Robert Kahn recommends Norman Foster's Sackler Gallery
The Royal Academy of Arts
www.royalacademy.org.uk
Sackler Galleries
1989-1991, Foster +Partners
In London, it seems that everyone has an opinion about architecture. Even Prince Charles set off a debate about traditional versus modern styles when he said an unbuilt proposal for the National Gallery was "like a carbuncle on the face of an old and valued friend." Better a carbuncle than needless cosmetic surgery.
The best arguments, however, are in deed, not words, and the best argument for modernism is the lovely jewel of an intervention for the Royal Academy by Norman Foster. Here, a glass stair and a glass elevator have been inserted in the narrow gap formed between the two buildings that comprise the Royal Academy. On one side is the original garden façade of the 1666 house (converted in the eighteenth century by Lord Burlington) now revealed for the first time in a hundred years, and on the other, the façade of the Victorian galleries. The stair and elevator, beautiful free standing objects in their own right, lead to a glazed reception hall incorporating the parapet of the original façade. From here one enters the former Diploma galleries, which were added above Burlington House in Victorian times. These rooms have been completely renovated, replete with new barrel-vaulted ceilings, and house the changing exhibitions.
This carefully detailed and thoroughly modern upstart manages to simultaneously assert itself while remaining completely respectful of its elders. As a bonus, there is a permanent installation in the glazed atrium of Michelangelo's Taddei Tondo. One can only imagine Michelangelo, himself no stranger to breaking the rules, looking down with a smile at being shown here, rather than anywhere else.
Robert Kahn
Architect
