A room for electrical infrastructure, security area, storage for the New Museum café kitchen and the Store, and a workshop are also housed on the mezzanine of the lower level. Visitors who choose to ascend from the lobby level to the galleries above may take an elevator or use one of the staircases situated in the building’s core. SANAA has crafted a fluid, three-level zone of extraordinary galleries on the building’s second, third, and fourth floors—all freed from columns by the structural support of the core, and all characterized by unique atmospheres ranging from intimate to grand.
“A museum for contemporary art should be neutral in the character of its gallery spaces, in order to create the widest palette for the art itself,” SANAA has stated. “With the galleries in this building, we tried to play with dimensions and the way daylight falls in the spaces. This allows the visitor to experience art in slightly different conditions on different visits, at different times of the day, in different spaces, without impeding the qualities of the art.”