Moneo unveils RISD plan - Front Page - Jose Rafael Moneo; Rhode Island School of Design - Brief Article

Art in America, Jan, 2003

Spanish architect Jose Rafael Moneo was recently in New York to unveil his model for the Rhode Island School of Design's new RISD Center, which will house additional spaces for the RISD Museum. The $46-million expansion and renovation project, located on North Main Street in downtown Providence, includes modifications to the existing Radeke Building on the RISD campus. Plans call for a dramatic atrium, a 250-seat auditorium, a cafe, a museum shop, a lecture hall, new classrooms and storage facilities. An additional 6,000 square feet of exhibition space will be reserved for the RISD Museum, providing the institution with a total of 32,000 square feet to be used for temporary exhibitions and for the display of selections from the approximately 80,000 works in the museum's permanent collection. Groundbreaking is scheduled for spring 2004, with a completion date set for fall 2006.

In this scheme, Moneo aims to connect the various historic buildings surrounding the RISD Center into a unified whole. He faces a similar challenge in his concurrent $45-million renovation and restoration project for Madrid's Prado Museum. After long delays, that endeavor is now set for completion in early 2004.