GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM (BILBAO), The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is a museum of modern and contemporary art designed by Canadian-American architect Frank Gehry, and located in Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain.

1. GUGGENHEIM
MUSEUM, BILBAO
JUHI JASEEM,
AMAL DEV,
MOHD. AFFAN,

2. INTRODUCTION
 The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is a museum of modern and
contemporary art designed by Canadian-American architect
Frank Gehry, and located in Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain.
 The museum was inaugurated on 18 October 1997 by King Juan
Carlos I of Spain, with an exhibition of 250 contemporary works
of art.
 The interconnected buildings whose extraordinary free-form
titanium-sheathed mass. It seems like a gigantic work of abstract
sculpture.
 The interiors are organized around a large atrium represents an
architectural landmark of audacious configuration and
innovative design.
 It is one of several museums belonging to the Solomon R.
Guggenheim Foundation and features permanent and visiting
exhibits of works by Spanish and international artists.

3. WHY BILBAO ?
 Located in Abando, Bilbao, Spain.
 After the civil war in 1940’s Bilbao lost major of it’s
industries, leading to emergence of public spaces
in town. The city was left looking for to find a way
to transform itself from a port hub of Spain’s
industry into a vibrant city built on a services
economy.
 Then city made a conscious decision to save the
city from suffering by having Guggenheim
Museum. As part of a revitalization effort for the
city of Bilbao, for economic stratification, social
exclusion, need of socio-cultural centers and more
public spaces.

4. CONCEPT
 Deconstructivism, translates to the breaking down, or
demolishing of a constructed structure, whether it
being for structural reasons or just an act of rebellion.
 The design of the building follows deconstructivism.
And is one of the most admired works of
contemporary architecture. Inspired by the shapes
and textures of a fish.
 Seen from the river, the form resembles a boat, but
seen from above it resembles a flower. The museum
is essentially a shell that evokes the past industrial life
and port of Bilbao

5. PLAN AND ELEVATIONS
 The museum is seamlessly integrated into the urban context, unfolding its
interconnecting shapes of stone, glass and titanium on a 32,500-square-meter
(350,000 sq ft) site along the Nervión River in the ancient industrial heart of the city.
 With a total 24,000 square-meter (260,000 sq ft), of which 11,000 square-meter
(120,000 sq ft) are dedicated to exhibition space.
 The exhibition space is distributed over nineteen galleries, ten of which follow a
classic orthogonal plan that can be identified from the exterior by their stone
finishes. The remaining nine galleries are irregularly shaped and can be identified
from the outside by their swirling organic forms and titanium cladding. The largest
gallery measures 30 meters wide and 130 meters long.

7. IMPACT ON THE SURROUNDINGS
 Almost immediately after its opening, the Guggenheim Bilbao became a popular
tourist attraction, drawing visitors from around the globe.
 ECONOMIC GROWTH : In its first three years, almost 4 million tourists visited the
museum, helping to generate about €500 million in economic activity. The
regional council estimated that the money visitors spent on hotels, restaurants,
shops and transport allowed it to collect €100 million in taxes, which more than
paid for the building cost.
 JOB OPPORTUNITIES : It had created and maintained around 4500 jobs, mainly in
transportation and other hospitality and retail establishments like hotels, cafes,
bars etc. This also promoted works of indigenous and international artists.
 LANDMARK : The psychological effect of the museum recover the civic pride
among people of Bilbao after the civil wars and deindustrialization, the museum
emerged as a landmark.
 IMOPROVED BILBAO’s OUTLOOK : The improvement in mobility through a
network of trams, the expansion and creation of green areas, collaboration with
private investment, and the empowerment of local people for developing their
own initiatives. Improved Bilbao’s outlook.
 CREATED A WORLDWIDE PHENOMENON : “THE BILBAO EFFECT”.
 ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS : Increase in tourism generated awareness
towards the environmental well being in the citizen and administration of Bilbao,
as a result Nervión river was cleaned of industrial waste

8. THE BILBAO EFFECT
 A phenomenon whereby cultural investment plus showy architecture
is supposed to equal economic uplift for cities down on their luck.
 Bilbao effect also known as Guggenheim effect pertains to the cause
and effect relationship that occurred when a single world-class
project became the catalyst for reviving once gritty, economically
distressed, post-industrial city. The effect means more than the urge
to travel. It can garner revenue from its own residents and from
tourists.
CRITICISM OF THE BILBAO EFFECT
 Many architecture critics have come out publicly stating that a lot of credit is
attributed to the museum more than it deserves. They criticise the effect while
claiming that the effect itself is inexistent.
 Edwin Heathcote, Architecture and design critic of the Financial Times, goes as far to
say that the Bilbao effect is a myth. Bilbao is deemed as a city that got lucky due to
several coincidences coming together.
 The promise of the “Bilbao Effect” also sparked a building boom in "statement"
architecture across the globe, one which proved imprudent in the wake of the recent
economic crisis. And from the present scenario of socio- economic disparities in the
city, and its poverty levels, that the effect cannot be called a success, even in Bilbao

9. IMPACTS OF GLOBALIZATION

10. CONCLUSION
 The gleaming Guggenheim Museum Bilbao has
put the Basque capital on the map of world
cities and has exacerbated optimism among
public officials worldwide about the role of
spectacular architecture in urban renewal.
 A major synthesis of Bilbao’s developments
through the lens of globalization – analyzes the
Guggenheim project as the latest of Bilbao’s
globalization efforts, puts the project in the
context of decades-long transformation and
contends that Bilbao’s positive economic
performance since 1994 is not fundamentally
due to the success of Frank Gehry’s building, but
rather to a complex array of causal processes
that must be understood in the context of
Bilbao’s connections with the world economy
and a changing world-system.

11.  Globalization processes in Bilbao are as old as the city
itself and that the role of the State must be taken into
account in order to explain the city’s changing fortunes
throughout the years. Globalization itself ought to be
understood as a complex and variable network-like
process with multiscalar nodes, an approach which is
carefully theorized and empirically developed.
 Recent figures on the rise of inequality and poverty in
the city make it impossible to consider the Bilbao model
a success. Severe poverty has increased in Bilbao since
2000 by 33 per cent and today affects 11.5 per cent of
Bilbao households, a figure that is twice the average for
the Basque Country as a whole. Moreover, the number
of households receiving income assistance has increased
by 38 per cent since 2002.
 The downtown bias of the regeneration projects, with
the centre being upgraded at the expense of the city’s
poorer areas, has exacerbated socio-spatial disparities in
the city and raises the risk of Bilbao being seen as a ‘dual
city’, i.e. : the ‘new’ Bilbao represented by the
renovated, spectacular downtown, and the ‘old’ Bibao by
the depressed neighbourhoods on the periphery.