Plans for Guggenheim in Las Vegas Unveiled

LAS VEGAS —  New York City’s Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and the Strip’s Venetian Resort on Friday formally unveiled museum-building plans so important to this town--far better known for fun than fine art--that even rival casino mogul Steve Wynn showed up to bask in the news.

The Guggenheim plans to build two museum exhibition spaces at the Venetian. One, inside the resort, will showcase art in partnership with Russia’s State Hermitage Museum. The second will be a separate building next to the casino to host rotating Guggenheim displays.

Museum and resort officials described details of the venture, anticipated for months, just a few hundred feet from the Venetian’s sea of slot machines. But Wynn, who opened the door to serious art in this city when he opened his Gallery of Fine Art at the Bellagio resort in 1998, said the project will permanently alter the complexion of entertainment in Las Vegas, a destination for more than 30 million tourists annually.

“It’s now possible we may see the most concentrated supply of world-class art ever seen anywhere,” said Wynn, with Vegas-style hyperbole. “This is a fundamental change for the city.”

Sheldon Adelson, owner of the Venetian, said that with the presence of the Guggenheim and the Hermitage here, “Las Vegas has redefined the word ‘entertainment.’ ” He praised Guggenheim’s director, Thomas Krens as having the courage to bring fine art to a city historically known for “topless shows, gambling, and no clocks . . . and no windows in the casinos.”

Both museums will be designed by acclaimed architect Rem Koolhaas. The 7,660-square-foot Hermitage-Guggenheim Museum will be built along the hallway linking the Venetian’s lobby and its casino. Scheduled to open next spring, the museum’s inaugural exhibition will feature 40 works representing Impressionism, Post-Impressionism and early Modernism drawn from the holdings of both institutions.

Mikhail Shwydkoi, minister of culture of the Russian Federation, said the joint venture would accomplish a long-term goal for the Hermitage by extending its reach to audiences outside Russia.

“High-brow critics will criticize us,” he conceded. “The Hermitage in the capital of gambling? [But] I say it’s very important for people to come to Las Vegas for different reasons.”

Guggenheim’s other presence at the Venetian will be in a separate, 63,700-square-foot building between its parking garage and the hotel.

Krens and Koolhaas said that while the building’s exterior will be largely blocked by surrounding structures, its spacious interior--with 70-foot-high walls, a massive skylight and a functioning industrial crane--will be unprecedented among museums, allowing wildly imaginative exhibitions.

The first, scheduled to open next summer: “The Art of the Motorcycle,” the Guggenheim’s hugely popular but critically controversial exploration of the motorcycle as cultural icon and design achievement.

Admission will be about $15, Venetian officials said. The resort will absorb the cost of construction--so far undetermined--and lease the spaces to the Guggenheim.