More than five years after hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, the new museum for the area’s self-styled mad potter, which was 15 months away from opening at the time, has opened — with a mad architect in charge.
Just kidding, but listen to Frank Gehry talk about his plans for the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art in Biloxi, which commissioned him to design a $35 million five-structure complex.
In his design, Gehry envisioned the structures dancing with the trees….”It’s a cluster of modest museum buildings that are dancing well with each other and the oak trees which was always my intent,” Gehry says in a news release. “It looks like it’s working and I’m very pleased.”
That’s according to the Mississippi Clarion-Ledger.
The campus’s new other stuctures — the Center for Ceramics and the George Ohr Gallery — have not been completed. The target for their debut is 2012.
What’s open now? The Welcome Center (pictured above), with cafe, museum store and exhibits by Mississippi ceramic artists; the IP Casino Resort Spa Exhibitions Gallery, which will show work by contemporary artists; and the Gallery of African American Art, which features works by African Americans and the Gulf Coast’s ethnic diversity. (The Pleasant Reed Interpretive Center, also part of the museum campus, is already open to the public.)
It’s a good bet that the museum chose Gehry hoping for the Bilbao effect. Listen to the executive director of the Mississippi Gulf Coast Convention and Visitors Bureau, Richard Forester: “The cultural and heritage tourist stays longer and spends more money” (quoted in the Clarion-Ledger). The museum is expecting on the order of 100,000 visitors a year.
But take a look at the gallery of photos of the new buildings — here — they look great, and together with Ohr’s works (below), maybe they can draw crowds from the nearby casinos.
UPDATED — 11/7 Evening: The Los Angeles Times has an article today about the Ohr-O’Keefe, describing — among other things — the precautions being taken for the next big hurricane:
Executive director Denny Mecham said the museum’s insurance company insisted that the art be moved at least 25 miles from the coast in the event of a hurricane.
Each piece of pottery has been fitted with a custom-cut foam packing mold. Boxes and crates stand at the ready, in storage a few miles away, for Mecham’s signal to haul the collection out of harm’s way….
…Since Katrina, there have been some modifications to the original building plan. FEMA forced one gallery to be raised by about two feet.
Photo Credit: Courtesy Clarion-Ledger (top)