With a plea to "please save Modernism," architect and professor David Heymann is the latest to tackle the issue of the former American Folk Art Museum on 53rd Street, which MoMA bought several years ago and plans to tear down as part of its expansion plan. Bloomberg's James Russell and several others have sounded off against the sculpted-bronze-facaded structure's demolition, and Heymann adds his voice to the fray. "What is primarily consequent about the AFAM?what makes it Modernist, and what makes it great?is its impulse to upend an existing architectural norm," he writes. For one thing, the building is a narrow lot on a side street, yet architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien managed to incorporate a big vertical court as well as lots of natural light that enters in unconventional ways. [Places; previously]
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