081 One Building for the Museums of the 20th Century

Competition: 1992

The State Gallery for the Art of the Twentieth Century is to be built on the site of the former Türkenkaserne directly adjacent to the Alte Pinakothek, originally built by Leo von Klenze and restored by Hans Döllgast. The brief required the accommodation of different collections with respectively different spatial requirements (State Gallery of the Twentieth Century, Graphic Collection, changing exhibitions, architecture, design).

The competition entry therefore proposes a building that consists of a number of volumes forming a conglomerate. Each building is thought of as a museum on its own, with its separate entrance and its own character. A ramified interior is to open out onto the park and the surrounding buildings. The individual museum buildings are to be made of bricks that are then to be clad in a glass envelope. This envelope is to be built up in a number of layers; the envelope would fulfill the thermal, optical and acoustic requirements and would be supplemented by liquid-crystal monitor surfaces, communicating images and letters. The façade proposal combines elements that have been studied for the Sandoz laboratory, for Ciba-Geigy’s building K411 and for the Centre Culturel de Blois.

A Building for 20th-century Museums

A building formed from several buildings: a conglomerate. Each building has its own expression. Each is an independent museum with its own access, its own technical apparatus, its own lights, its own atmosphere. Each building is a place of concentrated perception; a place of people and artworks.

A building formed around an interior space, a flowing and joining room opening to a park and to the neighboring buildings. Going through a piece of city, the inner space is also a space with its own character, a place of relaxation, of meditation, of peace. A place for looking out and for reorientation.

A building formed from joined museum spaces: a conglomerate of bricks. Sheathed in glass, its outer appearance changes unceasingly in changing light or with electronic word images moving by.

Team

Partners: Jacques Herzog; Pierre de Meuron
Project Team: Christine Binswanger; Martin Hsu; Nicolas Monnerat

Facts

In Collaboration With: Rémy Zaugg, Basel, Switzerland
Client: Bayerische Staatskanzlei
Planning: Mechanical Engineer: HL Bauphysik, München, Germany
Building Data: Gross floor area (GFA): 242'187 sqft, 22'500 sqm

Bibliography

Fernando Márquez Cecilia, Richard Levene (Eds.): “El Croquis. Herzog & de Meuron 1981-2000. Between the Face and the Landscape. The Cunning of Cosmetics. Entre el Rostro y el Paisaje. La Astucia de la Cosmética.” 2nd adv. and rev. ed. Vol. No. 60+84, Madrid, El Croquis, 2005.

Wilfried Wang: “Herzog & de Meuron.” 3rd adv. and rev. ed. Basel / Boston / Berlin, Birkhäuser, 1998. (= Studiopaperback).

Jacques Herzog, Pierre de Meuron: “Zwei Bauten für die Kunst.” In: Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland GmbH (Ed.). “Kunst im Bau.” Göttingen, Steidl, 1994. (= Schriftenreihe Forum). Vol. No. 1. pp. 95-99.