Friday Likes BY Armin

Friday Likes 47

From Germany to Hungary to Singapore, a lot of good thinking in this edition of Friday Likes.

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Opinion BY Armin

W FTW (for the Whitney)

Established in 1930, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York is devoted to the art of the United States presenting a “full range of twentieth-century and contemporary American art, with a special focus on works by living artists.” Its permanent collection contains approximately 19,000 paintings, sculptures, prints, drawings, and photographs, representing more than 2,900 artists and is considered one of the finest in the world. Currently located on Madison Avenue at 75th Street since 1966, the Whitney will move to a Renzo Piano-designed building dozens of blocks south in the Meatpacking District facing the popular High Line in 2015. In preparation for this move, the museum has introduced a new identity designed by Amsterdam-based Experimental Jetset.

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Opinion BY Armin

Destination: Corner of Stuff and Stuff

In 2005, the MoMA Design Store launched the first of its Destination: Design series that brings products from different cities and countries from around the world to the museum’s store. The project has a couple of benefits: a) more cool stuff to buy at MoMA and b) exposure for local artists who may not otherwise get a chance to sell their work at such large scale. So far, the series has brought products from Finland, Denmark, Buenos Aires, Berlin, Japan, Seoul, Brazil, Portugal, Istanbul, and Mexico. Its latest edition is Destination: NYC, a collection with approximately 200 lifestyle products including home accessories, furniture, paper goods and jewelry — all products are manufactured in the U.S.. Each edition in the series has had its own identity, sometimes designed in-house at MoMA, others in collaboration. This one was designed with the School of Visual Arts Masters in Branding Program under the guidance of Mark Kingsley, who also wrote advertising headlines and copy, designed window and store displays (currently in progress) and product photography.

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A B-Side BY Armin

Musée de la Civilisation

About: (Est. 1984) The Les Musées de la civilisation à Québec (Museum of Civilization of Quebec) is a museum located in Quebec City, Canada. “The Musée de la civilisation links the past, the present and the future. While remaining strongly rooted in the reality of Québec, it projects a new, attentive and dynamic outlook on all of human experience in its whole, and on civilizations from the world over.”

Design by: N/A.

Ed.’s Notes: Charlie Brown called, he wants his sweater stripe back. Kidding aside, decent evolution. Bigger view of the logo and sub-brands as well as introduction video below (or after the jump).

Relevant links: N/A.

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A B-Side BY Armin

The Ringling

About: (Est. 1927) “The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art [now just The Ringling] is the state art museum of Florida, located in Sarasota, Florida.Florida State University assumed governance of the Museum in 2000. [It] offers twenty-one galleries [and] more than 150,000 square feet have been added to the campus, which includes the art museum, circus museum, and Ca’ d’Zan, the Ringlings’ mansion, which has been restored, along with the historic Asolo Theater. New additions to the campus include the Visitor’s Pavilion, the Education, Library, and Conservation Complex, the Tibbals Learning Center complete with a miniature circus, and the Searing Wing, a 30,000-square-foot (2,800 m2) gallery for special exhibitions attached to the art museum.” (Source: Wikipedia)}

Design by: Wordlstudio.

Ed.’s Notes: This is exceedingly lame. Bigger view of the logo and how the logo works as sub-brands below (or after the jump).

Relevant links: Ringling “Our New Brand” page. Arts Sarasota story

Select quote: “The Ringling’s new brand identity captures the richness and diversity of its venues, collections and programs, as well as inspires curiosity and engagement from its visitors, members and community. It enhances the Ringling’s role as the cultural heart of Sarasota, the State Art Museum of Florida and one of the finest museums in the United States.”

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Opinion BY Armin

Palestine Says

Breaking ground last week and set to open in the Fall of 2014 as a project of the Welfare Association, the Palestinian Museum in Birzeit, Palestine, is “dedicated to the exploration and understanding of the culture, history and society of Palestine and the Palestinian people.” Along with exhibits, the museum will engage in research, education programs, and cultural events through its hub in Birzeit as well as through local and international partnerships and its digital platform. The museum’s identity has been designed by London-based venturethree. An extended brochure can be found here (PDF).

