{"id":137930,"date":"2026-03-14T02:29:19","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T02:29:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/137930\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T02:29:19","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T02:29:19","slug":"ministry-of-awe-turns-a-historic-philly-bank-building-into-a-trippy-art-playground","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/137930\/","title":{"rendered":"Ministry of Awe turns a historic Philly bank building into a trippy art playground"},"content":{"rendered":"

Love Philly? So do we. Let\u2019s be friends.\u00a0Sign up for the Billy Penn newsletter today<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Philadelphia is about to get a little more awe-inspiring: the Ministry of Awe (MoA)<\/a> opens its doors tomorrow, March 14. Billed as \u201ca new, ever-evolving immersive art experience,\u201d MoA sits inside a historic 19th-century bank designed by Frank Furness in Old City.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The MoA website describes the transformed bank as a \u201csurreal world where the only currency is the human spirit\u201d and \u201ceach act of wonder yields infinite returns.\u201d Instead of a traditional art museum, it\u2019s billed as an \u201cexperience\u201d \u2014 a word that increasingly seems to permeate the art world.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Harry Potter\u2019s Ministry of Magic regulated magic. Perhaps, this space is meant to regulate awe?<\/p>\n

\"\"Visitors enter the Ministry of Awe not through the grand lobby of the former bank but through an ATM that leads them to the basement. (Emma Lee\/WHYY)<\/p>\n

\u201cA moment of awe\u201d<\/p>\n

Entering the Ministry of Awe is indeed like entering into a \u201csurreal world,\u201d akin to going down Alice\u2019s rabbit hole or landing over the rainbow.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The bank\u2019s lobby is both familiar and foreign. Sure, there\u2019s an Old City feel to the building with its high ceilings, crown molding and wood trims. There\u2019s a vault in the back and desks with rotary phones and vintage typewriters.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But then, you realize that the typewriter is typing by itself. Oh, and look up. There\u2019s a giant eyeball staring at you with a camera in its pupil. A chaise lounge, seemingly immune to gravity, sits on the wall. Another wall has a gigantic nose sticking out from it that can talk and will tell you what you smell like. (Someone next to me had a musk of \u201c2007, a year for poor decisions.\u201d) Inside the vault \u2014 which unfortunately had some technical issues during our preview \u2014 one of the drawers contained little baggies of human teeth.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Meg Saligman welcomes visitors to her new immersive art space in Center City, The Ministry of Awe. (Emma Lee\/WHYY)<\/p>\n

The more we looked around, the more unusual details we discovered. And again, this was just the lobby.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen people come in, we want them to know that they should just feel free to explore and wander,\u201d said Meg Saligman, the \u201cMinistrix of Awe\u201d and major creative brain behind the space. \u201cIt\u2019s okay if you don\u2019t see everything. You could have a moment of awe that you\u2019ve never had \u2014 just one moment. That could be enough.\u201d<\/p>\n

Exploring all six floors<\/p>\n

MoA is an impressive feat. The building contains six floors jam packed with creative designs, creatures, interactive tech and hand-painted murals. Saligman brought together over 100 Philadelphia-based artists, performers, makers, engineers and designers to make it happen.<\/p>\n

To honor the building\u2019s history, themes surrounding banking, currency and transaction are the inspiration here.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a bank for the manufacturers of the day,\u201d said Nick Stuccio, MoA\u2019s executive director. \u201cBasket makers, sail makers \u2014 these are craftspeople, just like the artists that we\u2019ve commissioned around this building.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Writer and narrative artist Mimi Hacking wrote the charter of the Ministry of Awe, a document that gives the space a history and purpose. (Emma Lee\/WHYY)<\/p>\n

\u201cThink of bank words,\u201d Saligman said. \u201cTrust, bonds, tender, security. These are very beautiful words. So maybe we can rethink how our financial systems work, or how our collaborations between large groups of people are formed, right? That\u2019s what money is. A fictional thing doesn\u2019t really exist. There\u2019s no gold standard anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

Each floor at the Ministry is like its own little mini world. We were in the museum for about three hours, but it felt like we had just scratched the surface. Seriously, this entire article could have focused on just one corner of one room.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very individual thing,\u201d Stuccio said. \u201cI ask people, even like my kids and my wife are here, and they see it differently, and are drawn to different things\u2026 I noticed a detail I hadn\u2019t seen before, and I loved it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The basement has some bottom-dwelling creatures. There is a giant bathroom with an anthropomorphic female pig taking a soak (not quite Miss Piggy vibes, but still fabulous) as well another creature called a \u201cskin horse\u201d (this one had more nightmare fuel vibes).\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Madison Polidoro\u2019s \u201dThe Skin Horse\u201d is a large scale scupture that ocupies a stable-like room in the basement of the Ministry of Awe. (Emma Lee\/WHYY)<\/p>\n

One of the top floors, \u201cthe heavens,\u201d contains an interactive celestial mural projection on its vaulted ceiling. The sky changes from night to day with the spin of a metal wheel. Visitors can talk into a microphone and ask the mural to highlight certain images \u2014 like clouds, angels and eggs. (Yes, there are eggs in the heavens).\u00a0<\/p>\n

