THE FATE OF ART MUSEUMS: NFT / Digital Art and their Effects on the Modern Cathedral

Presented by Marifer Echeverri

USC School of Architecture

in partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree of Bachelor of Architecture

Advised by Prof. Wendy W Fok

ARCH 501

December 2021

ABSTRACT

Contemporary art museums have become the modern cathedral, allowing architects to build radical structures. Their rapidly evolving expositions and ever-changing demands produce innovative spaces that are treasures for the cities that they inhabit, as both icons and anchor institutions. The rising popularity of digital art and NFT files brings an additional layer of complications regarding the institutional and physical elements of museums. Digital museums may be seen as more accessible and less problematic than art museums as we know them today, but the formal conditions that the museums bring about as well as their role in communities prove how they are not ready to exit society as a typology. The exploration of space is still to be pushed through the modern-day cathedral, but with the advent of digital art, this exploration is threatened into a digital existence. They must evolve to survive the massive consumption of art through digital spaces as well as the scrutiny that they are facing in the wake of social revolution.

KEYWORDS

Art Museums

Digital Art

NFT Art

Form

Bilbao Effect

INTRODUCTION

Public art collections in North America began as permanent sets housed in neoclassical buildings that were created to represent national identity. The desire for national identity brought about monumental structures that were designed to house very specific artworks. But as collections evolved, the demands placed on museums changed greatly, creating a need for dramatic and constant change as traveling expositions grew in popularity. In addition to being monuments in the city, museums have also taken a role as grounding institutions for communities. Besides the formal changes implemented due to the nature of modern expositions, art museums are also pushed into becoming pieces of art creating the “Bilbao effect” that many cities craved as they funded their contemporary museums. A museum can no longer simply house the art, it must become an icon within the city and become a sculpture, indicative of the time and the artist that made it. With the creation of digital and NFT art, what is the fate of art museums? Are these great sculptures within a city going to become obsolete as our art consumption is pushed mainly onto digital spaces? Are these grounding institutions no longer necessary as cultural centers? What happens to art in terms of museum space and storage? What are the implications of this on the financial aspects of museums regarding the acquisition of NFTs and digital art?

THE MODERN CATHEDRAL: From City Beautiful to Bilbao

IMAGE 1, NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY, WASHINGTON DC. Example of mezzanine in early American Museums that promoted good behavior through the possibility of observation in these cultural institutions. "National Portrait Gallery." Washington.org. June 16, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. http://washingtonorg-prod-php7-1.us-east-1.elasticbeanstalk.com/meetings/find-dc-listings/national-portrait-gallery.

IMAGE 2, NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY, WASHINGTON DC. Example of neoclassical architecture that promoted the ideals set in place by the City Beautiful movement. "National Portrait Gallery." Washington.org. June 16, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. http://washingtonorg-prod-php7-1.us-east1.elasticbeanstalk.com/meetings/find-dc-listings/national-portrait-gallery.

Museums rose in popularity in the 19th century with the attempts of countries to establish themselves as world powers, both economically and culturally[i]. As museums began to play a larger role in the urban fabric, the City Beautiful movement picked up on this rising importance and pushed for a further transformation of cities with museums as anchor institutions[1]. City leaders began advocating for the creation of these institutions to bring about a “civilized society” that was well behaved and enlightened. The buildings of these institutions reflect these priorities as they created spaces of solemn reflection of artworks that are out of reach in lengthy galleries with great mezzanines that made museumgoers feel observed (Refer to Image 1)[2]. Besides creating institutions that benefit communities despite the misguided intentions, the museums served as physical symbols that identified cities as elite and modern, especially with the popular neoclassical architecture of the museums (Refer to Image 2).

[1] Meyer, Justin Reeves. “Art Museums and Neighborhood Development: Historical Evidence from the Case of the Portland Art Museum and the South Park Blocks in Portland, Oregon.” Journal of Planning Education and Research, 2021, p. 739456–, doi:10.1177/0739456X211020077. [2] Lindsay, Georgia. The User Perspective on Twenty-First Century Art Museums. Routledge, 2016.

