Sadly, the Parasol Unit Foundation for Contemporary Art has announced that due to the ongoing situation with coronavirus, it will close its gallery spaces in London today. Indeed many private galleries and foundations in London and elsewhere are doing this, some offering visits by appointment, but what makes this doubly sad is that this is […]
Large circular steel rings run across the room, out through window and across the terrace into infinity, while upstairs a field of stone bases all that remains of a 19th century house in Beirut destroyed in order to force the reluctant owners to sell it, intersperced with concrete cylinders which were test samples from the […]
Iran is a country of contrasts. The Daily Mail headlines today are about conflict: ‘Jeremy Hunt warns Iran of ‘unintended but catastrophic’ consequences over attacks on Gulf tankers as he backs America’s claim that Iran is responsible’. Yet, Iran is a country of beautiful art and architecture, with a great heritage that continues today, as […]
I wouldn’t like to wander through Parasol Unit on a dark night with the lights turned off, perhaps with a torch lighting up the details of Hyon Gong’s immensely detailed paintings. Or worse, with lightning from a storm flashing into the gallery spaces. In her solo first exhibition in Europe, Gyon’s work responds to recent […]
What is left when a building decays and crumbles into a ruin as the roof falls in and then the floors? The strong stone walls may remain for a while, with the windows smashed, providing glimpses from the street into the roofless ruin and to the blue skies beyond. When the walls go, what remains? […]
Renaissance altarpieces were normally the grand centrepiece of chapels with no connection to the outside world, apart from light flowing gently from high level windows. In contrast, Monique Frydman’s “Polyptyque Sassetta”, a delicately-coloured homage to the work of Renaissance artist Stefano di Giovanni is set against windows which give views out to the peaceful reflective […]
The area around Old Street in London is awash with building contractors as the character of the area is being changed out of recognition with new developments of various different shapes, sizes and architectural styles (some better than others). Surrounded by these developments is an oasis of calm, a water garden with ducks paddling happily […]
On the garden terrace, Yayoi Kusama‘s mirror box creates infinity for viewers inside and its mirrored walls reflect the space around it, while her aluminium globes create the impression of solidity as they float on the calm surface of the water. Alongside, angular thin lines by another artist – Rana Begum – formed of coloured […]
The area between Angel and Hoxton in London is a mass of building sites as this area is gradually redeveloped, taking advantage of the canals which provide fingers of water onto which many of the new residential apartments will face. In amongst this redevelopment are two old, but transformed, warehouse buildings, Nos 14 and 16 […]
"The many great gardens of the world, of literature and poetry, of painting and music, of religion and architecture, all make the point as clear as possible: The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden. If you don't want paradise, you are not human; and if you are not human, you don't have a soul."
(Thomas Moore)
To be an architect means having a wide range of interests - architecture, art and creativity in all its variety of forms, sustainability, science and innovation. The greatest interest is often where these different worlds overlap and collide - that is when something imaginative often occurs that pushes us all forward to another place
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