Mining heir Solomon R. Guggenheim initially housed his collection of abstract art in the Museum of Non-Objective Painting before it was renamed and given a permanent location in Wright’s structure. And Wright was decidedly in favor of non-objectivity, declaring that his shrine to modernism would “make the Metropolitan Museum look like a Protestant barn.”
Though Wright spent much of his career in rural and suburban areas, fellow architect Philip Johnson, famous for his Glass House, saw the Guggenheim as a successful realization of Wright’s unique vision in the center of metropolitan America. Defending it against vocal dissenters ready to lash out with unflattering nicknames, Johnson declared it to be “New York’s greatest building.”
