NGV Contemporary
Design Competition
Design Competition
NGV Contemporary
Design Competition
Client:
National Gallery Victoria and Development Victoria
Location:
Melbourne, VIC
Status:
Final 4 of open design competition 2021
In Collaboration:
Durbach Block Jaggers; Edition Office; Openwork
Scale:
30,500 sqm
Value:
$550 million
Contact Person:
Dr Stephen Long
NGV Contemporary is a place, not a monument.
Its landscape and built form have equal value.
Its understanding begins with Country.
NGV Contemporary is a companion to a networked precinct, not a stand-alone building.
It is permeable, not hermetic.
It is a part of the city, not an island.
NGV Contemporary embraces the plural and rejects the singular.
It is a forum for conversation, not monologue.
It is coherent, connected, radical.
In 2021, the collaborative team of Architectus, Durbach Block Jaggers, Edition Office and Openwork, known as FIELD, progressed to the final shortlist of four over a four-stage design competition for the National Gallery of Victoria Contemporary Gallery.
The FIELD proposal was designed to offer audiences a rich, layered experience – a canvas for art, performance, education, nature and public life that is always changing, always inviting and always inspiring.
No longer a palace, temple or vault, the contemporary gallery becomes a place of egalitarian welcome.
Balancing its multiple, overlapping, it’s a civic space of exploration and inspiration, of openness and containment.
With its changing canvas of exhibitions and experiences, NGV Contemporary is visited over and over and is never the same twice.
The design speaks directly to the pressing issues of climate and Country. The building is a producer not a consumer. With its softened geography, connecting to the familiarity of natural form, both ancient and contemporary, it’s a distinctive landmark within a transformed precinct.
The shapely textured clay surface holds the daily changes of earth and sky, reflecting the many moods of Melbourne. Its dappled, butterfly light animates the social spaces of the interior.
In a city that wears culture proudly, this gallery will be the precinct’s most welcoming door, the Arrival Gallery its charged civic room.
The NGV Contemporary is a place of gentle embrace and clear ambition. A soft cloak enclosing and revealing a hive of adventure.
FIELD’s vision is for a landmark destination within the nation, ground-breaking for its capacity to connect us to Country, to culture, to community and to the world.
Thank you:
–Daniel Browning, our First Nations advisor
–Finding Infinity for a ground-breaking sustainability strategy
–WSP for all engineering
–Ceramicist Kate Jones design
–Ned Donohoe for videos
–Narrative Graphics, Filippo Bolognese Images and Mogamma for renders, and
–Surface Design, Speirs Major, Lovell Chen, Art Processors, FROST and Karen Milward for their support.
MoreLess
Client:
National Gallery Victoria and Development Victoria
Location:
Melbourne, VIC
Status:
Final 4 of open design competition 2021
In Collaboration:
Durbach Block Jaggers; Edition Office; Openwork
Scale:
30,500 sqm
Value:
$550 million
Contact Person:
Dr Stephen Long
Key People
Dr Stephen Long
Principal
Brisbane
Canberra
Ruth Wilson
Principal
CCO
Sector Leader Public
Melbourne
Luke Johnson
Principal
Sydney
Sophie Cleland
Principal
Melbourne
Canberra
