Whitney cancels expansion plans - Artworld - Brief Article

New York's Whitney Museum of American Art has joined the growing list of museums around the country that have postponed or canceled construction projects due to the economic downturn. Two years ago, the Whitney hired prominent Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas to design a $200-million expansion. The most recent scheme involved the construction of a new nine-story building on a site next to the existing Marcel Breuer building, where four brownstones now stand. An earlier, more ambitious plan called for the transformation of the brownstones into gallery space, with a new 11-story building situated behind them. Museum director Maxwell Anderson told the New York Times that the museum is not in a position to proceed with the expansion and is now focusing on building its endowment, which currently stands at $45 million. Another Koolhaas-designed museum project was canceled in December when the Los Angeles County Museum of Art announced that it was shelving plans for a major redesign of its complex [see "Front Page," Feb. '02].

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