Doug and Mike Starn Receive 2009 Brendan Gill Prize
November 24th, 2009
Last Thursday, MAS proudly presented the 22nd Brendan Gill Prize to artists Mike and Doug Starn for See it split, see it change, their site-specific permanent art installation at the South Ferry subway terminal in Lower Manhattan. Commissioned by the MTA Arts for Transit Program, See it split, see it change was completed in December 2008 to wide praise.
The Brendan Gill Prize is named for the long-time MAS trustee, renowned New Yorker theater critic, author, and architectural preservationist. The cash prize, funded by a permanent endowment, is awarded annually to the creator of a work of art, book, sculpture, film, musical composition, or architectural design, accomplished the previous year, that best captures the spirit and energy of New York City. It was established in 1986 by MAS board members Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Helen S. Tucker and Margot Wellington. Continue Reading>>






MAS started out the month with the opening of the exhibit Re-Imagining Cities: Urban Design After the Age of Oil on October 1. It is co-sponsored by PennDesign and on view in our galleries through December 4, 2009. Click
Singer-songwriter Sufjan Stevens will receive the Municipal Art Society’s 2008 Brendan Gill Prize this Saturday, September 27, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music for his multi-media musical composition, The BQE. His “symphonic and cinematic exploration of New York City’s infamous Brooklyn-Queens Expressway” was selected by the Brendan Gill jury for “capturing the energy, vigor, and verve of our incomparable city.” We are thrilled to invite MAS Members to join us this Saturday and meet Mr. Stevens at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
The 2007 Brendan Gill Prize was awarded on Monday evening, December 3, to actor, playwright and poet Sarah Jones, for her Tony-award winning one-woman show “Bridge & Tunnel.” The newly built Diker Pavilion in the National Museum of the American Indian, a transformed landmark — formerly the U.S. Custom House built by the legendary Beaux-Arts architect Cass Gilbert — on Bowling Green, was the stage for the presentation.
The 2006 Brendan Gill Prize has honored Christo and Jeanne-Claude for The Gates — the first grand scale public art project of the 21st century, a one-time exhibition that inspired New Yorkers and the rest of the world to exultation and goodwill. For sixteen shining days, February 12-28, 2005, the billowing saffron of The Gates metamorphosed Central Park into a museum without walls.