ICP  |  International Center of Photography

Columbia University | GSAPP

critic  MARK RAKATANSKY
Summer 2015

The International Center of Photography is a world-renowned cultural institution involved in innovative exhibitions, education, and publication. The goal is to transform the International Center of Photography into a multi-media and multi-use visualization lab and workspace. 

The project site is the famous and infamous area of Manhattan known as the Bowery. Today the Bowery is rapidly becoming a new cultural district, with the advent of the New Museum, designed by SANAA and the Norman Forster designed Sperone Westwater Gallery. This cultural development now cohabits with the still active homeless missions and the influx of businesses coming from the surrounding neighborhoods of Chinatown, the East Village, Little Italy, the Lower East Side, and Soho, a mix in keeping with the long-standing social engagements of the International Center of Photography.

The project defines Photography Museum as a long exposure through which visitors capture the exhibition and the city.

The building itself is as an experience of photography.

By looking into different exposures of the photography history through the permanent gallery, the visitor defines its own lens in the end of the journey. By experiencing extended interactive exposures between programs, the visitor defines it’s own lens and in the end of the journey captures the city.