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10
D.
LIGHT PRISMS
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art,
Kansas City, 1999-2007
The proposal, composed of five interconnected structures as opposed to
a single massive expansion, fuses architecture with landscape to create
an experiential architecture that unfolds for visitors as it is perceived, cre-
ating an innovative merging of landscape, architecture and art.
The addition engages the existing sculpture garden, transforming the en-
tire Museum site into a new scenario for visitors’ experience, where the
five glass boxes become the main characters. Described by the architect
as five ‘lenses’, they form new spaces and angles of vision. At night, the
glowing glass volume of the lobby provides an inviting transparency, draw-
ing visitors to events and activities. The lenses’ multiple layers of translu-
cent glass gather diffuse and refract light, materializing light like blocks of
ice.
The proportions of his buildings have always been a peculiar concern for
Steven Holl; he has even worked experimenting with the golden ratio and
the Fibonacci sequence. In this museum, the relation between the height
and the depth were precisely calibrated to allow the permeability of the
space among the boxes not to obstruct the views of the surroundings.
Regarding the movement system, the circulation and exhibition merge as
one can look from one level to another, from inside to outside. The whole
system is working underground as a strategy to avoid interruptions of the
garden continuity. While visitors move through the new addition, they ex-
perience a fluid dynamism between light, art, architecture and landscape.
The new building is combined with the existing one, using the landscape as
a unifying agent, to create a fluid dynamism based on a sensitive relation-
ship to its context.