Documenta 12

Vorbereitungsarbeiten für den Aue-Pavillon Foto: Heiko Meyer© documenta GmbH

From the Documenta 12 Press Room:

Crystal Palace for documenta 12 Begins to Take Shape

Preparatory work on the exhibition architecture entered a new phase today: the Crystal Palace, the planned temporary exhibition building for documenta 12, is beginning to take shape. Preliminary work for the foundations began this morning.

First, large machines will remove 15cm of turf, after which a layer of sand and gravel will be laid, followed by a thin covering of asphalt, forming the basic foundation for the lightweight and airy pavilion.

This means that before the end of this week, the outline of this "Crystal Palace" will be traced on the meadow site. A shape or marking, a public sculpture even, out of which - providing the sponsoring and fundraising campaigns are successful - the Crystal Palace will rise. It was designed by the French architects Lacaton & Vassal using greenhouse construction techniques and will be built in partnership with Tim Hupe Architekten.

The exhibition architecture for documenta 12 is coming into view, an architecture designed to create space for learning experiences: "The moment when the exhibition is perceived not as a mere collection of sensational trophies, a junk room, a discourse factory, or a shopping mall, but as a broadly defined space for experience - that is the moment when the architecture has the task of enabling learning experiences." (Roger M. Buergel)