1959: Guggenheim Opens, Cage on TV, GAM Inaugurated

In 1959, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, opened on October 21, transforming the city's skyline. The museum celebrated its 60th anniversary in 2019 with a Robert Mapplethorpe exhibition featuring over 80 works from its collection, which received over 200 pieces from the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation in 1993. That same year, John Cage performed "Water Walk" on the Italian TV show "Lascia o raddoppia" hosted by Mike Bongiorno, where Cage appeared as a mushroom expert. The piece, first performed in January 1959, is one of Cage's most famous musical performances, following his 1952 "Theater Piece No. 1" at Black Mountain College with Merce Cunningham, David Tudor, and Robert Rauschenberg. On January 29, 2019, Fluxus member Gianni-Emilio Simonetti reinterpreted the original score at Spazio Lavit in Varese. Also in 1959, the Galleria Civica d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea (GAM) in Turin opened in a new L-shaped building designed by Carlo Bassi and Goffredo Boschetti, built on the site of a pavilion destroyed in WWII. The museum faced accessibility issues, leading to closure from the early 1980s until 1993, after a restoration by Giacomo Donato, Franco Marconcini, Arturo Job, and Ludovico Barbiano di Belgioioso expanded exhibition space and improved facilities.