Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis). It also rivals the world's grandest contemporary art behcmoths by near- ly doubling the Centre Pompidou in heigtut and length. Its massive scale has allawcd Gehry free rein to com- bine broad, expansive foms with relatively compact shapes, and thus arrive at a more appealing result than bis sometimes fussy designs, such as the Aruerican Center in Paris. Gehry cites the "surprising hardness" of the intense- industrialized Bilbao area and the futuristic urban vision of Fritz Lang's film Metropolis as bus two prima- ry sources of inspiration for the museum. Indeed, the Gchry's approach to the GMB's waterfront setting at once playful and imposing. The museum's entire structure seems to stretch indulgently along the bank of the Nervion River, and to ramble into unexpected places a portion of the building boldly slides under- neath La Puente de la Salve, a steel suspension bridge which cuts across the site. Gehry further engages La Puente de la Salve into his design with an elaborate, sculpturelike tower, the kind structure that he calls a "high reader." The tower bus no furuction other than visual punctuation. As Gehry interided. the GMB fumishes Biltao witla a spectacular icon that captivates the visitor's gaze, with the added interest of a highly complex contour that radically transforms itself depending upon one's vantage point. GMB's interior is less dramatic. Upon entering the museum, the visitor encounters soaring 165-foot-high glass atrium. According to Krens, who was intimately involved in the design process lsce sidebarl. the atrium reflects what one tnight call the positive ideas of Frank Loyd Wright's rotunda," like Wright, Gehry has used the idea of central organizing space. But whereas Wright's spiral for the original Guggenheim in New York was all