Moderna Museet MalmöModerna Museet
MalmöModerna Museet
Malmö
A starting point was that a new art museum—a public and cultural building—represents a rare opportunity to create a new node within the city; the urban balance is changed, and the neighbourhood develops. In Malmö, in the south of Sweden, there was the possibility to create a new art museum, starting from the industrial architecture of the former electricity plant dating from 1900, with an informal and experimental character that would complement the main museum in Stockholm.
The greatest challenge posed by the project (in addition to the demanding eighteen-month time limit from sketch design to inauguration) was the need to adapt the existing industrial brick building to current climatic and security requirements to comply with the highest international standards for art exhibition spaces. It soon became clear that what was needed was a building within a building: a contemporary addition within the existing shell. This radical reconstruction not only provided a challenge but also offered an opportunity for something new.
Seen from the exterior, a new extension marks the arrival of the museum. The extension provides a new entrance and reception space, as well as a cafeteria and a new upper gallery. Its perforated orange façade both connects to the existing brick architecture and introduces a contemporary element to the neighbourhood. The perforated surface gives the façade visual depth and is animated by the dynamic shadow patterns it creates. The ground floor is fully glazed so that sunlight is screened through the perforated façade.
In relation to its context, the new addition plays with scale. From a distance, it is only intelligible in comparison to the adjacent houses; only in close proximity can the building and its details be read in their own right. The elimination of the standard ‘middle-scale’ strengthens the museum's presence in the immediate urban setting while allowing the building to appear as a signal establishing a relationship with Malmö as a whole.
Inside, the building has been spatially reconstructed. Two new staircases allow the visitor to move in a loop between the grand turbine hall and the upper exhibition rooms. The staircases are each enclosed between two walls, which serves to divide the programme of the turbine hall into three separate spaces, housing a children's studio and a separate loading area (which can also be used for exhibitions) in addition to the main exhibition spaces.
As with the Kalmar Museum of Art, we have been committed to providing exhibition spaces that allow artists and curators to tailor conditions to each individual exhibition. Moderna Museet Malmö offers a series of white boxes, ranging from the almost domestic scale of the upper gallery to the Turbine Hall, which boasts a unique space almost eleven metres in height.
