Garden Pavilion

The garden pavilion - made for the exhibition "Living Uncertainty: an exhibition from the 32nd São Paulo Biennial", at the Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Serralves, in Porto - develops from the creation of two concentric spaces with distinct functions: the interstitial space and the central space.

The cylindrical spatiality emphasises the centrality of the work on show, which takes on a crucial importance in the design of the space. This is reinforced by the annulment of a main entrance in favour of the creation of a second, external façade, permeable from three points that divide the entrance to the pavilion by its periphery, enhancing different accesses and relationships with the Serralves Garden.

The discovery of the museological structure is made from three moments: the recognition of a habitable space, a transition path and the place of projection. From the outside, the pavilion presents an abstract skin, a continuous façade throughout its curved surface, built by four layers of vertical wooden planks. Natural light shapes its body, in a gradation of shades that reinforces its volumetry and reveals planes at different depths.

Crossed by sunlight, the built structure projects over itself, causing curved shadows that wander around the central façade, creating different shadow- shapes throughout the day. Contributing to the control of natural light in the interior space, the juxtaposition of two façade-plans, curved and parallel, which alternately open up double-curved arc spans, guides the visitor to walk through the immersive mediation space without revealing the central nucleus from the outside.

The absence of doors seeks to free the circulation of visitors in the appropriation of the exhibition pavilion, as a space in continuity with the garden where the "inside" is still "outside" and the "exterior" is already "architecture". An immersive space is created, in which the visitor becomes aware of the act of entering through the will to discover a space that is not immediately perceptible in its approach to the architectural object. The space "in between", as an antechamber-path, induces, to the visitor, the awareness of his body in space and leads to his preparation for the fruition of the exposed work - the film "Os humores artificiais" (2016) by Gabriel Abrantes - in a space that refers to it materially.

Architecture: Diogo Aguiar Studio (www.diogoaguiarstudio.com)
Team: Diogo Aguiar, Daniel Mudrák
Location: Jardins da Fundação de Serralves, Porto, Portugal | 41.158561, -8.659910
Date: 2017
Client: Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Serralves
Area: 75m2
Program: Temporary Museum
Engineering: PENREA - Rui Nuno Salgueiro
Construction: Somaia
Photography: © Fernando Guerra (www.ultimasreportagens.com)
© Francisco Nogueira (www.francisconogueira.com)
Video: © Sara Nunes (www.buildingpictures.com)