johnbyronkuhner.com

http://thmiii.com/?page_id=1734 I had the good fortune to stay at the house of Thom Collins, the current director of the Miami Art Museum, while visiting Miami.  He was extraordinarily hospitable and it was because of him that I ended up having VIP access to all the events at Art Basel, the massive contemporary art show in Miami.

http://ifcus.org/wp-load.php Collins, who is quite young, has had a “rapid ascent in the museum world,” and it was very impressive to see a person who was not a great deal older than me heading a major cultural institution in one of America’s biggest cities.  It seems there was a reason the job went to such a young person: an Art Info article from a few years ago indicates that he stepped into a sticky financial situation as the museum was attempting to move into a new space and was having difficulty raising the money:

At the time of his resignation, [previous museum director] Riley told the Miami New Times: “There’s a pretty long list of directors who’ve probably ruined their careers getting involved in a building program. It could be career tragedy.” As of May, the museum had reportedly raised $31 million of the $100 million in private funding required to complete the project.

Collins is scheduled to start at MAM in August, meaning he will be able to share in the pleasures of Art Basel Miami Beach this December [2010]. However, the museum’s new building will not be open to the revelers until 2013, assuming that Collins raises the money (and construction is completed) as scheduled.

Collins did, in fact, secure the necessary funds, and as of right now the building – I got a tour of the site while in Miami – is ahead of schedule.  The frame is entirely up and they are beginning to close the building.  Plenty can happen over the next year in terms of the construction, but since the money is there it looks like this building is going to get finished.

The building itself is in an extraordinary location, right on the bay in downtown Miami.  The building appears to have the usual modern allergy to curves, but it features extraordinary views and there are plans for amazing tropical plantings to be integrated into the building’s interior.  Hearing Collins talk about the interior design, allowing indirect but not direct sunlight for exhibit spaces, providing “breakout” spaces to insert exhibitions in the middle of a general chronological plan, having a great deal of “event space,” and combining, intriguingly, a lecture and movie hall with a monumental staircase a la the Greeks, was a treat.  It is amazing to hear intelligent people discussing massive plans.

Collins gave tours throughout the entire week, in a cowboy hard hat which was quite impressive.  Even more impressive was to see how apparently tireless Collins was: he had a completely insane social schedule for the entire week, frequently with donors which must require some measure of diplomatic finesse, and he returned every night fresh as a daisy.  He even had the energy for a spirited defense of Ricky Martin, when he returned one night to find me reading aloud passages from Ricky Martin’s autobiography, which I found in a conspicuous location in his living room, in a slightly mocking tone.  He insisted that “the book is actually genius” and he spoke with real warmth about hoping to see Ricky Martin as Che Guavara in the current Broadway production of Evita.  I was impressed that Ricky Martin’s career is still alive and well in Miami, and apparently in New York too.

[Photo by Edwina White.]