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Friday Likes BY Armin

Friday Likes 39

After a two-week hiatus, Friday Likes are back with colorful, somewhat colorful, and almost not colorful at all projects.

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Opinion BY Armin

ROM goes Portal on its Logo

Opened in 1914, the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM), an agency of the Government of Ontario, is Canada’s largest museum, with a dual focus on natural history and world cultures, attracting over one million visitors each year to its 30 galleries and six million objects in its collection. The museum is also well-known (and easily spotted) for its Daniel Libeskind-designed addition in 2007 that was part of an initiative dubbed “Renaissance ROM” for which the previous logo was designed. This week ROM introduced a new logo designed by New York, NY-based LaPlaca Cohen. (For a Government-owned museum, you know how much grief they must be getting for hiring Yanks.)

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Friday Likes BY Armin

Friday Likes 32

A burger, a shawl, and a construction company walk into a bar. They end up on Friday Likes. (Man, I need to work on my Friday Like intros a little harder).

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Opinion BY Armin

Typographic Tolerance

Inaugurated this November, the Jewish Museum & Tolerance Center is a 27,000-square-foot, state of the art, 50-million-dollar museum in Moscow, becoming one of the world’s largest museums to chronicle the history of the Jewish people and Israel. Housed in the Bakhmetevsky Bus Garage, the museum’s design was conceived by New York, NY-based Ralph Appelbaum and Associates and features interactive tables, hologram projections, and even a recreation of a Shtetl (small areas within a city with lots and lots and lots of Jews). The identity has been designed by Moscow-based Fleve.

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Opinion BY Armin

Architecture Museum at the Edge of the Edge

Set to open in June of 2013 in the rising city of Nanjing (pop. 6.5 million) in China, the Sifang Art Museum will be a 30,000-square-foot space devoted to contemporary design and architecture. Designed by Steven Holl, the museum is part of the Contemporary International Practical Exhibition of Architecture, a privately financed project that will also include a convention center and 20 villas each with a unique design by architects like Ai Weiwei and David Adjaye. The new identity of the museum has been designed by Singapore-based Foreign Policy Design Group.

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Opinion BY Armin

Museums that Weave Together, Stay Together

Established in 1906, the American Alliance of Museums (formerly the American Association of Museums) is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to “nurture excellence in museums through advocacy and service.” By developing standards and best practices, providing resources and career development, and advocating for museums to thrive the American Alliance of Museums (AAM) supports 21,000 cultural institutions — from art, history, and science museums to zoos, aquariums, and historic sites — and individuals — from directors to curators to registrars. This month AAM introduced its new name, to reinforce the notion of alliance, and a new identity designed by Portland, OR-based Satori Engine.

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Opinion BY Armin

Follow-up: Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam

In May we reported on the redesign of the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam identity by Mevis & Van Deursen that I described with zingers like “To call it a Type 101 exercise would be advanced” and placing its “concept and execution at the lowest end of the scale.” The comments raged on 200-plus strong and many came to the logo’s defense. I admit that it was one of the few times where I really felt that I got my impression and review wrong. That I was being obtuse. But every time I look at that logo I still see nothing that makes me want to like it on its own — now there is a little more graphic context to the logo thanks to a video posted by the Stedelijk, and shown below (or after the jump) where we see more of the application and hear from its designers.

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Opinion BY Christian Palino

Perot Museum Hoists Brackets

Established in 2006 in Dallas, TX, the Museum of Nature & Science is the sum of The Dallas Museum of Natural History, The Science Place, and the Dallas Children’s Museum that came together that year. In January of 2013, the museum will be relocated to a new building and be renamed as the Perot Museum of Nature and Science. The new identity, inspired by Morphosis Architects’ cube-shaped building, was designed by Pentagram partners DJ Stout and Michael Bierut.

