CALATRAVA: INTERIOR DETAIL

The Milwaukee Art Museum offers free admission on the first Thursday of each month, and I took advantage in June to take a few photos.  I have shot the museum a number of times, so this time I tried to concentrate on getting some more unusual shots of architectural detail.

I started in the underground parking garage, which carries Calatrava's distinctive architectural style over into structural details, as illustrated in the following shot.

And here is a shot of the garage wall that I liked for its clean lines and turned into a black & white.

I also took a shot of the stairway leading up from the garage to the museum's atrium.

Again, I liked the clean but interesting lines that the stairwell features.

In addition to its stunning atrium, the Calatrava addition features two long gallerias that also include distinctive architectural detail.  Here is a shot of the east galleria.

Because the surfaces are colored a light cream, capturing the lines of the support struts and recessed lighting is something of a challenge.  In the above shot I darkened the exposure and increased the contrast somewhat to bring out the complex curved lines.  It was evening and the lighting consisted of a mixture of natural evening light and interior artificial light, some incandescent and some florescent.  As a result, even though the surfaces were light cream, the appearance of the photo shows a variation of color from peach to light blue.

Here is another photo, this time from the west galleria, that shows the same color mixture.

And here is a third shot of a recessed lighting alcove that features the same coloration.

OK, so I have done this one before, but I do like the clean abstract lines.

The east galleria was somewhat cluttered with signs--and people--but the west galleria, which I visited toward the end of my visit, was pretty much empty, except for a series of decals of people that had been placed on the structural supports.

I liked that the light from the windows at the far end of the galleria was being reflected on the galleria floor.  I assume that the series of decals is a temporary feature.

In the following shot from the art gallery area I liked how the walls lead the eye to the group of small pieces of art on the far wall in the image.

And finally, purely for its interest as an abstract, here is a novelty shot of reflections in the glass of one of the museum's entrance doors.

If nothing else, at least I can say that this is not a typical collection of Calatrava shots.

John