Our appetite for fine art took us to Milwaukee Art Museum with its collection of 25,000 works on display–making it one of the nation’s largest galleries. While I was curious about the collection, I was most interested in the Quadracci Pavilion, built by Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava in 2001.

The iconic winged structure has demonstrably changed the city skyline by Lake Michigan’s waterfront…

to the point that Milkwaukee now incorporates Calatrava’s  brise soleil in it logo.

Parallels to Calatrava’s Oculus at NYC–Gound Zero are unmistakable;

comparisons are inevitable. 

The wings are extended most days until sunset, but stay retracted during nasty weather or high winds. 

Sadly, Leah and I were greeted with high winds, but we were fortunate to tour the museum with so few visitors.

With the exception of a group of mini-pals,

and isolated cases…

here and there…

we felt like we had the space to ourselves–

which gave us more time to study some of the special artwork in greater detail without distraction or interruption:

(quickly scroll up and down for cool moiré effect)

While I never considered that the building was competing with the exhibitions, I was always eager to return to Calatrava’s public spaces…

to cleanse my palette before indulging in another bite of brain food!