[i] These early museums were haphazard collections of artifacts put together to demonstrate the imperial power of countries like England, Germany, and Spain. They often displayed the cultural artifacts of the colonies that they took over as curiosities and tokens of power.

Museums as Parts of City Beautiful

The use of Neoclassical architecture for museums highlights the idea of attempted community improvement through elitist and colonialist ideas that are put together in the City Beautiful movement [i]. The movement[1] exalted the use of monumental architecture and neoclassical flourishes in attempts to beautify growing cities in North America[2]. The Greco Roman elements that are tacked onto these buildings were done so to establish a respectable identity for the city, but in turn, it created uniform anonymity that imitated once great architecture. Museums were increasingly regarded as significant establishments in terms of redefining a community in the 1990s[ii] where cities in the United States began to plan their city centers around such institutions in attempts to form more recognizable zones that carried the city’s identity as cultural areas, especially in an increasingly globalized society[3][iii].

Bilbao’s Effect on Museums

IMAGE 3, GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM, BILBAO Exterior shot of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao designed by Frank Gehry. "The Building: Guggenheim Museum Bilbao." Guggenheim Bilbao. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.guggenheim-bilbao.eus/en/the-building.

The desire for cities to be regarded as global entities prevailed, but the ambiguity provided by traditional architecture began to be seen as undesirable over sculptural architecture that was realized as a tool for creating a stronger identity. Architects were called upon to design dramatic, sculptural spaces that were to symbolize the city’s modern relevance as a cultural hub[4]. An example of this shift in architectural typology is the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao[iv], designed by Frank Gehry (Refer to Image 3), it created a wave of tourism in a small city because of the spectacular architecture generated. The museum rapidly became a pilgrimage site for tourists and within its first three years, it was visited by over 4 million people, breaking even with

[1] Lindsay, Georgia. The User Perspective on Twenty-First Century Art Museums. Routledge, 2016. [2] Meyer, Justin Reeves. “Art Museums and Neighborhood Development: Historical Evidence from the Case of the Portland Art Museum and the South Park Blocks in Portland, Oregon.” Journal of Planning Education and Research, 2021, p. 739456–, doi:10.1177/0739456X211020077. [3] Meyer, Andrea, and Savoy Bénédicte. The Museum Is Open: Towards a Transnational History of Museums, 1750-1940. De Gruyter, 2014. [4] Lindsay, Georgia. The User Perspective on Twenty-First Century Art Museums. Routledge, 2016.

[i] The City Beautiful movement was an ideology that was popularized in North America from the 1890s onto the 1900s. It intended to reform the city and urban fabric by introducing beautification efforts that surrounded ideas of monuments and procession. The physical spaces created by this movement reflected the virtues that the city leaders were trying to instill in their population to create a more harmonious and “cultured” population. [ii] We can look at the Portland Art Museum as a successful anchor institution for the South Park blocks in Portland, Oregon. This shows how museums can be engaged to benefit neighborhood development, especially the more recent attempts that link art museums to city planning. This museum took its place in the neighborhood in 1932 and has continued to take an active role within the community, showing how museums can have a positive effect on their surroundings. (Meyer, Justin Reeves. “Art Museums and Neighborhood Development: Historical Evidence from the Case of the Portland Art Museum and the South Park Blocks in Portland, Oregon.” Journal of Planning Education and Research, 2021, p. 739456–, doi:10.1177/0739456X211020077.) [iii] Anchor institutions are often considered to be universities and hospitals, but museums are often included in this definition, as they tend to be long-lasting nonprofit institutions that are meant to activate the community in which they reside. [iv] The Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao was built in 1997 to reinvigorate the port area of Bilbao. The Solomon R. Guggenheim foundation manages the institution and rotates parts of its permanent collection, which also rotates through other museums, and organizes temporary and borrowed exhibitions. The museum was designed by Frank Gehry and is meant to display seemingly random curves that catch the light of the sun and the river and seep into the surroundings. It is regarded as one of the most respected Deconstructivism works, and it is often regarded as a masterpiece of the 20th century.

the cost of construction. This growth seen because of a great institution being built within a community is often regarded (both positively and negatively) as the “Bilbao Effect”[1].

