In Sunday’s (1/23) Miami Herald, Andres Viglucci writes, “Here is a new Frank Gehry building that neither tilts nor twirls. There is not a glimmer of titanium anywhere. Just a whitewashed box of stucco, glass and steel, sitting decorously behind Lincoln Road Mall in Miami Beach. The only hint on the exterior that this is a Gehry design are the shapes that burst out of the rectangular shell as if they could not be contained within—a twisting canopy over the main entrance, a jutting rooftop office suite, a broad concave sunshade over 17th Street that some local wags have dubbed ‘the skateboard ramp.’ … The New World Symphony’s new $160 million home is the architectural analogue of the mission the 23-year-old orchestral academy has adopted under founding artistic director Michael Tilson Thomas: to encourage experimentation within the stolid walls of the classical-music tradition. A post-graduate training academy, high-tech music hall and performance lab for the 21st Century, the New World Center is a place where the traditional orchestral concert, video art and musical electronica can all be equally at home.” The hall opens with a range of events this week, including a commissioned work featuring a musical score by Thomas Adès and video by Tal Rosner.
Posted January 24, 2011
