VENICE BIENNALE 2005: EXPANSION-NEGLECT, ITALY, VENICE, 2005
AMO s Contribution to the Venice Architecture Biennale 2005
By OMA © All rights reserved
Does every museum in the world need to be modernized?
Do all museums have to adhere to the same technical conditions?
Do all museums have to be extended and Updated?
more..
Or can a certain amount of inaction, a certain resistance to change actually be instrumental in maintaining a degree of the authenticity so frequently erased by modernization? Can the architect, a person usually hired to change the conditions he finds, perform more like an archaeologist, scrupulously examining the current conditions, and proposing new forms of organization that allow each element to enjoy renewed value?

The Hermitage project cannot be understood in strictly architectural terms; in fact, it cannot be understood along any of the classical definitions of a project. The “Hermitage Project” is not a project: it is a concentration of different issues that can only be resolved successfully by taking a more comprehensive approach – curatorial or intellectual. Rather than a confident imposition of the new, the task at hand is to find those changes that will allow the Hermitage, without being too manifest, to function better.

During the last three years, AMO/OMA has worked as a consultant for the Guggenheim - Hermitage Foundation on scenarios for the museum’s future. The central issue at stake is how to modernize the Hermitage Museum while accepting one of Russia’s great legacies on its own terms. The Hermitage is examined as a whole: its functioning as a museum, its future position, its integral participation in the city of St. Petersburg …
CREDITS
Partners in charge:
Rem Koolhaas, Reinier de Graaf

Team:
Emilie Gomart, Holger Pausch, Alexander Reichert, Joao Leal Bravo da Costa, Mendel Robbers, Samir Bantal, Felix Madrazo, Brendan McGetrick, Jens Hommert and Todd Reisz


PUBLICATIONS
Haaretz, 06/06/2005
de Volkskrant, 10/06/2005
the Observer, 12/06/2005
the Financial Times, 18/06/2005

the New Scotsman, 18/06/2005
Archined, 11/07/2005
Kunstbeeld, 08/2005
Fondazione La Biennale di Venezia, 06/2005
NRC Handelsblad, 14/06/2005
Arts Fairs International, 12/06/2005
Studio #161, 08/2005