With Bilbao as an example, city leaders began to place a new demand on art museums, searching for architects that would design the next Guggenheim and set up a unique identity and surge of tourism for the city. This challenge became an opportunity for architects to explore form and create their masterpiece, free of many conventional limits set by more practical spaces. Art museums became the new gothic cathedral, with soaring roofs and seemingly impossible features that make up a space for venerating the valued objects of society.

THE FORM OF THE CONTEMPORARY (ART MUSEUM)

IMAGE 4, GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM, BILBAO Interior shot of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao designed by Frank Gehry. "The Building: Guggenheim Museum Bilbao." Guggenheim Bilbao. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.guggenheim-bilbao.eus/en/the-building.

In addition to the international growth that caused a great change in the form of art museums, the internal nature of the museums also created a stir, greatly altering the space. As museum collections transitioned from permanent, mostly royal, collections to borrowed and traveling collections the nature of the museums changed as well. With a permanent collection, the architect can anticipate the works of art that are going to inhabit the space that they are designing, but with traveling collections, the art pieces are ever shifting and so must the internal layout of the museum. Temporary walls and flexible spaces are now the most important internal features of contemporary museums. Additionally, white walls have become a staple in these spaces, allowing for further flexibility due to the barrenness and simplicity that comes with whiteness and its inability to clash with the ever-shifting pieces of art that are to be placed upon them[2](Refer to Image 4). The exterior of the museum is seen as a sculpture for the city, while the interior of the museum is meant to be a backdrop for the art and a seamless experience for the visitor.

[1] Meyer, Justin Reeves. “Art Museums and Neighborhood Development: Historical Evidence from the Case of the Portland Art Museum and the South Park Blocks in Portland, Oregon.” Journal of Planning Education and Research, 2021, p. 739456–, doi:10.1177/0739456X211020077. [2] Lindsay, Georgia. The User Perspective on Twenty-First Century Art Museums. Routledge, 2016.

MUSEUMS AND MONEY

Museums, as generally nonprofit institutions[i], survive on stringent budgets with a mission to preserve the art that they hold and to share it with the public. This stringency is brought by a tension that museums face allowing the public to experience the art as much as possible, charging the lowest possible admission fees, while still staying afloat as an institution[1]. Due to these financial limits, most museums can rarely afford to expand their collections, relying on donations from patrons. So, art pieces in museums are rarely seen as financial assets, but more as cultural pieces that are to be preserved and displayed for the public to admire and learn from.

Despite this, museums have been rapidly growing and their attendance had been booming in the 21st century. Beginning in the 1970s museums have seen an increase in attendance “from approximately 20 million visitors in the 1970s to more than 100 million at the turn of the century”[2].. To maintain this relevance museums must continue to adapt to the city and the cultural expectations of the community. Museums must make enough money to be able to adapt and evolve while still charging as little as possible to continue their amnesty with the community they inhabit.

Museums are no longer meant to simply shelter art, they must innovate the displays and the narratives that they are presenting to the public, creating an invaluable experience for the visitors, allowing them to interact with art in greater ways[3]. Their value, therefore, exceeds their collection and instead lies on their display and treatment of this art, a priceless piece of art serves of no value to a community when it sits in storage indefinitely. The stagnant collections seen in some museums may also be seen as infinite storage due to its failure of drawing in an audience. This expectation for museums to continually offer new expositions to communities creates a demand for borrowing artworks and seeking new art. This drive to acquire new pieces does not stop despite the financial limits set by the museums’ business models, instead, they are forced to be resourceful with their money and rely heavily on donations.

[1] Feldstein, Martin S. The Economics of Art Museums. University of Chicago Press, 1992. [2] Coblence, Emmanuel, and Valérie Sabatier. “Articulating Growth and Cultural Innovation in Art Museums: The Louvre’s Business Model Revision.” International Studies of Management & Organization, vol. 44, no. 4, Routledge, 2014, pp. 9–25, doi:10.2753/IMO0020-8825440401. [3] Coblence, Emmanuel, and Valérie Sabatier. “Articulating Growth and Cultural Innovation in Art Museums: The Louvre’s Business Model Revision.” International Studies of Management & Organization, vol. 44, no. 4, Routledge, 2014, pp. 9–25, doi:10.2753/IMO0020-8825440401.

