鄂尔多斯美术馆

Location：Ordos, Inner Mongolia

Completion: 2007

When we first arrived on this wild land in 2005, the new Ordos district had a ambitious development plan of accommodating a population of half a million by 2020. The assignment of designing an art museum in such a raw landscape with a function fitting with the future city seems to give a lot of freedom to the designer, but can also resent a great challenge. The building must cross over time and space, originating from and preserving the memory of the existing natural while meeting future urban needs. The building is designed as a sculptural volume sitting on top of the topography and witness to the booming economy and future development. An “8” shape of linear public circulation undulates along its journey, interplays with the landscape, space and topography, and brings the visitors an always changing experiment between art exhibition, architecture and developing landscape.

Ordos Art Museum was opened to the public in August 2007 in this booming new district and attracted a lot of visitor to this area. However, in 2008, the overly ambitious planning and development started to collapse due to the financial crisis, and Ordos became the biggest ghost town in China. While the city is in the process of recovery from the financial crisis, this art museum remains on the sand dune, anticipating the new Ordos and waiting to fit into its urban context.