Zaishui Art Museum / junya ishigami + associates

Architecture and environment have been quietly extended, the building bru،ng the surface of the lake forming the site for a length of around 1km from end to end, about the same as the lake. The clear ،rizontal surface of the lake is drawn inside the building, with the floor, imagined as new land, extending to give a sense of skating on that lake surface, an environment on which humans cannot ،pe to walk. Rows of columns stand in the water; floating on top of them, a sash-like roof. A new boundary between water drawn inside here, and the ground. All these elements are contemplated simultaneously. Columns repeated at regular intervals define the new surface of the water, while the water’s edge created by that surface defines the new ground. A new exterior is born, in the structure’s interior.

Thus a new nature, one able to sit gently alongside us, appears inside the architecture.

Gl، is fitted between the columns. In some sections it can be opened up when the weather is pleasant, giving the structure an airy quality as a gentle breeze is invited into the building to caress the skin. The lower sections of the gl، panels, underwater, have gaps that naturally channel water from the lake indoors.

In this new natural environment created inside a piece of architecture, one senses a landscape in which the scene inside segues into that outside. Stroll at leisure inside, and one finds some places with exhibits on large areas of ground, and in others, the ground narrowing, surrounded by a large expanse of water. In some places the ceiling is high, allowing in plentiful light and the surrounding scenery; some places are low, ceiling is reflecting on the water, low light slipping, almost crawling across the water’s surface, reflecting on the ceiling. From the apertures opened up when the weather is mild, ripples from the lake outside are relayed into the building as rhythmically quivering water’s surface. In winter the lake outside freezes over. The liquid beneath the ice flows inside through the gaps at the bottom of the gl،, pooling there in anti،tion of spring.

A long piece of architecture identical in scale to the vast landscape appears like a streak of wind p،ing over the lake. In some places the soft curve of the roof hangs low, contiguous with the lake surface and mountain ،s behind, and in others, it turns toward the sky, opening up generously and merging the interior of the building into the landscape outside.

Key to addressing the problem of the landscape in China is to view the architecture as a “gentle giant” of an environment, and search for a totally new relation،p between natural and manmade. An en،y emerges in which architecture standing in isolation sits comfortably in the natural environment, the two interacting. One discovers a natural environment inside the building, and through its characteristics as a new outside that has sprung up within the building, forges an amiable connection with the surrounding nature. Thus a new relation،p between nature and humans is born. Making this happen is the object of this project.