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Architects: atelier anonymous
- Area: 140 m²
- Year: 2023
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Photographs:STUDIO FANG
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Lead Architects: Vivian Bao
Text description provided by the architects. House of Craft –‘Power Station Configurator’, a scaffolding architectural installation, transforms the three-story riverfront platform of Power Station of Art Shanghai into a flexible and changing field. The first thing one sees at the narrow end of the platform is a scaffolding module, while on the larger area behind it, there are more modules, which are lined up towards the Huangpu River, forming a creative exhibition site for contemporary craftsmanship of China. First, this triangle space is divided. The entire space is divided into smaller modules so that the newly placed structure can adapt to the various sizes of various exhibiting items. The independent modules built by scaffolding can be moved and combined. Each module has four sides of curtains which can be adjusted to open up or enclose the display space of a module. The wooden display system designed for each module provides a hidden and unique small space for different sizes of craftwork. It restores the work site of contemporary craftsmen through the display of text, images, videos, etc.
House of Craft composed of steel modules is like a configurator of our concrete world under the orderly operation of the former ‘power plant’, breaking and reshaping the spatial order with its own allocation logic. It creates flexible layouts for the exhibition according to its specific topics, and season change. It provides more spatial possibilities for the riverfront platform. This installation brings together craftsmen throughout the country and transforms the public void into a shared exhibition site. Next to the glass façade facing the riverside, a lifted platform allows people to climb to the open view and have a relatively quiet and isolated space to continue thinking and looking back at the exhibition site.
The second chapter of ‘House of Craft’, designed by atelier Anonymous, is being exhibited at the Power Station of Art in Shanghai. The second chapter, ‘Ten Woodworks, One Glance’ unfolds with the thoughts of ‘Settle, Dwell, Relax, and Traverse’, and brings 10 groups of wooden objects that span in time and space, hoping to bring inspiration for contemporary wood makers and contemporary living. In this chapter, the ‘power plant configurator’ has evolved into a Bogu rack (also known as China Cabinet), which is usually made of wood, but in this exhibition, wood has become the object of display. The 10 groups of wooden objects are of different sizes. From the perspective of space, how to make them coexist harmoniously with the scaffolding system so that these objects and the fields they form can freely shuttle between the main structures, has become what we need to think about in this exhibition design.
The scaffolding is strong and cold, while the wood is soft and warm, absorbing more traces of time and environment. As a link between the two, we found galvanized iron sheets in the category of industrial materials, which are hard and soft and can be folded and hung on the rods of the scaffolding in a lightweight way, becoming shelves of wooden objects. The way the iron sheets form the space also reflects origami, a primitive handicraft in both China and Japan.
In the ‘Relax’ section, an armchair from the Ming dynasty was shown to the audience passing through contemporary materials. Wood and metal form a dialogue that is both attractive and repulsive, as well as a kind of collision. We hope that each exhibit can be related to the scaffolding module in a specific way, and even form a larger object together with the exhibits to impact or divide the surrounding space. The exhibition space actually extends on the entire riverside platform outside the scaffolding structure.
In the first section ‘Settle’, the table is placed in the connected space formed by two modules, one high and one low. The two modules abstractly express the high and low space of the living house and the changing living space. Ming-style Sugong four-sided flat strip table forms a stable horizontal line. In the second section ‘Dwell’, the viewer enters the module at an oblique angle, changing the usual viewing angle. The iron sheets of the scaffolding modules are also obliquely placed, like partitions in the living space, showing the possibility of a ‘Dwell’ space with flexibility. Wooden objects in life also naturally and flexibly join this changing and penetrating space. In the third section ‘Relax’, the chair is lightly placed on the small platform of the folded and suspended iron sheet and passes through the hole of the iron sheet. Lifted and the chair can be viewed from all angles. In the fourth section ‘Traverse’, the decomposed incense box is stored in a box made of iron sheets.
