The Denver Art Museum and the Bilbao Effect

I came to the idea of wanting to understand new museum buildings as social technology, not just as mere shelter, because of the process around the new wing of the Denver Art Museum. It would later become the Hamilton Building, but in the late 1990s when I was in school in Boulder, it was just called the expansion to the Denver Art Museum. As the bond issue went up for a vote, the idea of building a new wing to the museum was expressed not only in terms of need for more art display space, but also in economic and social terms: the new building would generate revenue through visitation and spending at downtown, and the new building would showcase Denver as the cultural center of the region, possessing the biggest and best museum in eight states. Then, when the initial model for Libeskind’s building—called Nexus at the time—was unveiled, the claim for the building expanded further to include revitalizing a neighborhood, generating international tourism, and representing Denver to the world.