Riverside Construction 2 by Charles Jamieson
Zaha Hadid "In Conversation" with Deyan Sudjic
Thursday 9 June 2011 - 7.30pm to 9.00pm
Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum
Ticket price: £22
Box Office: 0141 353 8000
FOLLOWING on from yesterday's posting about Patricia Cain's powerful Drawing (on) Riverside exhibition at Kelvingrove in Glasgow, comes news that architectural royalty, Zaha Hadid is paying a state visit to Glasgow ahead of the opening of her first major public building in the UK.
Hadid is one of the world’s most in-demand architects. She has form in Scotland though as through her friendship with Charles Jencks, she has already designed the Maggie's Cancer Care Centre in Kirkcaldy, Fife.
I visited this Darth Vader style building in the car park of the town's Victoria Hospital a few years ago in the company of Jencks, who knows Hadid from the days when he used to teach her at the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London.
Jencks and his late wife Maggie Keswick Jencks, who started up the groundbreaking Maggie's Centres before her premature death from cancer in 1995, were good friends with the notoriously quick-tempered Hadid.
I'd been commissioned by The Herald newspaper to write about a day out with a bus load of architects – and Jencks – visiting three of the Maggie's Centres; the original Edinburgh centre, Frank Gehry's Dundee Maggie's and Hadid's Kirkcaldy building. (You can find the original feature is you do a search of this blog)
The interesting thing about the Maggie's centres is that every architect who designs a scheme for the charity is given the same brief; to design a non-insititutional style building with a kitchen at its heart so that anyone affected by cancer can come in and not feel threatened.
Jencks was very entertaining with his stories about Hadid swearing and telling everyone she did not want cushions in the building as they'd spoil the look of the place, but it was clear that she held a place in his affections.
For me, the building worked on every level, even though it looked slightly threatening. Jencks likened it to a geode, hard on the outside and beautiful inside.
I've visited Hadid's Riverside Museum in Glasgow a couple of times now. Once when it was still a building site and more recently as the transport-related exhibits were being brought in prior to it opening to the public on June 21.
It is being touted as Glasgow's Guggenheim and this is no understatement. It is a stunning building and from what I could see of the way the exhibits were being set up, it's going to become a favourite haunt of generations of kids and grown-up kids to come.
There are cars stacked on walls, a carousel to show off the incredible collection of model ships, a mad indoor velodrome, a film set-like Glasgow street which moves through the decades from Victorian days to recent memory and much, much more. All set within Hadid's seamless building. Outside it looks jaggy - like her Maggie's Centre - but inside, it's a beautiful space. Perfect for its purpose. Not sure about the pistachio green colour, but you can't have everything.
Hadid has now agreed to do an 'in-conversation' at Kelvingrove ahead of the official opening. This is happening on June 9 and has been organised by the Riverside Museum Appeal and The Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Art.
In Conversation With Zaha Hadid will be hosted by Deyan Sudjic, journalist, author, academic and, currently, Director of the Design Museum in London . Deyan has close links to Glasgow when in 1999 he was Director the City’s year as the UK City of Architecture and Design.
The event will be held in the Central Hall of Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum as part of the 150th anniversary celebrations of the Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Art.
All proceeds from ticket sales will go towards the Riverside Museum Appeal. The public appeal is aiming to raise £5 million toward the cost of the new museum. More details can be found at www.riversideappeal.org
The Riverside Museum will open to the public on 21 June 2011.
