Menil Neighborhood
The several leafy blocks surrounding the main museum building constitute a compound or campus that has been described as “a neighborhood of art.” In the 1960s John and Dominique de Menil began to acquire property along the quiet, tree-shaded streets of this inner-city Montrose enclave, a neighborhood of 1920s and 1930s bungalow-style houses. Now owned by the Menil Foundation, the bungalows serve as museum offices as well as private residences; some house fellow arts organizations. The de Menils had virtually all of the bungalows painted their signature warm gray (the cypress-clad main museum building, which opened in 1987, is the same shade). Other arts buildings dot the campus, including the Cy Twombly Gallery and Richmond Hall, which house single-artist installations. The Rothko Chapel and the Byzantine Fresco Chapel Museum, built by the de Menils as spiritual sanctuaries, operate as separate foundations. Together, all of the structures on the Menil campus form a unified, serene-and somewhat surreal-landscape, while projecting a welcoming spirit.
above: Mark di Suvero, Bygones, 1976
