Los Angeles art collector and philanthropist Eli Broad has unveiled his proposal for a new museum in a ceremony in downtown Los Angeles. The new building, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro,will occupy one of L.A's controversial sites on Grand Street, next door to Frank Gehry's Disney Hall opened in 2003. The street has evolved from Victorian houses to the late 1980s chain of cultural monuments, institutions and corporate fortresses against the Latino community a few blocks down, emblem of the city's social polarization.* Mr. Broad has been a longtime supporter of cultural institutions in Los Angeles, sponsoring the $50 million Contemporary Museum addition to the Los Angeles County Museumthat holds his name and is designed by Renzo Piano, as well as having been the founding chairman of theMuseum of Contemporary Art LA (MOCA LA). Critics agree that the new buildingwill bring a nice contrast to the ¿exuberance¿* of Gehry's Walt Disney Concert Hall,in addition to breaking the pre existing barriers by having its two corner entrances overlooking both the cultural institutions and the Latino shoppingstripalong Broadway. The building designs presented are currently online at the architect¿s website and show 3D renderings of some interesting features, such as a porous and sequenced exterior covering a 35,000 square foot column-free gallery space, an art storage floor, ground floor and three levels of parking. For more information visit
www.dsrny.com *"Not All Sweetness in a Honeycomb Museum," Nicolai Ouroussoff, New York Times Architecture review. Jan 11, 2011.