Ensuring it’s a shrine to art and not to anything else

Is that the Virgin of Guadalupe appearing on the side of BCAM? Not if the architect has anything to say about it.

The Renzo Piano Building Workshop employed computer technology to make sure that the chunks of travertine -- mined in Tuscany, Italy -- used to create the building’s exterior were randomized to ensure that no natural veins or patterns in one piece of stone jump to the pieces placed next to it, perhaps causing visitors to imagine unintended images or patterns on the museum’s exterior walls.

-- Diane Haithman