The
Serpentine Gallery Pavilion has, in the last eleven years, become one of architecture's hot dates in London. This year, four years after their collaboration on the Bird's Nest stadium for the 2008 Beijing Olympics,
Herzog & de Meuron and
Ai Weiwei again collaborate marking London's hosting of the games. The syrupy poignancy of the timing is what it is, but what of the pavilion?
Such is the stature of the previous designers of the pavilion that the show has inevitably become something of a muscle act. The culmination of this approach, abdominals, pectorals, and all, was arguably the 2008 pavilion by Frank Gehry. The year after, Sejima & Ryue Nishizawa of SANAA, and again in 2011 Peter Zumthor, kicked back against the creation of loud, powerful, architectural objects with something more subtle entirely. This year's pavilion continues in the vein of this critique with a rummage through the bowels of pavilions past.
The first apparition of the pavilion is a near circular pool of water reflecting London's varied and sometimes bright skies. Beneath the pool, that is suspended about chest height, is a dark and miserable looking hole. A slightly acrid ,burning smell emanates. It is not inviting. And then there is finding the entrance path. A couple of paths look promising but they prove to be dead-ends with assistants enforcing the' keep off the grass' rule. preventing a short-cut dash to the entrance.
Inside the pavilion, all the surfaces save for the underside of the pool which is made of steel, are cork. The floors, benches, terraces, stools, columns, are all apparently made from, or clad in thick cork. There is a soft, natural, sound deadened feel to the 'room'. The cork slabs are beautifully cut and sanded to fit their precise location. But it smells as though the surface has been flamed, singed, blackened.
Eleven of the columns that hold up the water-filled roof are located on a vestige of the foundation of one of the previous pavilions. An extra column has been added by this years designers, apparently randomly located. Each column is a different shape, angle or size recalling the lost pavilion it represents.
The terracing, steps and ramps are projected from the ghost plans of pavilions past. The rich archaeological landscape that is created speaks of years of tradition, wealth, optimism and ingenuity compressed beneath, yet helping to support that shiny bright reflective pool.
The pavilion is open from 1
st June - 14
th October 2012.
Ai Weiwei was unable to leave China to work on the pavilion due to passport difficulties. He collaborated on this project over the internet.
