New LA art gallery takes up an entire city block

New York

"WE could have made it bigger," said art dealer Iwan Wirth, reclining in a mid-century chair on the second floor of his new 116,000-square-foot gallery. "But we don't want to be (bigger). These are manageable spaces." Manageable, of course, is relative.

The new Hauser Wirth & Schimmel art gallery takes up an entire city block. The complex - seven buildings which include a former bank, three warehouses, and a five-storey building originally used for milling flour - is easily the largest destination in LA's Downtown Arts District, an area that's rapidly becoming a destination for powerful New York galleries' grand satellite exhibition halls.