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Opinion BY Armin

Boom goes the Sans

Established in 1800, the Rijksmuseum (State Museum in English) in Amsterdam is home to more than 900,000 items in its collection, including a large amount of masterpieces from the Dutch Golden Age from artists like Rembrandt, Vermeer, and Hals. Housed in an 1827 building, the Rijksmuseum has been under renovation since 2003 and next year will see its reopening with a design by Spanish architects Cruz y Ortiz. Yesterday, Rijksmuseum introduced their new logo and identity, designed by Irma Boom with custom lettering by Paul van der Laan of Bold Monday, replacing the 32-year-old logo designed by Studio Dumbar.

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Opinion BY Armin

Here’s Looking at You, P

Housed in a 1926 Italian Renaissance-style villa built for oilman Waite Phillips in 23 acres of land and gifted to city of Tulsa, OK, in 1938, the Philbrook Museum of Art is home to an expansive collection of everything from Native American to African to Asian to European to contemporary art. In 2013, the Philbrook will open a new location to complement the villa in the historic downtown Brady District, a growing arts area in Tulsa. The new identity, which is inspired by the two locations, has been designed by Pentagram partner Michael Bierut in collaboration with partner Eddie Opara, who designed the website.

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Friday Likes BY Armin

Friday Likes 14

No real home runs, hat tricks, or 360 slam dunks this week. Just a few quirky and unexpected projects: New Ukrainian kids television channel, Italian food packaging in Australia, and military vehicle museum in Moscow.

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Opinion BY Armin

Stedelijk Museum Spells Out the Obvious

Established in 1895, the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (“Municipal Museum Amsterdam”) is a museum for classic modern art, contemporary art, and design in Amsterdam. Currently closed, until September of this year, for a major renovation and expansion by Mels Crouwel of Benthem Crouwel Architects that will adapt the 117-year-old building with a new structure, the Stedelijk will be able to showcase its permanent collection that includes works by Vincent van Gogh, Wassily Kandinsky, Marc Chagall, Henri Matisse, Piet Mondrian, and Jackson Pollock, among others. In late April the museum announced a new logo, designed by the website-less Mevis & Van Deursen, and was immediately met with discontent, gathering more than 300 comments in this Facebook post. Not much other information has been released.

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A B-Side BY Armin

Guggenheim UBS MAP Global Art Initiative

Launched this month, the Guggenheim UBS MAP Global Art Initiative is “an ambitious five-year collaboration to chart creative activity and contemporary art from around the world,” specifically South and Southeast Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East and North Africa. London-based johnsonbanks created the identity for the initiative, which had a tough challenge: “Our design task was then to create a design system that would accommodate both the world-famous museum brand and its equally famous sponsor, without being able to use any actual art, since the curation process is only just beginning.” See the full result here. A couple of images below (or after the jump).

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A B-Side BY Armin

Children’s Museum of the Arts

Founded in 1988, the Children’s Museum of the Arts (CMA) in New York provides exhibits, classes, and other programs. Late last year, with the move to a new space, CMA introduced a new logo designed by Base. Bigger view and different logo iterations below (or after the jump).

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Opinion BY Armin

Qagoma

Established in 1895, The Queensland Art Gallery in Australia is one of the leading visual arts institutions in the country with more than 14,000 Australian and international paintings, sculptures, decorative art objects, multimedia installations, and works on paper. In 2006, the Gallery of Modern Art was opened as a sister institution to focus on contemporary work. For a quick distinction the Gallery offers that “the historical (pre-1970) collections are displayed at the Queensland Art Gallery, while the contemporary collections (1970 onwards) are displayed at the Gallery of Modern Art.” This month the “Queensland Art Gallery|Gallery of Modern Art”, a mouthful, has been rebranded as QAGOMA an abbreviated abbreviation of QAG and GOMA, with a new identity by Interbrand Australia.

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Opinion BY Armin

The Dot Marks the Spot

Established in 1838, the Centraal Museum in Utrecht is the oldest municipal museum in the Netherlands with an eclectic collection of old and new items — nearly 50,000 — ranging from 18th century fashion to an early twentieth-century ship stored in the basement to a special collection and wing on the work of Dick Bruna, creator of the adorable Miffy. At the end of last year the Centraal Museum introduced a new identity, designed by Amsterdam-based Lesley Moore.