[i] Museums are usually set up as nonprofit institutions to apply for tax-exempt status, and are not money-making entities, as in they are not meant to sell art, just display it. The revenue that they gain from admissions and other amenities like cafes is meant to maintain the space and art. Both private and public art museums are set up this way, only art galleries are not considered to be nonprofit as they serve to sell pieces of art.

DIGITAL ART AND NFTs

Art has transcended traditional mediums with the advent of technology through the creation of digital art[i]. Digital art inhabits an immaterial space and scale due to its medium and poses a new set of challenges for museums, artists, and for audiences that are observing the art. In addition to digital art, the popularization of NFT[ii] art has brought on another layer of complexity to the art market and culture.

With NFT trade comes a possibility of an open market, erasing the middleman like art brokers and auction houses like Christie’s and Sotheby’s[iii][1]. This allows for artists to independently sell and negotiate their pieces, gaining all the profit immediately and an audience. This possibly creates a space for increased creativity due to the new medium’s opportunities and the market’s unique audience and liberties[2]. The opportunity for growth and exploration is greater, but due to the platform’s relatively new nature, many are arguing about its viability. Additionally, the art that has begun to surface is continually being criticized for its lack of creativity even with the medium and market’s revolutionary liberations[3].

Despite whether NFTs are a viable asset, digital art is still growing and seems to be the new medium many artists are adopting (independently or in conjunction with other mediums), so museums must adapt. They must evolve to properly display and curate these pieces of art and create the proper narrative to illustrate the ever-changing art world. The buzz around NFTs (even if short-lived) along with the turmoil caused by the pandemic during 2020 and 2021, forced museums to recognize the need to change their interactions with the community in the digital spaces built by the internet, and their exhibitions within the museum walls.

Digital Museums / Adapting to Screens

As museums adapt to this change in medium, we must consider what this means for the architecture of the building. Art museums must respond in a sufficient manner, curating the art in reflection of the digital nature of the pieces. In the wake of the 2019 COVID pandemic, many museums began to display their art online to draw attention to themselves and to remain active in the communities that they serve. This display of art has brought to question the idea of digital art museums and the existence of physical art museums. It may seem straight forward and ever more accessible to let museums inhabit the internet and abandon their buildings, but we must consider their role within a physical community. The nature of the digital presentation of art pushes people to be more impatient with the object and repeatedly scroll through, rapidly consuming massive amounts of visual data but not stopping to observe the intricacies of the art that is being shown. The curation and the space that they provide to observe, study, preserve, and store this art are crucial. How collections are presented to the public, along with the nature of the room itself, write a dialogue with the museumgoer to an extent that cannot be replicated in the digital space.

MUSEUM-LESS WORLD?

Museums as institutions are riddled with controversy as many collections stem from colonialism and the artifacts stolen from the nations that were and are subject to this invasion[4]. The unjust collection of art and artifacts from people and the following display by the colonizing countries has brought up the issue of whether museums are a monument to this colonialism and if they can be a space for activism despite this history. Indeed, this past of subjugation should not be forgotten, but the tools that these museums and future museums provide within a community should persuade us all to preserve these anchor institutions and transform them to better serve the communities that they envelop.

Digital art and social scrutiny have brought the future of museums under question and have brought up many points in need of reform. Art museums should aim to strike a balance with the Bilbao Effect, avoiding gentrification while also bringing value to their neighborhoods by involving the public in the creation and the day-to-day life of the museum. The modern-day cathedral should not be shunned as a monument to colonialism, it should be embraced as a platform for architectural innovation and cultural activation. Their existence in the future hangs on their ability to react to this scrutiny and to the world that is continually shifting to a digital space. The adoption of these issues into their mission statement is imminent and the architecture of the museum needs to reflect this change. The next “Guggenheim” is just around the corner as the demands placed on art museums have begun to multiply and the response is bound to be manifested as a building marking this new era of museums that voice the diversity in both the creators of the art as well as the art mediums.

