22nd Serpentine Pavilion 2023 by architect Lina Ghotmeh, West London architecture news, England architectural project pictures

22nd Serpentine Pavilion in London

5 June 2023

Design: architect Lina Ghotmeh

Location: Kensington Gardens, West London, UK

Serpentine 22nd Pavilion, London

London – Serpentine is delighted to open the 22nd Serpentine Pavilion, designed by French-Lebanese Paris-based architect Lina Ghotmeh, at Serpentine South on Friday 9 June 2023 with Goldman Sachs supporting the annual project for the 9th consecutive year.

Inspired by the architect’s Mediterranean heritage and fervent discussions around the table over current affairs, politics, personal lives, and dreams, the Pavilion is titled À table – a French call to sit down together at a table to engage and participate in dialogue while sharing a meal. As such, the interior of the Pavilion features a concentric table along the perimeter, inviting us to convene, sit down, think, share and celebrate exchanges that enable new relationships to form.

Considering food as an expression of care, the Pavilion’s design is a space for grounding and reflection on our relationship to land, nature and environment. By offering a moment of conviviality around a table, Ghotmeh welcomes us to share the ideas, concerns, joys, dissatisfactions, responsibilities, traditions, cultural memories, and histories that bring us together.

An accompanying catalogue, designed by Paris-based studio Les Graphiquants, will feature contributions by Ali Cherri, Beatriz Colomina, Bernard Comment, Fouad Elkoury, Simone Fattal and David Zilber. It will also include a comprehensive conversation between Hans Ulrich Obrist and Lina Ghotmeh. The book will be co-published by Serpentine and Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther und Franz König, Köln, and will be available from August 2023.

A new soundscape for the Pavilion Dawn chorus has been created by artist and composer Tarek Atoui, based on Lina Ghotmeh’s sketches, architectural materials and Atoui’s ongoing research on classical and rural Arab music. It can be accessed on the Bloomberg Connects app, together with the architect’s audio introduction to the project and other material.