Having worked for more than three years between 1994 and
1997 on the staff of the Colorado General Assembly, Denver’s civic center area
is an old stomping grounds of mine . For about three years during that era I
also lived only a few blocks away from the State Capitol building in a complex
then called Uptown Village (it seemed to have gotten a new name). Denver’s
Civic Center effectively surrounds the urban park called Civic Center Park
between the State Capitol building to the east, the Denver City and County Building
(city hall) to the west, Downtown Denver to the north, and Denver’s emerging
arts district to the south. The pictures I’ve included here are not from a
single day but from many trips to the area over a five-year period between 2008
and 2013.

Although the east-west axis of the Civic Center area from
the State Capitol to City Hall hasn’t changed much since I first arrived in
Colorado in 1991, the area around it has undergone a remarkable transformation.
Way back then the main branch Denver Public Library was a non-descript two
story building, and the nearby Denver Art Museum was a 1960s Brutalist concrete
block structure that looked more like a prison or medieval fortification than a
place for an upcoming city’s art collection . Affectionately known as “The Castle” the
building is still part of the Denver Art Museum, but by the time I returned in
2008 a sleek, angular new building designed by architect Daniel Libeskind had
been built next door with an enclosed bridge connecting the two.

Denver Public Library also got a grandiose new building back
in the mid-1990s, one of the most famous post-modernist buildings by architect
Michael Graves, a building that looks completely different from anything else
in Denver which nowadays, along with the new art museum building, anchors an
emerging arts district.

I’m describing the area as an “emerging arts district”
because there continue to be museum additions to the area, as well as offices
geared towards arts businesses and non-profits, loft housing, and even an arts
hotel as well as several new museums. The historic structure beside the Denver
Art Museum is the Byers-Evans House Museum, a historic home built by the
founder of the Rocky Mountain News and later inhabited by the family of former
governor Evans . In 2011 the Clyfford
Still museum also opened on the block, housing the personal collection of the
American abstract expressionist artist which constitutes the majority of his
work. How Denver landed the collection of a famous artist with no previous
connection to the city says something about how the city is competing
successfully against others as a growing cultural metropolis.

Meanwhile, the Kirtland Museum of Decorative Arts is
scheduled to be moved to bigger digs in the Arts District from its humble abode
a few blocks away on Capitol Hill. And in 2012 Colorado also completed a new
building for the Colorado History Museum in the vicinity replacing a smaller
structure a few blocks away. I have to admit, though, that I wasn’t
particularly impressed with it. I assumed the bigger and better building was to
enable the state to show off more of its historical collection. However, the
displays still struck me as rather scant and not very impressive compared to
many other state historical museums I’ve been to . You’d get the impression they
just wanted to spend some money on a bigger and better building.

Although my pictures show Civic Center Park as open and
relatively quiet, it is in fact the center for Denver’s big parties throughout
the summer, ranging from Capitol Hill Peoplesfest and Taste of Colorado to
Cinco de Mayo and Gay Pride. The park also contains some of the most famous statues
by sculptor of western American art Alexander Phimister Procter.

I first visited Denver in 1988 on the way back east to New
York on my first trip to the western U.S. At that time I visited the State
Capitol building as a tourist and went up into the dome for a view around the
city. During the 1990s I spent more than three years working in the capitol
building and in recent years have returned many times for meetings and
presentations in conjunction with the work I’ve been doing on Colorado state
government related issues as an economic consultant. I guess it seems so
commonplace to me that I’ve neglected to take any pictures within the building
during that time, to have gone on the state capitol tour, or to have gone up
into the dome since, despite making a point of visiting other states’ state
capitol buildings when I travel around the country. OK, I vow that when I’m
back in Colorado again I will visit the state capitol once in full tourist
mode.