ArchShowcase 
Sanjay Gangal
Sanjay Gangal is the President of IBSystems, the parent company of AECCafe.com, MCADCafe, EDACafe.Com, GISCafe.Com, and ShareCG.Com. Moody Center for the Arts in Houston, Texas by Michael Maltzan Architecture, IncMay 8th, 2020 by Sanjay Gangal
Article source: Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc The Moody Center for the Arts at Rice University is a state-of-the-art facility dedicated to the advancement of transdisciplinary collaboration between the arts, sciences, and humanities. The two-story, 52,465 square-foot building is designed to create dynamic relationships between the diverse instructional, production, and exhibition spaces. The first floor includes a 150-seat Studio Theater, the Skylight Gallery, Central Gallery, Entry Gallery, and two Media Arts Galleries. Interdisciplinary maker labs including a wood shop, metal shop, paint booth, rapid prototyping areas, and a student classroom are dispersed on the ground floor. On the building’s primary facade is a large projection wall that brings the art outside. The second floor features a breakout study area, three classrooms, a large studio, an artist’s studio, a technology lending library, audiovisual editing booths, and a café that bridges the public spaces of the ground level.  Image Courtesy © Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc
 Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan
 Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan  Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan At the heart of the building is a double-height space that anchors the building in plan and section. Imagined as a kind of interior quad, this flexible studio echoes the numerous quadrangles found across the university campus. The interior of the building prioritizes transparency, circulation, and campus connections. Sightlines transect through spaces within and beyond the building, creating layered views of the activities across production, instruction, and exhibition spaces. Simultaneously, views extend outward along major corridors to the campus, enabling building users to easily orient themselves. Extensive interior glazing offers views into learning, production, and exhibition spaces, highlighting artistic process as a complement to the exhibition of finished works. A wide stair rises from the first floor and turns back toward the building’s interior at the northern end of the creative open studio. The stairs create an amphitheater that serves as an informal social space and connects the various adjacent program areas in section.  Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan  Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan The emphasis on transparency and circulation extends to the building’s exterior, with most of the building’s first floor along the principal elevations clad in floor-to-ceiling glass. Arcades created by the second floor’s cantilevered massing create shaded walkways, with the overall effect of the building’s brick-clad upper story appearing to levitate. Large picture windows punctuate the articulated brick facade in a playful rhythm and bring light deep into the interior spaces. These design elements create an iconic place in the spirit of the building’s forward-looking vision that is equally at home within the historic campus. Many of the Moody’s design elements reinterpret characteristics of the university’s historic buildings. For instance, the exterior cladding is a manganese ironspot brick that shifts colors by reflecting the area’s environmental conditions. At times, the brick may take on a black, purple, silver, or pink hue unlike traditional bricks on campus.  Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan  Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan  Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan  Image Courtesy © Iwan Baan  Image Courtesy © Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc  Image Courtesy © Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc  Image Courtesy © Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc  Image Courtesy © Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc  Image Courtesy © Michael Maltzan Architecture, Inc
Categories: Art Center, Art Studio, Theater, University |
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