Architects Maya Lin and Frank Gehry (#235, Topic I)

The current issue of US News and World Report features America's Best Leaders; for architects, it selects Frank Gehry. A year or so ago, the 1818 Society (an association of World Bank retirees) sponsored a visit to the Corcoran Museum, having an exhibition honoring Gehry and showing off his design for the museum's extension, the winner of a world-wide competition. Earlier, Gehry's design for a museum in Balboa Spain made that town famous (it became a tourist attraction and, thus, a cash cow). Our local museum's board of directors apparently wanted to duplicate this feat. According to the docent who accompanied us on this visit, the budget for this extension was some $50 million! Being a bean-counter, I immediately expressed my displeasure. Why spend $50 million for a simple (to me) face-lifting renovation? Washington is not Balboa; one goes Balboa, perhaps, to see the museum. But one comes to Washington to conduct business -- even as a visitor, with so many attractions to cover, one is unlikely to rank a visit to a fee-paying museum among one's top priorities. Besides, with the museum next to the AFL-CIO headquarters, with the organization representing the working class and with its building facade non-descript, it is, at least to me (being a member of the working class), an insult. The docent, needless to say, made an unconvincing effort to defend the board's action. Later, as I read in the papers, the board reversed itself and the museum director resigned. The architect worthy of being honored by USNews is, in my view, Maya Lin, the architect who designed the Vietname Memorial on the mall. According to a documentary on Lin's accomplishment, her design, done when she was a mere student at Yale, encountered tremendous resistance. I can never forget the facial expression of this project's main sponsor, a businessman made rich by his Federal government contracts and made famous by his manipulating to become a 3rd party presidential candidate. His obvious disdain -- exhibiting his undisguised racism and discriminatory attitude (Lin is a Chinese-American woman) -- was barely bearable; indeed, he made Lin cry on several occasions. He actually wanted to torpedo the project by withdrawing his financial support. So what? Lin's design survived and, indeed, it has become one of Washington's most visited attractions. Lin was in Washington last Wednesday to give a talk; afterward, she was asked a question. It seems that another Vietnam Memorial is being planned, and she was aske how she felt. She chose not to answer it, which incurred the displeasure of the Washington Post reporter who covered the event, who said, in no uncertain terms, that she should have answered it. What a sadistic town Washington is!