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«On Site» a survey of Spain, architects' playground.
«On Site: New Architecture in Spain» opens Sunday at the Museum of Modern Art. Packed with pretty images and elegant models, the exhibition lacks the scholarly depth you might have hoped for on a subject that has mesmerized architects and planners since the 1980s. Also missing is the kind of basic information - historical background, a clear sense of a building's context, the architects' ages and nationalities - that would make the show accessible to a broad audience. What's more, the show's nationalist subject is a tricky one. A more tightly focused exhibition on, Catalonian architecture might have made a more compelling story, given the region's longstanding and determined struggle to assert its cultural independence from Madrid. And the starting date for the work on view - 1998 - has no particular resonance in Spain's recent architectural history. But if the show feels undercooked, there is much to see.
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