developed a world-renowned art photography collection, first under Edward Steichen and then John Szarkowski, as well as an important film collection under The Museum of Modern Art Department of Film and Video. The film collection owns prints of many familiar feature-length movies, including Citizen Kane and Vertigo, but the department's holdings also contains many less-traditional pieces, including Andy Warhol's eight-hour Empire and Chris Cunningham's music video for Bj�rk's All Is Full of Love. MoMA also has an important design collection, which includes works from such legendary designers as Paul L�szl�, the Eameses, Isamu Noguchi, and George Nelson. The design collection also contains many industrial and manufactured pieces, ranging from a self-aligning ball bearing to an entire Bell 47D1 helicopter.

Exhibition houses:

At various points in its history, MoMA has sponsored and hosted temporary exhibition houses, which have reflected seminal ideas in architectural history.

* 1949: exhibition house by Marcel Breuer
* 1950: exhibition house by Gregory Ain
* 1955: Japanese exhibition house
* 2008: Prefabricated houses planned by:
o Kieran Timberlake Architects
o Lawrence Sass
o Jeremy Edmiston and Douglas Gauthier
o Leo Kaufmann Architects
o Richard Horden

Renovation:

MoMA's midtown location underwent extensive renovations in the early 2000s, closing on May 21, 2002 and reopening to the public in a building redesigned by the Japanese architect Yoshio Taniguchi, on November 20, 2004. From June 29, 2002 until September 27, 2004, a portion of its collection was on display in what was dubbed MoMA QNS, a former Swingline staple factory in the Long Island City section of Queens.

The renovation project nearly doubled the space for MoMA's exhibitions and programs and features 630,000 square feet (59,000 m2) of new and redesigned space. The Peggy and David Rockefeller Building on the western portion of the site houses the main exhibition galleries, and The Lewis B. and Dorothy Cullman Education and Research Building on the eastern portion provides over five times more space for classrooms, auditoriums, teacher training workshops, and the museum's expanded Library and Archives. These two buildings frame the enlarged Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Sculpture Garden.

MoMA's reopening brought controversy as its admission cost increased from US$12 to US$20, making it one of the most expensive museums in the city; however it has free entry on Fridays after 4pm, thanks to sponsorship from Target Stores. The architecture of the renovation is controversial. At its opening, some critics thought that Taniguchi's design was a fine example of contemporary architecture, while many others were extremely displeased with certain aspects of the design, such as the flow of the space.

MoMA has seen its average number of visitors rise to 2.5 million from about 1.5 million a year before its new granite and glass renovation. The museum's director, Glenn D. Lowry, expects average visitor numbers eventually to settle in at around 2.1 million.

Financial Situation:

Before the economic crisis of late 2008, the MoMA’s board of trustees had Glenn Lowry sell its equities in order to move into an all-cash position. This move is not credited to one specific person, but the board includes banker David Rockefeller, Leon Black, a top person in private-equity, and former PaineWebber CEO Donald Marron.
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