Artistry Versus History:
Building The Future
Of The Queens Museum Of Art

By Angela Montefinise and Tamara Hartman

It was the arts that have preserved the life of the Flushing Meadows-Corona Park building that has stood through the crowds of two World’s Fairs and witnessed the first meetings of the United Nations and numerous young skating couples.

But as plans finally move forward to give a creative light to the exterior of one of the borough’s premiere art institutions, preservationists are raising questions about the future of the Queens Museum of Art’s (QMA) past.

The competition for a new design to what was the World’s Fairs New York City Building was a nation-wide, year long process sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts. Organized by the New York City Department of Design and Construction (DDC), the competition’s jury closed the event in February with three architectural designs as finalists. The first place winner, designed by Eric Owen Moss Architects of Culver City, California, calls for the creation of an atrium and entranceway that exposes the surrounding park area while its unusual design attracts visitors into the arts space. The winning proposal has been on display at the QMA since March in an exhibit that closed earlier this month.

But while the exhibition has closed, the commentary session for the community is still open through August 16, and at presstime, several preservationist groups were planning to join forces on July 26 and call on the community to raise their voices for preserving history.

The groups, which include the Historic Districts Council, the Queens Borough Preservation League, and the Art Deco Society of New York State, told the Tribune that they will be outside the Queens Museum of Art (QMA) on Friday to protest the new design, and request that museum officials reconsider their redesign plans.

The concept of a new vision for the QMA was built from plans to expand the museum into the entire building space, as some of the founding parents of the QMA in 1972 always hoped it would. The Museum currently shares the building with the World’s Fair Skating Rink, which is moving into a new rink space. Once the rink is moved, the Museum’s space will double from 45,000 to approximately 100,000 square feet, according to figures from the DDC.

The DDC explained that the competition process was a two-stage process with only five original entries moving on to the section stage of competition. The jury for the competition included: Architect Ben Van Berkel of the UN Studio, Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Susan Chin, FAIA of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs; Peter Eisenman, FAIA of Eisenman Architects, New York, New York; Merrill Elam, AIA of Scogin, Elam and Bray Architects, Inc., Atlanta, Georgia; Carma Fauntleroy, then of the Queens Museum of Art; Enrique Norten, FAIA of TEN Arquitectos, Mexico City, Mexico, and Brooklyn, NY; Anne Papageorge, RLA, of the New York City Department of Design and Construction; and Professional Advisor Ralph Lerner, FAIA, of Ralph Lerner Architect PC, Princeton, New Jersey.

Though the website inviting architects to join the competition described the challenge “to create an innovative expansion strategy for the museum meeting its unique goals and mission, and amplifying the dramatic opportunities afforded by its historic building and site,” the preservationists raising their voices this week feel that wasn’t enough.

They would have liked to see the architects challenged to preserve the building’s historic structure as part of the parameters of the competition, and some have called for the process to begin again.

However, QMA’s Executive Director Tom Finkelpearl – who joined the Museum in March – explained that preserving the history of the site has long been part of the museum’s goal and even as he awaits word from the City as to the financial future of the project, plans are still underway to expand exhibits chronicling the building’s past.

Finkelpearl told the Tribune that the museum, “will expand our current exhibition on the history of the site, and we will have other exhibits on its history. For example, we want to do an exhibit on Robert Moses . . . The United Nations met in what became the hockey rink, so we definitely plan on acknowledging that in some way.”

In an earlier Tribune interview Finkelpearl noted and confirmed again this week that the only funding available and spent so far has been federal funds from the National Endowment for the Arts to hold the competition. No projected start date on the project will be released until the City puts the project out to bid and reviews the bid proposals. He also noted that support from the residents of the City and the Borough will be essential for the future design of the Museum to take shape, especially in light of current City budgeting constraints.

The president of the Queens Borough Preservation League, Jeffery Kroessler, told the Tribune, “This design competition was conducted by the National Endowment for the Arts without any mention that the building is historic. None of the participating architects, therefore, took the building’s history into account. We think that’s wrong, and the design obliterates the historic roots of the building.”

