We have been asked to make a Museum to house the Olnick Spanu collection of Italian Arte Povera. A museum in the style of the Phillips Collection in Washington where the owners’ house became home to the collection.
The project envisages a cube 20x20x20 m that is white on the outside and white on the inside. Its location is within a dense wood and a basic condition is that it should have large walls on which to hang the collection.
The floor space is divided into four squares of double height. These spaces are placed vertically so that the double heights interconnect via the common space of single height, with an ascending helicoidal arrangement of these spaces. It is the same mechanism that we used in the Turégano House, but this time with much larger dimensions and reaching out to the four quadrants.
It is devised in such a way that visitors can make their way around the edges of this large space while always retaining a general view of the works hanging against the white draped background of the walls.
Skylights are perforated in the roof and windows high up on the walls will serve to provide optimum lighting.