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A B-Side BY Armin

Arkansas Museum of Discovery

The Arkansas Museum of Discovery (named in 1997) in Little Rock, AR dates as far back as 1927 when it was known as The Arkansas Museum of Natural History and Antiquities. The Museum of Discovery is moving to a new building and they have introduced a new logo designed by local firm Stone Ward. Logo announcement here.

Thanks to Zac Cosner for the tip.

Opinion BY Armin

P is for Window

Established in 1892, the Portland Art Museum is the seventh oldest museum in the United States and the oldest in the Pacific Northwest. The museum houses more than 42,000 objects that span American, Asian, Modern and Contemporary, and Native American Arts, as well as photography and silver. In September the Portland Art Museum introduced a new identity designed by Portland-based Ziba.

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Announcement BY Armin

Graphic Design: Now in Production

This Saturday, October 22, the Walker Art Center will open Graphic Design: Now in Production (GD:NIP), a joint exhibition with the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum. This is the first major exhibition on the field of graphic design since the Walker’s seminal 1989 exhibition Graphic Design in America: A Visual Language History curated by Mildred Friedman and the Cooper-Hewitt’s 1996 survey Mixing Messages: Graphic Design in Contemporary Culture, curated by Ellen Lupton. For GD:NIP the Walker’s Andrew Blauvelt and the Cooper-Hewitt’s Ellen Lupton have teamed up to showcase the current state of graphic design: “Expanding from a specialized profession to a widely deployed tool. With the rise of user-generated content and new creative software, along with innovations in publishing and distribution systems, people outside the field are mobilizing the techniques and processes of design to create and publish visual media.” Brand New is honored to be part of this exhibition in a number of ways.

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Opinion BY Armin

War! What is it good for? For Good Logos

Founded in 1917 and first opened to the public in 1920, the Imperial War Museum — no plural at the time — was established to create a record of the experience of Great Britain during the first World War. Since then, and with an expansion to four other museums — IWM London; IWM North in Trafford, Greater Manchester; IWM Duxford near Cambridge; the Churchill War Rooms in Whitehall, London; and the historic ship HMS Belfast — the Imperial War Museums (IWM) is “the world’s leading authority on conflict and its impact, focusing on Britain, its former Empire and the Commonwealth, from the First World War to the present.” IWM, as it is now officially named, introduced a new identity last month, designed by London-based Hat Trick.

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Opinion BY Armin

Asian Art Museum Turned on its Head

First opened in 1966 as a wing of the M.H. de Young Memorial Museum in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, the Asian Art Museum, now in its own building, is currently one of the largest museums in the Western world devoted exclusively to Asian Art, housing a collection of over 17,000 artworks. It was also one of the most financially troubled museums in the Western world devoted exclusively to Asian Art with a $120 million debt, which was recently announced would be solved, setting the museum up for a much needed reinvention: “Our new brand,” explains Jay Xu, Director of the Asian Art Museum “promises to awaken the past and inspire the next. It means we’ll unlock the past for visitors and bring it to life by sparking connections. We’ll also be a catalyst for new art, new creativity and new thinking.” To help turn things around, literally, the Asian Art Museum worked with Wolff Olins to design its new identity.

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A B-Side BY Armin

National Railway Museum

Opened in 1975, the National Railway Museum features “over 300 years of railway history and its collections include over 100 locomotives, some 250 items of rolling stock and thousands of other objects — from posters and tickets to uniforms and silverware.” It has two locations in the UK, one in York and the other in Shildon. The new identity was designed by Thompson Brand Partners. Creative Review has a bit more story and images.

Thanks to Cody Pate for the tip.

Opinion BY Armin

Speech Bubbles Up from Down Under

Officially formed in 1980 but only opened in 2001, the National Museum of Australia (NMA) “explores the land, nation and people of Australia. The Museum celebrates Australian social history in a unique way by revealing the stories of ordinary and extraordinary Australians.” The NMA is located in Canberra, the national capital of Australia, and is housed in an enthusiastically designed building by Ashton Raggatt McDougall that lives in a picturesque peninsula. The museum recently introduced a new identity designed by Sydney-based Gen.a.

