A Box for Cultural Treasures

In 2002 the Provincial Government of Guangdong announced a new regional development vision based on culture. Compared with Shanghai, Beijing or its neighbouring city Hong Kong, Guangzhou has not been in the focus of the Western audience as a city of contemporary Chinese cultural production.

As part of the Pearl River Delta Region, Guangzhou has a history of several hundred years of exchange with Western countries and the Arab world. But in recent years other places in China have become the major destinations for investment and exchange. The city of Beijing used the Olympic Game’s in 2008 to show the world not only its new economic power, but also its contemporary vision in architecture. With the National Stadium by Herzog & de Meuron, the Opera House by Paul Andreu or the CCTV Headquarters by OMA, the city administration showed a new face of Chinese society to the world. Shanghai used the Expo in 2010 for the same purpose in urban development.

The 2010 Asian Games played a similar role for the development in Guangzhou. The new 610-metre tall Canton Tower, designed by Information Based Architecture, is the highest tower in China and the icon for the new CBD at Pearl River New Town. Further high-rise towers by Wilson Eyre Architects and KPF provide the setting for other new cultural landmark buildings, such as the Guangdong Opera House designed by Zaha Hadid Architects or the Guangdong Museum designed by Rocco Design Architects from Hong Kong.

In 2004 Rocco Design Architects won the museum commission in an international competition of invited architects. The building is sited opposite the new Opera House, next to the green belt of the Pearl River. Floating above an artificial landscape that covers the podium of the museum and extends the undulating green space of the park, the main exhibition space is located in a square box, lifted above ground.

The design refers to the antique Chinese lacquer box used to keep valuable treasures, which perfectly reflects the purpose of the museum. The access from the main axis of the public space between the opera and the museum leads the visitor into the open foyer under the floating box. The exterior façade of the box with its geometric cuts for the openings looks the same on all four sides. The greyish aluminium cladding panels contrast with the red window reveals that define the irregular openings. The openness of the main interior hall, which is naturally lit from above, contrasts with its massive appearance from outside.

The circulation between floors along a path in the open atrium gives visitors the feeling of moving through an artificial landscape. With varying degrees of transparency and changing spatial arrangements, the visitor is animated to move from one exhibition hall to the next. The physical and visual connections across the atrium further motivate the movement. Besides the exhibitions, the building itself contributes a cultural treasure to the identity of contemporary culture in fast developing Guangzhou. In the direct vicinity of the spectacular organic forms of Zaha Hadid’s Opera House, the massive dark floating box provides a radical contrast, and builds a triangle with the Canton Tower across the river.

Placed at the Cultural and Art Square on the main axis of the new city near to the Pearl River, the Guangdong Museum not only adds a new gem to the cultural landscape of Guangzhou, but will also help to make the brand new town a home for its citizens. With its radical appearance and the strong iconic image, it will help to define the contemporary cultural identity of this southern metropolis.

Eduard Kögel