Design Concept
For the proposed museum building, we have taken a bold step and inverted the typical exhibition space typology. The full exhibit gallery program is conceived as ten, 3-dimensional monolithic objects, a dramatic departure from the gallery defined exclusively as an interior space. Exposing the galleries to be viewed in the round, in space, adds a critical scale dimension to the program, one that is not typically legible in the museum experience. The galleries are given an impressive solidity and monumental scale, and yet many are floating in space- held up on virtual pedestals. It is the complexity of this dual expression of monumentality and lightness which defines the contradiction within the individual museum experience, celebration, judgment and the rejection of sentimentality. The ten gallery objects are juxtaposed to each other both vertically and horizontally to create a 3-dimensional cubic composition within and through a linear circulation volume. The objects are then push-in and pulled-out like drawers to create a series of interior voids and dramatic interstitial spaces.