一間美術館 改寫城市命運
摘錄自：天下雜誌 經濟學人電子報 2013/12/27
2013-12-26 Web only 作者：經濟學人
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| 圖片來源：flickr.com/photos/aon/ |
麥肯錫最近的報告指出，一座城市想要成功，除了要有綠地、為城市生活帶來活力的移民之外，還要有繁榮的文化產業。位於西班牙北部的畢爾包古根漢美術館於1997年開幕，它證明了由市長推動、設計充滿想像力的美術館，真的可以扭轉一座城市的命運。
古根漢美術館開幕頭3年，遊客為地方政府帶來超過1億歐元的稅收，回收建築成本綽綽有餘。去年，超過100萬人造訪古根漢，至少半數來自國外；雖然古根漢的收藏品並不是非常驚人，它還是有辦法吸引遊客。其他沒有歷史級文化中心的城市，現在都將畢爾包視為模範。
AEA顧問公司指出，接下來10年，世界各地將有超過20間以博物館為主軸的文化中心動工，總成本預估為2,500億美元。其中最受人關注的，就是阿布達比的薩迪亞特島，以及香港的西九文化區。西九文化區的新博物館為M+博物館；M+透過購買和捐贈取得了大量中國當代藝術品，雖然距離開幕尚有4年，但M+已可望名列亞洲重要博物館之林。
沙烏地阿拉伯（麥加）、澳洲（伯斯）、阿爾巴尼亞（地拉那）、巴西（貝洛奧里藏特）也都有建立新文化樞紐的計畫。明年，位於烏克蘭基輔的前軍火庫區（Mystetskyi Arsenal）將全面開幕；前軍火庫區擁有5萬平方公尺的展覽空間，為全歐最大的博物館。
貝洛奧里藏特位於巴西東南，為距離知名藝術和雕塑公園伊紐罄（Inhotim）最近的城鎮。伊紐罄成立於1980年代，擁有超過20間美術館和大量藝術作品，現已成為國際級的藝術重鎮，每年擁有超過25萬名遊客。新文化中心會讓貝洛奧里藏特本身也能吸引遊客。
這類文化樞紐必須具備明確的遠見，讓遊客可以一來再來，例如，伯斯的新文化中心己經計畫與孟買、馬斯喀特、阿布達比、奈洛比等地的博物館合作。另一方面，內蒙古的鄂爾多斯博物館則顯示，單只是建造一座美麗的博物館是不夠的；鄂爾多斯博物館本身並沒有收藏品，展覽計畫也非常少，也難怪遊客寥寥可數。對於其他地區即將建造的文化中心來說，那或許是個教訓。（黃維德譯）
©The Economist Newspaper Limited 2013
The Economist
Cultural centres
The Bilbao
effect
By The Economist
From The Economist
Published: December 26, 2013
Dec 21st 2013 | From the print edition
If you build it, will they come?
A THRIVING CULTURAL sector is an essential part of what makes a city
great, along with green spaces and immigrants who bring renewal and vigour to
city life, according to a recent study by McKinsey, a consultancy. The opening
of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao in northern Spain (pictured) in 1997, 20
years after the Pompidou Centre, shows how an imaginatively designed museum
commissioned by an energetic mayor can help turn a city around.
Visitors' spending in Bilbao in the first three years after the museum
opened raised over €100m ($110m) in taxes for the regional government, enough
to recoup the construction costs and leave something over. Last year more than
1m people visited the museum, at least half of them from abroad. This was the
third-highest number ever, so the building continues to attract visitors even
though the collection on display is modest. Other cities without historic
cultural centres now look to Bilbao as a model for what vision and imagination
can achieve.
Over the next decade more than two dozen new cultural centres focused
on museums are due to be built in various countries, at an estimated cost of
$250 billion, according to a study by AEA Consulting, a New York firm that
specialises in cultural projects. Contracts have been signed and concrete is
already being poured on some of them.
The most talked about are Saadiyat Island, a museum complex in Abu
Dhabi that will be home to local offshoots of the Guggenheim and the Louvre,
and the West Kowloon Cultural District in Hong Kong, which will house M+, the
new museum of Chinese contemporary art, Hong Kong's answer to London's Tate
Modern.
M+ has secured two large collections of Chinese contemporary art
through a mixture of gifts and purchases. One is a large holding built up by a
former Swiss ambassador to Beijing, Uli Sigg; the second was accumulated by a
mainland businessman, Guan Yi. The decision to award the 38 pieces to Hong Kong
rather than to a mainland museum ruffled feathers in Beijing. With four years
to go before M+ opens, it is already set to become the leading institution of
its kind in the region.
Plans are also well advanced for new cultural hubs centred on museums
in Saudi Arabia (Mecca), Australia (Perth), Albania (Tirana) and Brazil (Belo Horizonte).
And what will be Europe's largest museum, the Mystetskyi Arsenal, with 50,000
square metres (540,000 sq ft) of exhibition space, is due to open fully in
Kiev, Ukraine, next year.
Belo Horizonte, in south-east Brazil, is the town closest to a remarkable
art and sculpture park known as Inhotim, founded in the 1980s by Bernardo Paz,
a mining magnate. More than 20 galleries are filled with contemporary art, and
hundreds of other works, many of them specially commissioned, are spread across
2,000 hectares of lush parkland. Inhotim has become an international art
destination, with more than a quarter of a million visitors a year. The new
cultural hub will make the city of Belo Horizonte itself part of the draw.
Such cultural hubs need a clear vision of what they can offer if
visitors are to come more than once. The new centre in Perth, an expanded
version of the existing Western Australian Museum, is relaunching itself as the
museum of the Indian Ocean and is already planning exhibitions in collaboration
with museums in Mumbai, Muscat, Abu Dhabi and Nairobi. The Mystetskyi Arsenal
will open next year with a magnificent show by Ukraine's best-known artist,
Kazimir Malevich (1879-1935). But it is not clear how it intends to fill its
vast spaces after that.
The example of the new Ordos Art Museum in Inner Mongolia, beautifully
designed by a firm of Beijing architects, suggests that just building a
terrific museum is not enough to ensure success. The city of Ordos has sprung
up fast and is relatively rich, thanks to discoveries of oil and gas, but the
museum has no collections and precious few plans for exhibitions. No wonder it
is devoid of visitors. There may be a lesson here for the new cultural centres
about to be built in other parts of the world.
©The Economist Newspaper Limited 2013
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