ACCORDING TO STEVEN Holl, there are three types of museums: the ‘white box that sucks the life out of art’, the ‘overly expressive museum’ which upstages the art, and – somewhere in between – the quiet yet transformative museum. ‘We work on the third type, which brings the user through because there’s a general spatial energy,’ says Holl, noting a marked reticence to tilted walls and extravagant settings that often detract from the art. The American architect’s considerate approach for cultural buildings comes from a long line of collaborations with a who’s who of artists, such as Walter De Maria, Richard Nonas and James Turrell.

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His latest home for the arts, the Nancy and Rich Kinder Building

for the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston (MFAH), is the pi.ce de

r.sistance of a masterplan Holl envisioned for the museum’s 5.7ha

campus eight years ago. With its translucent glass skin, reflecting

pools and fluid interiors, the building is also a reflection of Holl’s

signature concepts of porosity, light and spatial choreography.

The 15,000 sq m Kinder Building is dedicated to works from

MFAH’s international collection of modern and contemporary art.

Opening on 21 November 2020, it joins an array of buildings across

the museum campus: the two main gallery buildings – the 1920s...

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