PRA2

  PRA2 is my architecture final thesis at the ETSAB. I graduated second of that term and went to Madrid with my project under my arm to show it to Miguel Zugaza (director of the Prado at the time), to Rafael Moneo (architect of the Prado extension I was critiquing) and Manolo Borja, who was too busy for a simple student like me (unlike the other two), so he sent me the programming guy at the Reina Sofia to listen to my ideas...

  The sweeter and more enthusiastic of them all was Zugaza, the director of the Prado :)) (such a relief). Moneo refused to even look at my project, but he was very nice, and we chat for 20min in his office. He just refused to look at it :)))) Jesus Carrillo of the Reina Sofia was polite but not too curious.

  But why choose the Prado for my thesis?

  First of all, because I saw it as maybe the only opportunity I will ever have to spend so much time thinking and working in such an amazing cultural institution.

Second because after more than 20 years making international competitions and thinking about this very much needed extension to the Museum, they finally chose the architect from Madrid (a political decision more than architectural) who made a very questionable project, which does not solve any of the soaring congestion problems the museum has and looked to relief with a couple of international competitions. Why all this for ending up with Moneo??

  But I also wanted to use this opportunity to work on a world class museum, to address issues that are present in many art institutions worldwide nowadays, as the exploding tourist economy brings new numbers to cultural institutions, who now try to compete with the entertainment culture. How to manage this while maintaining cultural and artistic high standards, is the main issue many cultural institutions face today.

  The Prado Museum is a good example, due to its small size but outstanding collection. Before Moneo´s extension there was not even a bar where to have coffee. The lines for special exhibitions went around the block (summer and winter) and merchandising shops (which bring so much money to museums) didn´t even exist inside the building. So, an extension was overdue...

  Moneo´s project has too much program for its small size, and you end up with a small temporary gallery, a small auditorium (there was none before), a small cafeteria, a small bookshop and small everything... The worse is entering through to Moneo´s new entrance in the back and small the roast beef of the cafeteria.

  The most interesting part of Moneo´s building is the conservatory and restauration restricted areas (visible in some parts of the visit), where the Museum becomes a richer place, for paintings to be seen but also restored. Diller & Scofidio put a similar space in their Broad Museum entrance in LA few years later, and as you go up the stairs you can also see some restauration rooms. Of course, in the Prado Museum, with its historical collections, is feels very natural. At the Broad it´s a bit like a gimmick, (unless they need to restore the Jeff Koons´ rich drunk collectors break at Art Fairs 😊).

 But the congestion problems remained exactly the same. Also by locating the extension behind the main building, it kind of unbalanced the whole to the back, and away from the Paseo and the city center.

Our Pra2 aims at doing the contrary and appropriate the paseo inside our premises.

  I strongly thought another extension was needed to address more pressing issues regarding the public and its experience, as well as the collection itself, mostly in storage.

  The Villanueva building is very small if you think about the impressive collection the museum has. One of the biggest painting collections in the world, with 27.509 objects, of which 7.825 are paintings. Only 900 hundred (of extreme quality of course) were exhibited when Moneo opened his extension.

  I am glad to read that in 2011 (after my visit with the Pra2 in 2008 to the Museum 😊) the rooms got reorganized to house 300 more works. Which does not change that much in terms of public experience… More paintings too see, in the same conditions.

  The Schaulager, recently built by Herzog & deMeuron at the time I was thinking of all this, gave me the idea to use the art in storage as a way to rethink the programing of the Prado.

  At that time, and probably still, the storage of the Prado Museum was in a series of separate buildings in the area, but not connected to the Museum.

  Why if we brought the storage to the Museum? We could think in terms of the Schaulager and its open storage building with temporary exhibitions. And this idea of the Open Storage started to simmer.

  At the same time, there was little you could do to the original building. In fact, you do not want to touch it. It is perfect as it is. Moneo saw it too. But given the massive tourist attraction the museum is, we need way more space for people.

  One of the main problems in the way many museums function, is its limited and poor way of experiencing the Art:

One single Entrance - One single ticket - One single choice: Permanent or Temporary – for EVERYBODY. And we are all different.

Some new museum extensions in the world (a trend after the Guggenheim effect) have more bars, restaurants, shops, resting areas, event spaces, auditoriums, performance spaces, screening rooms, etc… MoMA, the expansion queen, for example, has a lot of different new spaces, also due to its multidepartment structure. But it has definitely been a case study for me. The movie screenings, conferences, educational programs, etc work very well there.

  MoMA also has member hours, special visits and tries to diversify the experience a little more. But they´ve also had a lot of growing going on… Opportunities to keep rethinking their mission.

  The richness of any Museum lays on the diversity of options for each different person who wants to go there. People are different (age, culture, interests, education, preparation, relation to the city, etc) and so are their expectations and what they want from a museum.

