It was a little more than a decade ago, in 1984, that the Museum of Modern Art completed its last major expansion. That effort lasted nearly four years, during most of which time the museum was closed or nearly so, with only a token representation of its permanent collection being accessible to the public. The result of this massive expansion was, as we noted at the time, a museum designed “for a public nurtured on blockbuster exhibitions--exhibitions that are as much media events as they are art events, and that have the inevitable effect of arousing, by means of high intensity publicity campaigns, the kind of interest which art in and of itself can probably never fully satisfy.” Hence the prevalence of the museum-as-department-store design, above all the exposed escalators to handle the greatly increased crowds attracted as much by MOMA’s restaurant and atrium as by its collection.

Now MOMA is about to embark on another major expans ...

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