Kunsthaus Graz - GRAZ ART MUSEUM

He encontrado este articulo muy bonito sobre el Museo de Arte de Graz, "Kunsthaus Graz" obra de los Arquitectos Peter Cook y Colin Fournier en la web www.arcspace.com.
Tengo que decir que hay pocos edificios que me fascinan tanto como este, que he tenido la suerte de visitar tiempo atrás en un viaje organizado.
Será quizas por sus formas tan alegres y desenfadadas , o bien por su acabado tan lucido y redondeado, seguramente este edificio singular atrae toda mi atención.
Espero que para quien aún no lo conoce sea todo un descubrimiento, como lo ha sido para mi.
 Aquí os transcrivo integralmente en articulo en inglés:

"While the building's interior is meant to inspire its curators as a "black box of hidden tricks", its outer skin is a media facade which can be changed electronically."
Colin Fournier




Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz

Located on the banks of the Mur, between the red brick roofs of neighboring historic buildings, the new architectural symbol is locally referred to as  the "friendly alien".
The interplay between the new biomorphic structure on the bank of the Mur and the old Clock Tower on the Schlossberg will become the trademark of a city which strives to achieve a productive dialogue between tradition and the avant-garde. With respect both to urban planning and to its purpose, the Kunsthaus functions as a bridgehead at a point where the past and the future meet.

Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz "Schlossberg-Nozzle"

Like a bubble of air, the bluish, shimmering skin of the Kunsthaus floats above its glass-walled ground floor. Spanning up to 60 metres in width, the biomorphic construction envelops two large exhibition rooms without additional supports.
From the surface of the acrylic glass outer "skin", strikingly shaped "nozzles" project outwards to admit daylight: they are inclined to the north and thus provide optimum natural lighting.

Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz

The main eastern facade of the Kunsthaus is augmented with an additional architectural concept called BIX which was initiated and developed by the Berlin based architects realities:united.
BIX is a matrix of 930 fluorescent lamps integrated into the eastern Plexiglas facade of the Kunsthaus. Through the possibility to individually adjust the lamp¹s brightness at an infinite variability with 20 frames/second images, films and animations can be displayed.
Thus the original architectural concept of the skin was radically redefined transforming the facade into a low resolution computer display, a "communicative display skin", fusing architecture, technology and information.
The Kunsthaus facade as a display constitutes an extraordinary medium for presenting art and related information transfers.

Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz BIX facade: "Hands Petting"

The glass-walled ground floor contains a bar, a function rooms and various communications amenities as well as the foyer, from which the "Pin", a moving ramp, leads to the upper exhibition rooms.

Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz
Café/Bar/Restaurant Les Vipères

Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz

Isolated, transparent window areas in the "skin" allow visitors to look out, while the "Needle", a projecting, glass-enclosed structure, offers a spectacular view of the Old Town of Graz from a height of about 16 metres.

Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz The "Needle"

Functionally and technically, the Kunsthaus meets the most up-to-date requirements for museums on the international loan circuit. Its 11,100m2 of usable space provide everything its managers need to participate in the global exhibition business on the highest level.

Photo: Niki Lackner
Courtesy Kunsthaus Graz, Peter Cook and Colin Fournier / LMJ Graz

As a multi-disciplinary venue for exhibitions, events and other means of presenting contemporary art, new media, and photography, the Kunsthaus Graz has a complex palette of features and functions.
In the upper storeys, bridges link the 23-meter-high new structure with the "Eisernes Haus" whose cast-iron construction - which is the oldest of its kind in Europe and is classified as a historical monument - was carefully and skilfully renovated as part of the construction work on the Kunsthaus.
Construction start: July 2001
Completed: September 2003

Plan Level 0


Plan level 4
Gross floor area: 13.100 m2
Net area: 11.100 m2
Exhibition area: 2.500 m2
Underground parking: 146 car slots
Bubble weight: 3,9 Mio kg davon Stahlbaukonstruktion 225.000 kg
Peter Cook of Archigram and Colin Fournier, who entered and won the international competition for the Kunsthaus together as "Spacelab", are both professors at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London (UCL).
For the implementation of this project, they have formed a joint venture (the Arge Kunsthaus) including their own Austrian office, Spacelab cook-fournier GmbH, the structural engineering firm Bollinger + Grohmann from Frankfurt, and the Graz firm Architektur Consult ZT GmbH as the local partner. The Arge Kunsthaus is also backed by a large team of technical specialists.


Client: Stadt Graz Kunsthaus Graz AG

Architecture:
Spacelab Cook-Fournier GmbH
Architektur Consult
Design:
Peter Cook & Colin Fournier
Niels Jonkhans
Mathis Osterhage
Marcos Cruz and team 
Nicola Haines 
Karim Hamza 
Anja Leonhäuser 
Jamie Norden    
Project management:
Kunsthaus Graz AG
Ernst Pogöschnik 
Andreas Blass 
Josef Spindler
Projektion:
Hans Lechner GmbH, Wien&
Hans Lechner Sabine Liebenau
Overall management:
ARGE Kunsthaus Designers: spacelab cook/fournier (Peter Cook / Colin Fournier) Partner Architect: Architektur Consult, Graz (Peyker, Domenig, Eisenköck) Structural Engineer: Bollinger & Grohmann, Frankfurt/M
Project team:
Dietmar Ott (Project manager)
Niels Jonkhans (design architect)
Gernot Stangl (3D-engineering)
Gerhard Eder (technical coordination)
Werner Riedl (construction supervisor)
Architekten/Ingenieure:
Johanna Digruber
Daniela Fritz
Herbert Hazmuka
Hans Robert Gobli

Fuente: www.arcspace.com mas info en wikipedia