Kroessler pointed out that when a public building is deemed eligible for historic status, as the Museum was in February, and Federal money is being used to change it in some way, a public review process known as a “106 review” automatically begins so interested parties can suggest ways that the change can still preserve the building’s historic status.

In the case of the QMA, the National Endowment for the Arts is currently holding a public review process so people can comment on the proposed design, and it ends on August 16. Anyone interested in adding their comment on the project can send testimony by fax to 202-682-5572 or e-mail it to eliask@arts.endow.gov.

Kroessler said, “Right now, people can submit written suggestions and testimony about how the historic nature of the building can be preserved. We will be submitting comment that the design will have an adverse affect on the building, and those comments should be taken into consideration. Nothing is guaranteed in this process, however. The Endowment can decide that taking photographs of the building is preserving it. We disagree.”

The QMA’s website describes the winning architect’s vision for the future of the building as follows: “His scheme was judged to be most successful in addressing the relationship between the park and the building, bringing excitement, drama, and an inviting quality to the museum’s façade. The expanded museum will include a new study center for collections, more galleries for temporary installations, additional education workshops, a multipurpose gathering space to accommodate performances and receptions, increased space to house the permanent collection, and a café.”

The world beat a path to Queens in 1939 as Flushing Meadows hosted the 1939-40 World’s Fair.

Constructed for the Fair, the New York City Building was the exhibition hall for all things New York City. When the Fair ended, nearly all of the structures built for it, including the noted architectural centerpieces, the Trylon and the Perisphere, were torn down. The New York City Building was an exception. In the years that followed, the area that is now Flushing Meadows-Corona Park fell into disrepair and became overgrown with weeds and grass. But when the dream of President Franklin Roosevelt’s “United Nations” was realized after World War II, the building space in the park was to be reinvented. The 51 member nations signed the charter of the United Nations in San Francisco in October of 1945 and their first order of business was to pick up the pieces left behind by war, but the newly formed international organization needed a home.

Mayor William O’Dwyer formed a committee of 12 prominent New Yorkers to put together a proposal to bring the U.N. to New York “I believe that we have in Flushing Meadows Park in Queens a very accessible site in every way suited to the present and future requirements of the United Nations for working space for the World Capitol in surroundings which insure protection from all unfavorable influences,” O’Dwyer said in his introduction to the report.

In 1946, the United Nations chose Queens as its home and world capital – until its move to Manhattan five-years-later.

The New York City Building was again visited by the world in 1964 when New York hosted its second World’s Fair in Flushing Meadows and it again housed the showcase of New York City. Inside was constructed the Panorama of New York City, one of the most popular exhibits of the 1964 World’s Fair which attracted an average of 1,400 visitors a day, and featured tracked-cars simulating helicopter flight over this 9335 sq. ft. model of the 320 square miles of New York City.

The Panorama, now a permanent part of the Queens Museum of Art, was re-opened to the public in 1994.

Kroessler responded to the concepts of exhibitions preserving the history of the site by saying, “That’s not enough. Putting up some pictures is not going to maintain the historic side of the building. The building itself should be preserved.”

Kroessler also said the preservationists are going to try to get the building landmarked, and added, “Having it landmarked will not protect it from getting changed, but will force people to acknowledge the historic background of the building. If the architects in the competition knew about the history, maybe the designs would have been different.”

The Museum’s website summarizes QMA with the following: “From its establishment, the museum has pursued building a permanent collection that preserves the artistic heritage of Queens and contains works of international and culturally diverse 20th– and 21st–century art that contribute to an understanding of American art. At present, the collection encompasses an archive of 3,500 documents and artifacts related to the 1939 and 1964 World’s Fairs, the Panorama, the 9,335 sq.ft. model of the city created for the 1964 World’s Fair, and 1,800 works of modern and contemporary art. A sampling drawn from the museum’s collection, including works by Berenice Abbott, Dawoud Bey, Chakaia Booker, Cai Guo-Qiang, Grace Hartigan, Lewis W. Hine, Reginald Marsh, and Theodore Roszak . . . [and] since 1997 the museum has housed and displayed a collection of Tiffany objects on extended loan from the Egon and Hildegard Neustadt Museum of Tiffany Art. These objects, made in the company’s workshops formerly located in Corona.”

— Stephen McGuire contributed to this story