2026-04-19T19:16:07Zhttps://recercat.cat/oai/requestoai:recercat.cat:2117/4271392025-07-22T23:50:30Zcom_2072_1033col_2072_452951
RECERCAT
author
Guo, Lina
2024-10-21
This thesis
focuses on the project evolution
of Tate Modern (London), a successful
museum renovated by Swiss architects Herzog &
de Meuron (H&dM). However, it starts with a different
approach: evaluating the drawings from a media perspective.
By examining the drawings published by various print media
including professional magazines and books over different period, the
thesis covers the project spanning over 20 years, from the competition in
1994 to its second realization in 2016 and subsequent developments to the
present day, encompassing two distinct phases: renovation (TM1) and extension
(TM2). Drawings selected cover conventional types such as floor plans, sections,
elevations, master plans etc. As drawing is the main language for architects, each type
of drawing conveys distinct information. Collectively, they provide a comprehensive
understanding of the project. For readers, they serve as significant tools to understand
architectural projects. Throughout the years, the drawings of tate modern in each project
phase are published by one of the magazines continuously almost every single year, from
the early publication by ANY in 1996, several times by Spanish El Croquis, once by German
Detail, etc. Forming a chronology where the evolution of drawings is obvious. Meanwhile,
Tate Modern is regarded by Herzog & de Meuron as their core project in the development of
the firm. During the long collaboration with the Tate, they gradually became capable of doing
international projects and gained fame globally. Not a coincidence, three chronologies overlap:
first is the evolution of the project Tate Modern; the other is evolution of drawings in print
media publications; and the third is the development of architects and the firm. Through such
juxtaposition, we can see there are subtle influence and interactions between one another.
Print media is a special type of publication compared with other the popular internet based
media nowadays on account of its distinguished features like its physical materility, restriction
on pages and format, periodicity, and editorial decision. For this reason, compared with original
archives, print media, especially magazines, could only cover part of the story. But when we
compare between various paperbacks, it is obvious that drawings are selected or neglected, same
set of drawings are presented in different styles under various editorial decisions, arranged in
different typology, graphic design, layout, and image-text relations and distributions. As far as
accessibility to local and online libraries, publications that have published the entire project
of Tate Modern are collected as many as possible, at the end being sufficient to develop a
understanding of the essential stages of the project evolution. Simultaneously, in order to
achieve a better understanding of reasons behind differences between versions of drawing
types, this thesis combs through the versions according to time, discover several "cuts"
in the project evolution which then become essential phases to understand the evolution
process. By overlapping the chronologies of versions of drawings and the development
of H&deM office, we can also find out how the versions of published drawings are
related to their management. After all, it is a journey of discovering how architects
present a single project in different period and publications. The methology by
tracing architectural drawings through media is potential to explore more
contemporary and historical projects.
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Open Access Attribution 4.0 International
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Arquitectura::Tipologies d'edificis
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Arquitectura::Sistemes de representació arquitectònica::Dibuix
Tate Modern (Gallery)
Art museum architecture -- Great Britain -- London
Architectural drawing
Tate Modern (Galeria)
Museus d'art -- Arquitectura -- Gran Bretanya -- Londres
Dibuix arquitectònic
Architectural drawings of Tate Modern in the print media
Master thesis