Film Society of Lincoln Center in New York City Gets Renovation
The Film Society of Lincoln Center is instrumental in making our New York City event in October happen, and we're excited that its new $41 million film center will be officially open on June 17.
From The New York Times:
More than 160 in-ground orange lights at the entrance will “create a kind of welcome mat,” said the architect David Rockwell, who designed the project. “We wanted people to easily find us. The facade leads you in.”
The film center is part of Lincoln Center’s overall redevelopment, and Mr. Rockwell collaborated with that project’s architecture firm, Diller Scofidio & Renfro, on the film center’s exterior to make sure it felt of a piece with the rest of the refurbished complex. Where Lincoln Center once conveyed an aura of elite culture that some found intimidating, its renovation tried to make the campus more transparent, welcoming and accessible by adding things like the bleachers outside Alice Tully Hall and the roof lawn on the North Plaza.
There are 12 constituent groups at Lincoln Center, the country’s largest performing arts center, and the Film Society — which is best known for the New York Film Festival and New Directors/New Films (which it presents with the Museum of Modern Art) — is trying to be the least august. The new film center can be entered from the street — unlike much of Lincoln Center, which is up a flight of steps on a plinth — and it will have a cafe that will be open late, encouraging filmgoers to stick around and anyone else to hang out.
“It’s a good counterpoint to the grandeur of Lincoln Center’s other spaces,” said Daniel H. Stern, the society’s president. “We have the chance to bring a slightly younger demographic. We wanted a place for people to interact with each other in addition to interacting with the art.”
