"We always want to respect our donors," says Julia Dolan, Portland Art Museum (PAM)'s senior photography curator. "But we're trying to orient directionally."
Dolan was leading a tour group through the new Rothko Pavilion, walking us into the north wing, which happens to house the now more accessible rooms dedicated to photography. Like several of the museum's other areas, PAM's photo collections have been packed away for much of the four-year construction project to connect the institution's two major buildings.Â
Before the pavilion, we called the hulking, former Masonic Temple of Roman brick and terracotta the Mark Building and the museum's original structure the Beluschi Building, after its designer Pietro Beluschi.
New museum maps now orient visitors through five floors of exhibitionsâtraversable by four elevatorsâin PAM's north and south wings. Even ingenue edifice the Rothko Pavilion is labeled simply "pavilion."Â
Reopened to near full capacity on November 20, PAM is as grand and stately as it has ever been. The triumph of this redesign is that more visitors can now see in, venture inside, and use the museum. And PAM wants to be used.
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