The Guggenheim at 50

This is the 50^th anniversary of the opening of the Guggenheim. Am I the only one of a certain age who feels that building somehow speaks to our youth? That it appeared – – first the idea of it and drawings/models that were so improbable and playful, and serious and organic/mathematical and unlike anything else just as we were old enough to be standing there ready in mind and spirit to receive it, to think about it, to feel protective of it in some way, to be both amazed and blasé. It didn’t fit; it didn’t really work as a museum, but it was our defiant touchstone of a sort. And with age it had to be restored, repaired. But it’s still sui generis and not quite as influential as it was once expected to be, both triumph and white elephant. But when we were young we gazed upon that single newest thing and thought in poetry