SERPENTINE SACKLER GALLERY
DESIGN BY ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS
DESIGN BY ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS
THE SERPENTINE SACKLER GALLERY DESIGN BY ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS
ZAHA HADID’S STATEMENT
The Serpentine Sackler Gallery consists of two distinct parts, namely the conversion of a classical 19th century brick structure – The Magazine – and a 21st century tensile structure. The Serpentine Sackler Gallery is thus – after MAXXI in Rome – the second art space where Zaha Hadid and Patrik Schumacher have created a synthesis of old and new. The Magazine was designed as a Gunpowder Store in 1805. It comprises two raw-brick barrel-vaulted spaces (where the gunpowder was stored) and a lower square-shaped surrounding structure with a frontal colonnade. The building continued to be in military use until 1963. Since then The Royal Parks used the building for storage. The Magazine thus remained underutilised until now. Over time, much amendment and alteration has occurred inside the historic building and its surroundings.
Instrumental to the transformation into a public art gallery was the decision to reinstate the historic arrangement of The Magazine building as a free standing pavilion within an enclosure, whereby the former courtyards would be covered and become internal exhibition spaces. In order to reveal the original central spaces, all non-historic partition walls within the former gunpowder stores were removed. The flat gauged arches over the entrances were reinstated whilst the historic timber gantry crane was maintained. Necessary services and lighting were discreetly integrated as to not interfere with the ‘as found’ quality of the spaces. These vaults are now part of the sequence of gallery spaces.
The surrounding structure has been clarified and rationalised to become a continuous, open sequence of exhibition spaces looping around the two central powder rooms, thus following the simplicity and clarity of Leo von Klenze’s Glyptothek as an early model for a purpose-built gallery. What was a courtyard before, became an interior top-lit gallery space. Longitudinal roof lights deliver natural daylight into the whole gallery sequence surrounding the central vaults and with a fixed louver system they create perfectly lit exhibition spaces. Retractable blinds allow for a complete black-out of the galleries. The continuous sky-light makes the vertical protrusion of the central core of the building (containing the two vaults) legible on the inside. These reconstructions and conversions were designed in collaboration with heritage specialist Liam O’Connor and in consultation with English Heritage and Westminster City Council. In addition to the exhibition spaces the restored and converted Magazine also houses the gallery shop and offices for the Serpentine’s curatorial team.
The extension contains a generous, open social space that we expect to enliven the Serpentine Sackler Gallery as a new cultural and culinary destination. The extension has been designed to complement the calm and solid classical building with a light, transparent, dynamic and distinctly contemporary space of the 21st century. The synthesis of old and new is thus a synthesis of contrasts. The new extension feels ephemeral, like a temporary structure, although it is a fully functional permanent building. It is our first permanent tensile structure and realisation of our current
research into curvelinear structural surfaces. The tailored, glass-fibre woven textile membrane is an integral part of the building’s loadbearing structure. It stretches between and connects a perimeter ring beam and a set of five interior columns that articulate the roof’s highpoints. Instead of using perimeter columns, the edge beam - a twisted ladder truss supported on three points - dips down to the supporting ground in front, in the back, and on the free west side. On the east side this edge beam (and thus the roof of the extension) swings above the parapet of The Magazine. A linear strip of glazing gives the appearance that the roof is hovering above The Magazine without touching. The Magazine’s western exterior brick wall thus becomes an interior wall within the new extension without losing its original function and beauty. This detail is coherent with the overall character of the extension as a ‘light touch’ intervention. The envelope is completed by a curved, frameless glass wall that cantilevers from the ground to reach the edge beam and fabric roof. The interior of the new extension is a bright, open space with light pouring in from all sides and through the five steel columns that open up as light scoops. The anticlastic curvature of the roof animates the space with its sculptural, organic fluidity. The only fixed elements within the space are the kitchen island and a long smooth bar counter that flows along The Magazine’s brick wall. The tables, banquets and chairs are designed as a continuous Voronoi pattern, reminiscent of organic cell structures. Our aim is to create an intense aesthetic experience, an atmosphere that seems to oscillate between being an extension of the delightful beauty of the surrounding nature and of being an alluring invitation into the enigma of contemporary art.
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ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
SERPENTINE SACKLER GALLERY DESIGN BY ZAHA HADID & PATRICK SCHUMACHER
The Serpentine Sackler Gallery, designed by Zaha Hadid Architects, will open to the public on Saturday, 28 September 2013.
The Serpentine Sackler Gallery gives new life to The Magazine, a former 1805 gunpowder store, located seven minutes’ walk from the Serpentine Gallery on the north side of the Serpentine Bridge. With 900 square metres of new gallery, restaurant and social space, the Serpentine’s second space in Kensington Gardens is a new cultural destination in the heart of London. This autumn, the Serpentine presents its unrivalled programme of exhibitions and events across both Galleries and into Kensington Gardens.
The new Gallery is named after Dr Mortimer and Dame Theresa Sackler, whose Foundation has made the project possible through the largest single gift received by the Serpentine Gallery in its 43-year history. Major funding has also been awarded by Bloomberg Philanthropies. Bloomberg is a long term supporter of the Serpentine as well as sponsor of the opening exhibition. The total build cost is £14.5 million.
In 2010 the Serpentine Gallery won the tender from The Royal Parks to bring the Grade II* listed building into public use for the first time in its 208-year history. The Serpentine Gallery has restored the building to an excellent standard, in partnership with The Royal Parks, renovating and extending it to designs by Zaha Hadid Architects. A light and transparent extension complements rather than competes with the neo-classical architecture of the original building. It is Zaha Hadid Architects’ first permanent structure in central London and continues a relationship which began with the inaugural Serpentine Gallery Pavilion Commission in 2000. The landscape around the new building will be designed and planted by the world-renowned landscape designer Arabella Lennox-Boyd.
