Following Delays, Menil Drawing Institute to Open in November

The Menil Drawing Institute in Houston has announced that it will finally open its doors on November 3. The brand new $40 million facility was supposed to welcome guests months sooner, but was forced to postpone its opening date due to the need for additional construction work.

Billed as the first freestanding facility built expressly for the acquisition, exhibition, study, conservation, and storage of modern and contemporary drawings, the 30,000-square-foot building will be inaugurated with “The Condition of Being Here: Drawings by Jasper Johns,” an exhibition spanning the artist’s career.

The Menil Drawing Institute has been a program of the Menil since 2008, organizing major traveling exhibitions and undertaking scholarly projects including the catalogue raisonné of the drawings of Jasper Johns, to be published when the exhibit dedicated to the artist begins in November. Designed by the Los Angeles-based firm of Johnston Marklee with the collaboration of landscape architects Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, the institute will be the fifth art building on the Menil’s 30-acre campus.

“Situated in the center of our neighborhood, the Menil Drawing Institute offers a deeply thoughtful, highly personal window into the practice of drawing, which we hope will intrigue and inspire all who visit,” said Menil director Rebecca Rabinow.

Let's block ads! (Why?)