Saligman and crew worked with the Pig Iron Theatre Company to bring actors into the space.<\/p>\n

A \u201chigh priestess\u201d occupies the heavens, walking around in a white Sgt. Pepper trenchcoat and holding a glowing orb. Her voice is soft and soothing, and she says things like \u2014 \u201cvery chill, very glamorous, very springtime.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her actual name is Rose Loardo and her job is to \u201cwelcome you into this heavenly, celestial space \u2014 to add to the environment with movement and voice and energies, to transport you to a different vibe than the other floors.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Rose Luardo portrays the high priestess in heaven, showing visitors in with a glowing orb. (Emma Lee\/WHYY)<\/p>\n

A mix of silly and serious<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot of silliness inside the Ministry of Awe. In the department of \u201cforgery, fraud and counterfeiting,\u201d portraits of famous fraudsters hang on the wall and guests are encouraged to forge signatures. A man dressed like a white-collar hamburglar runs it through an AI scan and lets you know how you did.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s artwork that would seamlessly fit into a modern art museum. Right next door to the hamburglar guy, is a splintered, cascading wood sculpture that wraps around a staircase from artist Daniel Ostrov. The idea sprung from \u201cinsecurity\u201d \u2014 financial insecurity after all is what inspires many famous fraudsters.<\/p>\n

\"\"Daniel Ostrov\u2019s sculpture of steam-bent wood interlaces with a spiral staircase at the Ministry of Awe. (Emma Lee\/WHYY)<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way the piece starts is it\u2019s very ordered, and the wood is stacked evenly, but there\u2019s these tendrils that are on the inside that are hidden,\u201d Ostrov said of the artwork. \u201cAnd then as it spirals up the staircase, they start to break loose and break free until you get to the top, and it\u2019s absolute chaos. That\u2019s the idea of the insecurity breaking out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even the bathrooms and staircases in MoA are art spaces. One bathroom had a mini replica of a video store in it and the toilet says \u201cthank you for your deposit\u201d when you flush. Artist Dennis Haugh created a replica of Duchamp\u2019s \u2018Nude Descending a Staircase<\/a>\u2019 in one stairwell and is currently installing a forgery of Charles Willson Peale\u2019s \u2018Staircase Group<\/a>\u2019 in another \u2014both of which currently hang at the Philadelphia Museum of Art<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Some other fun noticings:<\/p>\n

The very top floor is a spaceship that supposedly crash landed into the museum. Inside there\u2019s a ghost hanging around that you can find with the help of an iPad.\u00a0<\/p>\n

You are invited to touch, draw on and interact with various artworks in MoA. There are also easter eggs you are encouraged to find.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a floor with a holographic ballerina \u2014 just like one you would find in a jewelry box. She begins dancing to a classical tune and then slowly starts pixilating and breaking free to fast-paced electronic, rock vibes. It\u2019s pretty fun.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a floor all about death with a casket on the ceiling. When you look into a mirror, your face appears in a portrait in another room with the words \u201cin loving memory\u201d around it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are little oculi scattered throughout the building that you can peer into other spaces with.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Look for images of a \u201cbird lady\u201d throughout the museum. It\u2019s a motif of Saligman\u2019s.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI would baptize my kid in this place\u201d<\/p>\n

Right now, MoA is a kind of this cacophony of ideas and intrigue that you are invited to walk into and try to unknot. Artist Sam Cronick, who helped with some of the building\u2019s AV elements, is excited about how everything is coming together.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI would do everything here,\u201d he said. \u201cI would have my wedding here. I would baptize my kid in this place. I love everything about this \u2014 every nook, every cranny, there\u2019s just so much to explore.\u201d<\/p>\n

There isn\u2019t another museum in Philadelphia quite like what\u2019s going on inside MoA. The art playground feeling and sense of whimsy make it feel a bit like the Please Touch Museum but for adults. Saligman said she is excited to bring a new kind of experience to the city.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the Ministry of Awe is adding a little, perhaps sass and irreverence,\u201d she said. \u201cAn alternative experience within a very historic area and an evolving creative space that hopefully is an ongoing call and response where some innovative artwork gets made.\u201d<\/p>\n

And even though the old bank is filled with art from bottom to top, she noted that this is just the beginning.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re willing to let it evolve organically, but it is important to us that it\u2019s a space that evolves,\u201d she said, \u201cthat there will always be active art making in it, and that it\u2019s generative \u2014 that it hopefully could help sustain artists and be a place of collaboration and creativity.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Love Philly? So do we. Let\u2019s be friends.\u00a0Sign up for the Billy Penn newsletter today. Philadelphia is about…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":137931,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[5201,4877,564,94,22351,10533,13272,69,71,70,30610],"class_list":["post-137930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-artificial-intelligence-ai","tag-arts","tag-featured","tag-history","tag-ministry-of-awe","tag-museums","tag-old-city","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-pig-iron-theatre"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137930","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137930"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137930\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137931"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}