Nan Gallery / AZL architects

Architects: AZL architects
Location: Nanjing, Jiangsu Province, China
Project Team: Zhang Lei, You Shaoping, Yuan Zhongwei
Project area: 230 sqm
Project year: 2007
Photographs: Nacasa & Partners

The project was a renovation from a used boiler house of local chemical engineering institute into an art gallery. The Nan Gallery is covered by a corrugated panel façade and employs Corten steel for the main entrance gate. The building’s weathering pattern enmeshes it into its context, and after only a few months the contemporary structure was temporally ambiguous. The result was an infusion of post-industrial character into its site and programme.

Careful consideration for the existing brick chimney further connects the Gallery with its site. The transition from outside to in could not be starker, with clean white gallery space made all the more pure in contrast with the rough and weathered exterior. The seven metre tall exhibition space is very conducive to exhibitions, with nuanced architectural expression in clear deference to artwork on display.

The unity of opposites, realistic materials, and visual games foster a sense of balance and self-sufficiency.