The opening exhibition in the Serpentine Sackler Gallery is the first UK exhibition by the young Argentinian artist Adrián Villar Rojas, who is gaining international renown for his dramatic, large-scale sculptural works. At the same time, in the Serpentine Gallery, there is a major retrospective of the work by Italian sculptor Marisa Merz, who received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2013 Venice Biennale.
A redesigned website features the inaugural Digital Commission by Cecile B. Evans, while the first annual Bridge Commission explores the route between the
two Galleries with a series of texts by twelve internationally acclaimed writers. Each story is timed to last as long as it takes to walk from the Serpentine Gallery to the Serpentine Sackler Gallery. The Serpentine’s expanded presence in Kensington Gardens is illustrated by a specially commissioned map by the artist
Michael Craig-Martin.
Responding to its unique location in The Royal Park of Kensington Gardens, an expanded programme of eight exhibitions will now follow the seasons with different shows in each Gallery four times a year. The seasonal theme carries through to the
wider programme with the Pavilion Commission signalling the start of London’s summer and the multi-disciplinary Marathon, a fixture of Frieze week in the autumn. The Serpentine’s programme of outdoor sculpture with The Royal Parks continues with Fischli/Weiss’s monumental Rock on Top of Another Rock, which remains in place until March 2014.
The opening of the Serpentine Sackler Gallery marks a new beginning for the internationally acclaimed arts organisation, which has championed new ideas in contemporary arts since it opened in 1970. The Serpentine Gallery has presented pioneering exhibitions of 1,600 artists over 43 years, from the work of emerging practitioners to the most internationally recognised artists and architects of our time, such as Louise Bourgeois, Frank Gehry, Damien Hirst, Jeff Koons, Gerhard Richter, Yoko Ono, Andy Warhol and Ai Weiwei.
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS 2013 © LUKE HAYES
ZAHA HADID
Zaha Hadid, founder of Zaha Hadid Architects, was awarded the
Pritzker Architecture Prize ( considered to be the Nobel Prize of architecture)
in 2004 and is internationally known for both her theoretical and academic
work. Each of her dynamic and innovative projects builds on over thirty years
of revolutionary exploration and research in the interrelated fields of
urbanism, architecture and design. Hadid’ s interest lies in the rigorous
interface between architecture, landscape and geology as her practice integrates
natural topography and human – made systems , leading to experimentation with
cutting – edge Technologies. Such a process often results in unexpected and
dynamic architectural forms.
EDUCATION
Hadid studied architecture at he Architectural Association from
1972 and was awarded the Diploma Prize in 1977.
TEACHING
She became a partner of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture,
taught at the AA with OMA collaborators Rem Koolhaas and Elia Zenghelis, and
later led her own studio at the AA until 1987. Since then she has held the
Kenzo Tange Chair at the Graduate School of Design, Harward University; The
Sullivan Chair at the University Illinois, School of Architecture, Chicago;
guest professorsships at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste in Hamburg; The
Knolton School of Architecture, Ohio and the Masters Studio at Columbia
University, Newyork. In addition, she was made Honorary Member of the American
Academy of Arts and Letters, Fellow of the American Institute of Architecture
and Commander of the British Empire, 2002. She is currently Professor at the
University of Applied Arts in Vienna, Austria and was the Eero saarinen
Visiting Professor of Architectural Design at Yale University, New Haven,
Connecticut.
AWARDS
Zaha Hadid’ s work of the past 30 years was the subject of
critically – acclaimed retrospective exhibitions at New York’ s Solomon R.
Guggenheim Museum in 2006, London Design museum in 2007 and the Palazzo della
Ragione, Padua, Italy in 2009. Her recently completed projects include the
MAXXI Museum in Rome; which won the Stirling award in 2010. Hadid’ s
outstanding contribution to the Stirling award in 2010. Hadid’ s outstanding
contribution to the architectural profession continues to be acknowledged by
the most world’ s most respected institutions. She received the prestigious ‘
Praemium Imperiale ’ from the Japan Art Association in 2009, and in 2010, the
Stirling Prize from the Royal Institute of British Architects. Other recent
awards include UNESCO naming Hadid as an ‘ Artist for Peace ‘ at a
ceremony in their Paris headquarters last year. Also in 2010, the Republic of
France named Hadid as ‘ Commandeur de l’ Ordre des Arts et des Lettres’ in
recognition of her services to architecture, and TIME magazine included her in
their 2010 list of the ‘ 100 most Influential People in the World ‘. This years
‘ Time 100 ‘ is divided into four categories: Leaders, Thinkers, Artist and
Hereos – with Hadid ranking top of the Thinkers category.
ZHA PROJECTS:
Zaha has played a pivotal role in a great many Zaha Hadid
Architects projects over the past 30 years. The Maxxi National Museum of 21 st
Century Arts in Rome, Italy; the BMW Central Building in Leipzig, Germany and
the Phaeno Science Center in Wolfsburg, Germany are excellent demonstrations of
Hadid’ s quest for complex, fluid space. Previous seminal buildings such as the
Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art in Cincinati, USA, have also been hailed
as architecture that transforms our vision of the future with new spatial
concepts and bold, visionary forms.
Currently Hadid is working on a multitude of projects worldwide
including: The London Aquatics Centre fort he 2012 Olympic Games; High – Speed
Train Stations in Naples and Durango; The CMA CGM Headquarters tower in
Marseille; The Fiera di Milano masterplan and tower as well as major master
planning projects in Beijing, Bilboa, Istanbul and Singapore. In the Middle
East, Hadid’ s portfolio includes national cultural and research centres in
Jordan, Morocco, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia, as well as
the new Central Bank of Iraq.
