Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2007 by Olafur Eliasson and Kjetil Thorsen

Serpentine Gallery director Julia Peyton-Jones discusses the spinning top-shaped 2007 Serpentine Gallery Pavilion designed by Olafur Eliasson and Kjetil Thorsen in the next instalment of our exclusive video series. Danish-Icelandic artist Eliasson and Norwegian architect Thorsen of Snøhetta collaborated to design the Serpentine Gallery Pavilion in 2007. “It’s the only time an artist has been involved in designing the pavilion,” says Peyton-Jones in the movie. “We wanted to broaden out the selection to see if by introducing an artist there would be a different kind of view on the whole project. Of course, there was.” Eliasson and Thorsen created a timber-clad structure with a ramp spiralling around the outside. The sides of the ramp featured a series of white louvres made from twisted cord, but were otherwise open so that visitors could look out onto the park as they walked up. “What Olafur and Kjetil designed was something that looked very much like a spinning top,” Peyton-Jones says. “It was a very interesting pavilion because it was the first structure that really used the pavilion as a way of having a different kind of perspective on the park.”