DRIFTING ART LAND in London, UNITED-KINGDOM by HOLDUP Architecture

Article source: HOLDUP Architecture

Hard to assess in urban term, the river claims the birth of the city while staying detached from it by its particular identity: ubiquitous as a spine, yet barely passable by inhabitants. Inserted in the Thames, undefined as a plot (central but distant), the drifting island embodies a favored observatory by proposing an alternative reality of London. Visitors are given the chance to experience and sense water in an elaborated architecture that merges and exchanges with its environment, like any living organism would unassumingly do.

Image Courtesy © HOLDUP Architecture

• Architects: HOLDUP Architecture
• Project: DRIFTING ART LAND
• Location: London, UNITED-KINGDOM
• TYPOLOGY: Floating art gallery
• FLOOR AREA: 450sqm
• STATUS: Competition entry
• COMPLETION: June 2008
• CONDITION: Open competition
• EVENT: Arquitectum
• TEAM: Engineering : GMGB

Image Courtesy © HOLDUP Architecture

By acknowledging that the proposal of a unique journey prevails on a mere “moving gallery” design, the floating structure offers much more to see from the outside world than its apparent interiority let us know. In order to absorb the deep essence of London, a bunch of periscopes sticks out from the exclusive water skin, sucks in the veracity of the Capital city, until then undetectable, and finally reveals it in the core.

‘THIS DEVICE REINTERPRETS IN A CONTEMPORARY MANNER PLATON’S MYTH OF THE CAVE, WHICH DISOWNS PRECONCEPTIONS THAT OUR SENSES FORM BY HABITS.’

Image Courtesy © HOLDUP Architecture

The main hall comprises both permanent and temporary exhibition spaces, plus the auditorium, scarcely partitioned by sails, randomly tightened to a forest made of thin posts. Flooded with natural but treated diffuse light, the immaculate area allows time to be suspended for a while, so that people can wander freely among artworks.

If one gets more adventurer, he could sneak in the underwater basement and try to find intimate lounges, within reach, though hidden in a coral sea of hanged filaments. This claustrophobic vision that periscopes provide permits to focus and comprehend the city, paradoxically more efficiently than from the surface.

Tags: London, United Kingdom

Category: Art Gallery

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