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Opinion BY Armin

Splashy Museum

Established in 1937, the National Maritime Museum (NMN) in Greenwich, England is one of the largest museums in the world on this theme and one of the most popular attractions in the UK. Along with the NMN sit the The Royal Observatory, which happens to the epicenter of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), and The Queen’s House, the birthplace of British architectural Classicism. Today, NMN is launching a new identity for all of its attractions, designed by London-based Someone.

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Guest Opinion by Joshua Levi Posted BY Brand New

Forward-Looking Image

When I was a kid, my family and I would see shows at our town’s golden era movie house. It was a small, second-run theater. Its rich decor and the perpetual smell of popcorn oozed of the past in this kind of magical way. My favorite visit was to see Back to the Future. I can remember the juxtaposition of an art deco theater and a time-traveling Delorean like it was yesterday. I was taken back to that moment earlier this year, and again last week, walking around the Museum of Moving Image (MoMI) in New York with a new expansion designed by Leeser Architecture and new identity and signage designed by karlssonwilker. While this project is a few months old, there is not much information out there about it, so I decided to do some digging and gather some of the loose images on this project, most found on this Flickr set by Archidose and this Facebook album from karlssonwilker.

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Opinion BY Armin

Van Gogh’s Brush Strokes

Established in 1973 in Amsterdam, the Van Gogh Museum holds over 200 paintings as well as drawings and letters of Vincent van Gogh. More than 1.5 million people visit every year, making it the most visited museum in the Netherlands and, according to research by The Art Newspaper, it is the 23rd most visited museum in the world. Earlier this month the museum introduced a new identity designed by Amsterdam-based Koeweiden Postma.

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Opinion BY Armin

D is for Design and Dots

Established in 2010, Design Museum Boston (DMB) is a nonprofit organization that “envisions creative, engaging public art and design education for Boston and New England.” Without its own physical space DMB is a nomadic museum — or what they call a “decentralized network of physical and virtual exhibits” — bringing different programming and experiences to galleries, retail environments, and public spaces. Back in January — sorry, sometimes we are out of the loop on things — DMB introduced a new identity designed by Continuum and, to many people’s amusement, the design process was thoroughly documented on Core77: Here is a list of posts from nine weeks worth of work and, a highlight from week 5, here are the design concepts shown.

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Opinion BY Armin

Deconstructing CAMH’s Building

Founded in 1948, the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston (CAMH) is a “non-collecting institution dedicated to presenting the best and most exciting international, national, and regional art.” Located in Houston’s museum district, CAMH is housed in a very unconventional building — especially for Houston architecture standards — designed by architect Gunnar Birkerts. Viewed from the top, the building’s North and South walls are parallel to the street while the West and East walls are angled at 45 degrees. Viewed at street level, the building has a subtle but noticeable slant. It’s on these physical attributes (as well as an odd triangle shape that sits on top of the entrance) that CAMH has introduced a new logo and identity designed by New York-based AHL&CO.

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Opinion BY Clinton Duncan

Typography: Where East Meets West

Mathaf, Arab Museum of Modern Art (pronounced mat-haf) is a new modern art museum in Doha, Qatar. Its mission is to showcase modern and contemporary art from the region, shifting existing perceptions of arts practice in the Arab world, and provide a forum for dialogue and scholarship. An existing building, in the traditional style, was redesigned by French architect Jean-François Bodin and the new branding was handled by the Dubai office of Wolff Olins with two custom typefaces, one by Tarek Atrissi Design and another by Pascal Zoghbi from 29ArabicLetters.

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Opinion BY Clinton Duncan

Living Art

SECCA, or the South Eastern Centre Contemporary Art, is a contemporary art centre in North Carolina. Originally founded in 1956, the organization really got going in 1976 thanks to a philanthropic bequest of industrialist James G Hines’s 32-acre estate. In 2010, after an extensive renovation, they turned to Pentagram partner Luke Hayman for a new visual identity to compliment their shiny, newly updated art space.

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