Inside Out:  New Perspectives on the Heinz Architectural Center’s Collection

October 28, 2000 – January 21, 2001

The newly renovated Heinz Architectural Center opens with a show from the collection that explores how architects use drawings and models in the process of design, and the way information is communicated by these forms of representation. Associate curator Tracy Myers explains, “The show opens with a group of sketches -- really just thoughts on paper.  Then we have elevations, perspectives, sections, and composite drawings, which work as a hinge for the exhibition.  Then we move from looking at buildings from the outside to looking at them from their interiors.”

While the center has mounted exhibitions from the collection before, this is the first that Myers and curator Joseph Rosa have organized. "Remodeling and expanding the Center gave us a chance to take a fresh look at our collection.  In it we found wonderful examples of the ways architects have recorded and shared their ideas over time,” says Rosa.

The new gallery in the Heinz Architectural Center will be similar to the original galleries, but with several differences in the details.  “There is continuity,” says Myers.  “It will be obvious to the visitor that the new gallery, like the original ones, was designed by Cicognani Kalla Architects in New York.  However, the new gallery is distinctive in relation to the rest of the Center.  The molding has a flatter profile, the ceiling color is different.  But the design vocabulary is pretty much the same.”

Visions, Fragments, and Impressions:  French Nineteenth-Century Drawings and Bronzes from the Collection of Herbert and Carol Diamond

September 14 – January 14, 2001

 Small bronzes were especially popular in the 19th century.  The Diamond collection contains 23 bronzes and 60 drawings from a period when great changes were taking place in French society, changes which are illustrated in the art of the period.  Works by Auguste Rodin, for example, rather than celebrating famous people, stress the inner thoughts of the model.  Jean-Jacques Feuchere’s Satan embodies another artistic debate as its traditional finish and literary theme contrast with the unconventional pose of Satan’s body encased in bat wings.
 

Aluminum in Contemporary Architecture

November 18, 2000 – February 4, 2001

In an exhibition designed to complement Aluminum by Design:  Jewelry to Jets, associate curator Tracy Myers of the Heinz Architectural Center has organized an exhibition of architectural works from the 1990s that make use of aluminum.  The projects range in scale from a small workshop and office in Texas to a 27-story office tower designed for Bangkok.  “What became clear to me as I was reading through the research for this exhibition,” says Myers, “is that aluminum has been used in all types of buildings and in many forms, from sheathing in a corrugated aluminum skin to the fixings that keep plate glass together in a curtain wall.” 
Aluminum is a desirable building material for many reasons – it is cheap, lightweight, and resists corrosion.  “There is a public elementary school outside Atlanta that is covered in aluminum that looks like fish scales,” Myers says. “The architects wanted to give the building a specific architectural identity, but they had a limited budget.  Now the school building stimulates the students’ interest in structures and design.”

The exhibition will consist of works on paper, photographs, models, and many examples of Computer Aided Design.  “Sometimes the desire to use aluminum necessitates the use of CAD,” Myers adds. “And sometimes it becomes clear in the design process that the only material that will work is aluminum.”

Some of the architects included in the exhibition are Sir Norman Foster, TEN Arquitectos in Mexico City, and Kohn Pedersen Fox.