[1] "Sotheby's and Christie's: A Comparison of the Biggest Auction Houses." TheCollector. July 10, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.thecollector.com/sothebys-and-christies-a-comparison-of-the-biggest-auction-houses/. [2] Jennifer Hahn | 9 April 2021 Leave a comment. “NFTs Will Usher in a ‘Creative and Artistic Renaissance’ Say Designers.” Dezeen, 19 Apr. 2021. Accessed December 10, https://www.dezeen.com/2021/04/09/nfts-impact-design-architecture-fashion/. [3] Aaron Betsky | 9 April 2021 Leave a Comment. ""When Will We See Good Design in a NFT?"" Dezeen. April 14, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.dezeen.com/2021/04/09/nfts-opinion-aaron-betsky/. [4] Lindsay, Georgia. The User Perspective on Twenty-First Century Art Museums . Routledge, 2016. [i] The history of “digital art” can be traced back to computer-automated images from the 1950s, but the term digital art was coined in the 1980s. The first software that allowed users to freehand draw on a computer was MacPaint which came about in the late 1970s (Victoria and Albert Museum, Online Museum. "The Pioneers (1950-1970)." A History of Computer Art. July 17, 2013. Accessed December 10, 2021. http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/a/computer-art-history/.). [ii] The difference between cryptocurrency and NFTs is that crypto, like Bitcoin or Ethereum, is fungible, meaning that all units are valued at the same price within each platform. NFTs, on the other hand, are unique tokens, so they are valued uniquely and are traded respectively. One of the first forms of cryptocurrency was created in the 1980s and has greatly risen in popularity during the 2010s. NFTs seem to have first come onto the market around 2012 with the creation of Colored Coins which were used to represent a particular asset within the bitcoin system. Although NFTs have been around for almost a decade, their popularity grew during 2016 with the trade of Rare Pepes and CryptoKitties. These two recreational platforms which sold unique memes and cat assets within a game set up the groundwork for the more current trade of NFTs. This trade has exploded with the recent developments in the art world where Beeple sold work at Christie’s for $69 million. This began a frenzy where people began to take notice of this platform and have begun to overproduce pieces in attempts to be the next Beeple. (Steinwold, Andrew. "The History of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)." Medium. October 07, 2019. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://medium.com/@Andrew.Steinwold/the-history-of-non-fungible-tokens-nfts-f362ca57ae10.) [iii] Christie’s and Sotheby’s are two of the largest, international auction houses. They have both been around since the 1700s and have grown to be the most respected auction houses, having connections with the world’s wealthiest circles. They are private companies based in London and seem to have a duopoly on the world art and antiquities market ("Sotheby's and Christie's: A Comparison of the Biggest Auction Houses." TheCollector. July 10, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.thecollector.com/sothebys-and-christies-a-comparison-of-the-biggest-auction-houses/.).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Aaron Betsky | 9 April 2021 Leave a Comment. ""When Will We See Good Design in a NFT?"" Dezeen. April 14, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.dezeen.com/2021/04/09/nfts-opinion-aaron-betsky/.

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Feldstein, Martin S. The Economics of Art Museums. University of Chicago Press, 1992.

Lindsay, Georgia. The User Perspective on Twenty-First Century Art Museums . Routledge, 2016.

Jennifer Hahn | 9 April 2021 Leave a comment. “NFTs Will Usher in a ‘Creative and Artistic Renaissance’ Say Designers.” Dezeen, 19 Apr. 2021. Accessed December 10, https://www.dezeen.com/2021/04/09/nfts-impact-design-architecture-fashion/.

Marcus Fairs | 29 March 2021 Leave a Comment. "The Environmental Impact of NFTs Is "horrible" Says Architect Chris Precht." Dezeen. April 01, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.dezeen.com/2021/03/29/environmental-impact-nfts-horrible-architect-chris-precht/.

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"National Portrait Gallery." Washington.org. June 16, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. http://washingtonorg-prod-php7-1.us-east-1.elasticbeanstalk.com/meetings/find-dc-listings/national-portrait-gallery.

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"Sotheby's and Christie's: A Comparison of the Biggest Auction Houses." TheCollector. July 10, 2021. Accessed December 10, 2021. https://www.thecollector.com/sothebys-and-christies-a-comparison-of-the-biggest-auction-houses/.

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