Song Art Museum | Vermilion Zhou Design Group

Beijing, China│ 2017.9

Total area 22,000 m2, Architectural interior 2,200 m2

Client: H BROTHERS ART 

Design Team:

Creative Director, Lead Designer│Kuang Ming(Ray) Chou

Architecture Design Director│Shi Hai

Interior Design Director│Garvin Hung

Lighting Design Director│Vera Chu

Architect│Huang Jing

Interior Designer│Jamie Pai

Decoration Designer│Mavis Huang、Boyuan Ling

Photographer│Xia Zhi

An Art Container - Instead of creating certain atmosphere for exhibition, in this case, we emphasize the connection between the subject and object.

The original architecture is Victorian style with Western-style gardens, as an overly makeup woman, is outdated. The owner intended to transform its function into an art space for the public using. Our first step is to remove all the decorations from her, to show her purely look.

Disharmony is what has happened in this project: an imitated aspect from a mighty culture without its core. For instance, the Victorian building without its cultural base, the only thing it has is symbol which needs to be reconsider and to be released. In short, what we aim to approach in this project is to make disharmony from disharmony. As a result, the building would be back to the original context, a spatial container.

"Blank-leaving" is the most artistic expression of Chinese painting. Therefore, we reduced all the decorated elements including symbols, which were directly transformed from the west like the effect of fading the oil painting into Chinese ink.

On the other hand, " geometrical " form is the most objective expression in Western logical thinking. The architecture of the museum becomes purest white after removing those complicated symbols by using some semi-transparent materials like PC. The extended buildings connected together with new corridors in several kinds of geometric shape. So the new & old, Western & Eastern, contemporary & traditional link together, conversation in between starts over.

The vertical circulation makes interior more possibilities to stretch. Accordingly, art collections will be arranged and displayed with a logical order. The space would allow visitors walk through the whole space without any certain route and experience the messages this works try to express.

The whole base shaped like Chinese long scroll, we also reconsidered the relationship between architecture and courtyards. We selected and arranged almost 199 pine trees to scatter around, taking the art museum as the main building, restoration of ancient buildings and resettlement of ancient archway at two side, these remain owner’s preference and positioning the museum as an oriental style.

The significance of the art museum is to present the art. As a platform for displaying it, our definition of " Song Art Museum" is an "art container", with "art" as its mainstay and "container" as its complement, and in the future it can also easy be duplicated in any other place with it’s own language, we intent to give the architecture and space more possibility. 

" Song Art Museum " transforms everything into geometry, purity, like Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu said " Govern without intervention " from the outside to inner. With its " clean " existence, any kind of "contemporary art" is welcome to enter, to vitality showing without scruples. The courtyard surrounded by the pine trees, to give the external vitality of " Song Art Museum ", the scenery becomes the breath of both inside and outside. The oriental sense also becomes the natural rhythm of mutual attraction between traditional and modern architecture.