The Advocate’s cover story for August features architects in front of neighborhood places they find inspiring. There were a few portraits that didn’t make it into the magazine because of circumstance. Marc McCollom, one of the featured architects and a Lakewood local, was originally photographed in another Dallas space.
To get his take on Dallas Museum of Art’s Sculpture Garden and James Turrell’s "Tending (Blue)", hit the jump.
McCollom says of DMA’s Outdoor Sculpture Center (pictured):
“With its intermingling of fountains and artwork under a canopy of live oaks, the sculpture garden is a true urban oasis. Surprisingly quiet, the outdoor rooms are generously scaled and are one of the few public spaces in Dallas where lingering is encouraged. Because the sculptures are outside, they are a little less precious — you can get closer and touch and literally get inside some of them, providing a rich material and spatial experience.”
Of all the architects I talked to for the story, McCollom had to have been the most patient. I interviewed him a total of three times because, while the DMA Sculpture Center was his first photoshoot, his first choice for inspiring place was James Turrell’s "Tending (Blue)" inside the Nasher Sculpture Center. Unfortunately we couldn’t get permission to shoot inside "Tending (Blue)", but his description of just a single detail of the piece marks McCollom as a true architect:
"The purpose of the space is to emphasize and enable one to connect with the sky. The fact that the sky is literally present at that ceiling plane is what is so powerful … how the ceiling simply stops in a crisp, clean line and the sky starts right next to it; they both seem equally present."
