The old museum had no parking, so getting to it required heroic resolve. Now visitors can park beneath the building and take an elevator to the plaza, which should look less bland and diagrammatic once all the trees, fountains and sculpture are installed. Unfortunately, the podium terminates in a 12-foot wall that partially blocks views of the museum from Bishop Boulevard, the main pedestrian approach. This space is meant to evoke memories of the original Meadows Museum up the street, but the gesture is pointless and anti-climactic. If you're going to shout, have something to say.
Some buildings are better half-finished.
The upstairs galleries, on the other hand, are handsome. The use of color is welcome and very Spanish, and the paintings look superb in these tall beaux-arts rooms with their cove ceilings and gridded skylights. The one devoted to Murillo, Ribera and other painters of Spain's Golden Age is particularly striking. Regular visitors will probably depart thinking not only that the Meadows collection looks better than ever, but that they have never really seen it. The art museum is the cathedral of the 21st century, a place of invention and experimentation and risk.