Artist's rendering of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art. (MDC Partners)

by Frank Gehry

The recent outpouring of negative sentiment in Chicago against MAD Architects' proposal for George Lucas' lakefront museum is troubling to read.

Chicago is a great city for architecture and has historically supported innovative, forward-looking work. There is a natural impulse to deride a project in the early stages of design, particularly one that has a new shape or expression.

This is not a new concept.

The Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, the Eiffel Tower in Paris and even the Monadnock Building in Chicago had many early critics. In my own experience, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles was called broken crockery when I first went public with it, and that was the nicest thing that got said. In Bilbao, the newspapers had an article asking for the architect of the museum to be killed — that was me! All of these projects have gone on to be great assets to their mutual cities, and I think the same will be true of the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art and Chicago......Continue Reading

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