The Serpentine Pavilion art gallery in London has been postponed due to Covid. Nevertheless, this delay only gives Sumayya Vally and her co-architects more time to see their vision through. Each year, a new architect designs the gallery, bringing fresh ideas to the popular London space.
This year, Vally will take on the project with her all-female architect team at Counterspace. They plan to employ a series of modern technologies to build an ecologically sustainable and beautiful building.
“Rather than rush to execute Counterspace’s stellar design as soon as it is safe to do so, the Serpentine has chosen to accept the slowness reshaping society today and utilize it to develop a deeper relationship with the architects … [and] to draw more meaningful connections between their Pavilion and the people, communities, and nature of London,“ writes World-Architects.com.
Sumayya Vally leads Counterspace, “an interdisciplinary architectural studio.” They have the task of designing the Pavilion, which will be used as a cultural and debate space.
Counterspace, dedicated to socially conscious architecture
Established in 2015 in Johannesburg, South Africa, Counterspace isn’t just an architectural firm. In addition, it’s a publishing platform and research space.
“The studio occupies a space between the functional and the speculative; pedagogy and praxis; simultaneously describing cities and their histories and futures, and imagining them,” says the firm’s website. Vally explains one such example here an image of a Shembe ritual.
Some other projects include the following:
The Brixton Mosque, a “minaret made of light [that] appears only at 5 times in the day.”
Parallel Nationalisms – Sumayya Vally
Vally sees architecture as another way to explore history
“My favorite materials to work with are light, color, and sound,” says Vally. “Architecture is about creating atmospheres.”
Vally’s work often focuses on the combination of history, social responsibility, and trauma. She usually calls Counterspace’s projects “obsessions,” to emphasize the degree to which she engages with the work and sees it as more than just a task. She considers her art activism, as well. “All practice, intentionally or unintentionally, is complicit in perpetuating various philosophies, where one is aware of it or not,” Vally explains.
“I believe that forces of representation and difference – being a woman, being Muslim, being African, and so many other factors that the young people I work with and teach being, are strengths that allow us to see and think differently,” Vally tells Whitewall.
Sumayya Vally will explore community and gathering in her work on the Serpentine Pavilion
For the last 20 years, architects have used the Serpentine Pavilion as a creative platform. The gallery within it offers space for various events – even royal ones. The artistic director of the Pavilion, Hans Ulbrich Obrist, told The Guardian that he was excited to be working with Counterspace this year.
“The idea of working with different communities is very important for us and Counterspace’s proposal does this in a remarkable way,” he said. He then added that they especially appreciated the “social dimension of [Counterspace’s] practice.”
A key part of Counterspace’s proposal includes the use of ecofriendly materials like cork and K-Briq modules, made of 90% recycled materials.
Serpentine Pavilion model – Sumayya Vally
“As an object, experienced through movement, it has continuity and consistency,” said Vally. “But difference and variation are embedded into the essential gesture at every turn.”
The pandemic has rendered gathering spaces nearly useless. So, Counterspace will be using the extra time to emphasize the “themes of community and gathering sharply into focus – allowing us the opportunity to extend and deepen our engagement process over two years.”
Explore more of Counterspace’s work and ideas here.
