Building Collections at MoMA NY

Ever wondered what went on behind the scenes when some of the world's most iconic structures were in the design process? Or what the great architects of the 20th century were really thinking?

Building Collections, currently on view at MoMA New York, should is an unmissable exhibition for any architecture aficionado. The show presents an exceptional collection of architecture drawings, documents and models from the museum's Architecture and Design Department, some of which are new acquisitions and the great majority of which have never been on public display before. 

The curators - Barry Bergdoll (Philip Johnson Chief Curator of Architecture and Design), and curatorial assistant Margot Weller - have devised eight distinctly themed areas, encompassing the full range of the collection which ranges from 1890 to the present day and documenting some of the most iconic moments in architectural history.

The section marked 'X' for example, features pages from Ceci n’est pas l’architecture, a lecture given by Le Corbusier from in Buenos Aires in 1929 where he deploys the now famous 'X technique', used to dramatically reject past ideology in favour of new modernist ways of thinking. In the same section is Willi Baumeister’s poster, Wie Wohnen? Die Wohnung Werkbund Austellung (1927), created for an exhibition of housing, in which he crossed out an image of a traditional elaborately decorated interior with a red X.

‘Utopias and Alternative Modernisms’ on the other hand includes projects from the 1970s; some of which were realised (Ant Farm's House of the Century) and others which never made it past the drawing board, such as Haus Rucker Company's Stück Natur.

But for a really in-depth look at building design, loiter in ‘Process’, a collection of models, sketches and plans showing all the stages of design development. A highlight here are the sterile white models of UNStudio’s Mercedes Benz Museum in Stuttgart, in real life a shimmering be-ribboned silver and glass structure.

Catherine Hudson writes on art and fashion