The Stedelijk Museum’s mobile Construction Cabin in front of the temporary, and recently abandoned premises of the museum.

For more than four years the Stedelijk Museum was temporarily housed in a former postal building near Amsterdam’s central station. After selling the last ticket on September 30, the museum abandoned the space and has become homeless until the end of next year. As late as December 2009, after more than half a decade of renovation and expansion, the illustrious museum will finally re-open at its original location in the centre of the Dutch capital. Due to a combination of legal procedures, financial constraints and construction delays the museum was not finished in time to enable a smooth transition.

However, this forced nomadic existence has not stopped the museum from looking for new and daring ways to stay in touch with its audience and to reach out to new and younger target groups. In a radical attempt to go beyond its own traditional boundaries and to live up to its outspoken ambition to become the fifth museum for modern and contemporary art in the world, the Stedelijk has launched an extensive programme of off-site events that will literally take the museum to the streets of Amsterdam. It consists of both major themed exhibitions of works from the collection at counterpart institutions, such as the Van Gogh Museum and the Nieuwe Kerk, and contemporary art events scattered throughout Amsterdam. The museum has even appointed a group of so-called ‘Eye Openers’, teenagers who (help) organize activities, guided tours and events for people of their own age and act as consultants to the museum.

The newly developed website www.stedelijkindestad.nl contains information in Dutch and English about all activities of the ‘Stedelijk without walls’.

The most striking example of the Stedelijk’s eagerness to overcome the self-created vacuum and to engage with new audiences is the so-called Construction Cabin on Tour. This mobile structure will travel through Amsterdam, from the picture postcard city center to the less picturesque suburbs, and will accommodate various activities. Once installed it unfolds like a Swiss Army Knife, with tilt and turn doors and windows that (un)cover a small coffee corner, an information terminal, and a small flexible space that can be used for film screenings, educational activities and other small-scale gatherings. The mirror-finish look of the polished stainless steel on the inside reflects the surroundings of the Cabin, enabling the museum to blend into the world beyond its own walls.

The Construction Cabin, designed by Niels van Eijk and Miriam van der Lubbe, as a computer rendering (left) and during the official presentation (right).

Click here for a WMV impression (PC) of the new Stedelijk Museum.
Click here for a Quicktime impression (Mac) of the new Stedelijk.
Open the Stedelijk Museum’s photostream in Flickr

Related posts:  Tours of the future, but yet unfinished Stedelijk  //  Japans ritueel voor een veilig Stedelijk  //

This entry was posted on maandag, oktober 6th, 2008 at 11:30 pm and is filed under Architecture, Art, Europe, Exhibition, Museum. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.