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Architects: KRIS YAO | ARTECH
- Area: 32641 m²
- Year: 2023
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Photographs:KRIS YAO | ARTECH, Shephotoerd Co.
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Acoustics: Shen Milsom & Wilke, Xu-Acoustique
Text description provided by the architects. The New Taipei City Art Museum is situated on reclaimed land at the convergence of the Yingge River and Dahan River. The gently sloping site resembles an island within the flowing streams, offering captivating views of the majestic mountain and river landscapes. To the north lies Guilun Mountain, while to the south, the museum overlooks the Dahan River and Xueshan Range. Drawing inspiration from the region's rich history and culture, the design incorporates elements such as the dry riverbed, the quaint charm of old streets and brick buildings, and the swaying reeds, particularly abundant during the autumn and winter seasons, to create a modern and prospective architectural form, a "museum of modern and contemporary art among the reeds."
The design intelligently blends the natural and the fabricated, interpreting elements of one in the form of the other, and vice versa. The distinctive façade is composed of a series of sandblasted aluminum tubes of varying heights and lengths, paired with vertically segmented three-color aluminum panels arranged in a staggered manner. From afar, this linear screen conjures the blurry beauty of reeds swaying in the wind, concealing the solid exhibition box that so often suggests a building of its typology. It cleverly mirrors the ever-changing natural environment and landscape on the facade, attracting people with its unique architectural appearance to visually experience the fleeting changes in the vastness.
At ground level, the fair-faced concrete art village unfolds to reveal a network of art streets and sculpture terraces. This new museum follows the concept of a museum 'open to all'. Visitors can freely wander around the outdoor terraces lined with cafes, workshops, and restaurants, spatially organized in the same manner as the old streets of Yingge and Sanxia. They can also participate in various art activities, linger to admire open installations, or follow the brick pavement to the hilltop and overlook the landscape.
Above the village floats the steel-structured art museum, whose rigid rectangular mass disappears behind a swaying reedbed indicated by numerous vertical tubes of various heights. The long-span structural system ensures the most flexible exhibition space. A grand staircase leads visitors to the elevated lobby on the second floor, granting access to the four types of display spaces: general exhibition rooms, large-scale exhibition rooms, international exhibition rooms, and special-themed exhibition areas. A garden restaurant stands on the roof, where dining guests can enjoy an extensive view of the Da Han Riverscape. Another design feature is the individual circulation to the operation management center and collection storage that expedites control and security measures.
The open art village embraces an original concrete materiality to showcase the geographic typology formed by the erosion of the Dahan River. The architectural concrete walls feature a texture imprinted by diagonally arranged cedar wood planks, contrasting with the rugged chiseled surfaces at the top and sides. The robust grainy concrete walls and brick pavements create a winding and dynamic spatial arrangement, establishing an artistic space intertwined with nature.
The landscape bridge at the entrance of the site is constructed using weathering steel, which develops unique color and texture over time. Within this natural setting, it harmonized with the blurred façade of the art museum, serving as the starting point to guide visitors into the museum to explore further.
