Baker: New deYoung A Big Improvement

The facade of San Francisco’s new deYoung Museum has not been a big hit with members of the public, some of whom have suggested that it looks like an aircraft carrier. But Kenneth Baker says that art lovers should reserve judgment until they’ve seen the whole museum, and that includes the inside. “The new de Young deploys its resources to encourage our recognition that the meanings of art, even of the decorative arts, lie neither wholly within the art object nor wholly outside it.”