Contemporary Arts Center

Contemporary Art Center
Established	1939
Location	44 E. 6th Street Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
Director	Raphaela Platow
Website	www.contemporaryartscenter.org

The Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) is a pioneering contemporary art museum located in Cincinnati, Ohio. The CAC is a non-collecting museum that focuses on new developments in painting, sculpture, photography, architecture, performance art and new media. Remaining committed to programming that reflects "the art of the last five minutes," the CAC has displayed the works of many now-famous artists early in their careers, including Andy Warhol.

History

Founded in 1939 as the Modern Art Society, the Contemporary Arts Center was one of the first institutions in the United States dedicated to exhibiting contemporary art. Its inaugural exhibition, Modern Paintings from Cincinnati Collections, opened in the basement of the Cincinnati Art Museum. In 1964, the CAC moved to the Women's Exchange Building in downtown Cincinnati. In 1990, a highly publicized exhibit of controversial Robert Mapplethorpe photographs led to a trial that was chronicled in the 2000 television movie Dirty Pictures.

In 2003, the CAC moved to its first free-standing home, the Lois & Richard Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art, which was designed by Zaha Hadid.

Projects and Exhibitions

In March 2008, the Contemporary Arts Center announced the exhibition and auction FORM: Contemporary Architects at Play, a collection of remarkable, new artworks from ten world-renowned architects, including Zaha Hadid, Michael Graves and Bernard Tschumi. Together the works, designed exclusively for the CAC and constructed in innovative materials provided by Formica Corporation, explore a range of artistic expression from the most creative designers working in architecture today, with designs ranging in scope from domestic pieces to conceptual sculpture.

CAC and Formica Corporation presented the architects with a challenge: to design an object that people could "sit upon, lie upon, lean upon, play upon." The architects present a broad range of approaches to the challenge. The result is a collection that runs a spectrum of scale, design and intent, but the works all share superior attention to detail, elegant design and luxurious form. Though the designs vary greatly from one another, all include an element of delight, inspiring the title FORM: Contemporary Architects at Play.

Participating Architects include:

• Peter Eisenman, Eisenman Architects
• Michael Graves, Graves Design
• Zaha Hadid, Zaha Hadid Architects
• Thom Mayne, Morphosis
• Bill Pedersen, Kohn Pedersen Fox
• Laurinda Spear, Arquitectonica
• Bernard Tschumi, Bernard Tschumi Architects
• Jaime Velez, Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, LLP
• Massimo Vignelli, Vignelli Designs, Inc.
• Buzz Yudell, Moore Ruble Yudell Architects and Planners

Described by New York gallery owner Max Protetch as comprising museum worthy forms to domestic showpieces, Christies Fine Arts Division sold eight pieces and one concept at auction raising $425,000.

In March 2011 the Laminex Group brought the collection to New Zealand for the Auckland Arts Festival and invited New Zealand architects and design professionals to submit entries for a New Zealand collection. The domestic competition was entitled Formica Formations. Queenstown designer Graham Roebeck of Structural Integrity Ltd won the Professional category and Auckland Unitec student Norman Lin, the emerging designer category.

Location

44 East 6th Street (Corner of 6th & Walnut), Cincinnati, OH 45202

Across Walnut Street from the Aronoff Center for the Arts in downtown Cincinnati's cultural and entertainment area known as the Backstage District.

Leadership

The Alice & Harris Weston Director and Chief Curator is Raphaela Platow.

See also

• Contemporary art

External links

• The Contemporary Arts Center (CAC) Official Site