With such a historical collection, one would think that the Prado should devote more space to scholars and professionals. But for your average tourist, aren´t they other ways in which he could experience better, or different these masterworks than strolling infinite corridors? And for Madrileans? Could the Museum be part of their everyday life instead of the main touristic destination of your city? Look at MoMA, it is the pride of New Yorkers.

  So bringing the storage to the museum in a separate building (but connected) and using this storage to create new and more diversified programming became the starting point for the project.

  Below ground is the ideal place to store anything that needs climate control, and so we devised a huge bar facing the old building with storage underground and new public programs above ground. Our extension does not have one new single traditional gallery space.

  Another guiding idea was the experience of art. How to really enjoy it without having what Amy Whitaker called “Museum Legs”. The original owners of these paintings enjoyed them in the privacy of their homes. They were made to ornate their bedrooms and living rooms, bringing refinement and sensibility to their daily lives.

  Couldn´t we invent new ways of showing art that would be more integrated with our daily life experience?

  The HOTEL came first. I don´t know if I saw Hirschorn HOTEL DEMOCRACY before or after, but it is what the Pra2 Hotel is about: SLEEP WITH THE PAINTING.

Not only the kings and queens can sleep today with a Goya (under glass) but guests of the Pra2 Hotel can choose à la carte, a painting they would love to spend a time with. A much more intimate experience.  

If that proved too complicated logistically, the hotel could be a temporary exhibition space, where a curator could curate the rooms according to any theme.

  The RESTAURANT on the top floor, with a huge terrace overlooking the city and the museum would function as another temporary exhibition space. EATING WITH GREAT ART from the Prado, would make it a destination for Spanish as much as for tourists I believe. A business lunch, a birthday celebration, a special date, while experiencing this sublimation of the sense. It really is great to live with art, and I find it nice to let everybody have this experience, while these masterworks are seen and loved by people, instead of rotting in dark forgotten rooms. And curators could have the most fun curating for these situations. I already see myself eating with Zurbaran´s natures mortes with food 😊

The terrace could host parties and celebrations as the MoMA patio does. Such a new set of first class cultural premises for Madrid. Such a waste not using it !

   Another bar and the bookstore in the ground floor, and a hotel restaurant in a mezzanine (with no paintings) will function as more traditional commercial spaces, which right now are nonexistent in the Paseo del Prado. Thus, feeding the city and its inhabitants who are maybe not going to the museum but are just walking the boulevard which connects the “Golden Triangle” (as they call it) of the city.  

  We hope it will become a pole for Madrid, not only for tourism, but its citizens as well.

  In other to foster Spanish culture, research and international connectivity with other institutions, another big chunk of the program goes to the professional and scholar sectors. The storage space below ground is an OPEN STORAGE, with rooms for classes and small conferences, facilitating the study of the artists and the objects in the collection, which can be pulled off easily and studied in the premises.

  Above ground will be a mediateque and a library, for less professional people - individuals who want to learn more and expand their education. Classrooms for painting, or art history, etc

  A lounge with wi-fi to stop and to relax from the visit, destined for those Museum Legs who are renting a cheap hotel in Madrid but need a break in their day, will also encourage mingling and life at the museum. Free access to these facilities with the museum entrance will encourage them to spend more time overall if they can rest comfortably and pause throughout their visit.

  Maybe I am not being realistic in the current museum culture who wants people to walk as fast as possible and come and go fast. Here we are not concerned with microeconomics but with museum experience and art enjoyment for all.

  We want them to stay long and have a great time 😊

  At last, to connect the old building with the bar of new public programing and storage, we create a huge event´s space underground - the missing piece in such a great cultural institution. This huge underground area, during the day, acts as another outdoor space, opening at the ceiling and connecting the two levels (above and underground).

It functions as entry of light and air for all the Open Storage and the educational sides and individual media rooms; and as the plaza for the underground, so when you come from the old building to it, it feels almost like an urban environment, as you arrive to the balconies.

 Basically, this project of ideas tries to enrich our experience when going to museums of this size. We are all different and we need different experiences out of a same institution.

  Tourism is but one of the publics who goes (or could go) to our museums. Like Dan Graham I love museums. I have learnt so much in them, they are so important for the strength of societies and they are becoming such an integral part of mass culture, and such an opportunity to learn for so many people, that we should try to think a bit more intelligently about them, about what we can use them for, other than to make money and get as much people in as we can.

  They are the repository of who we are as a culture and how we think in each period of history, and of the beauty humanity is capable of when we are not killing each other.

With so many people going to museums we are giving people a great opportunity (if they have the interest) to become a better version of themselves, which education always fosters (not commerce). Art and culture make better human beings (not money), and we should all have the best opportunities to learn from them.

I know it happened to me!