Architecture Room at this Year’s Royal Academy Summer Exhibition

ARCHITECTURE ROOM AT THIS YEAR’S ROYAL ACADEMY SUMMER EXHIBITION

APRIL 2022

Níall McLaughlin and artist Rana Begum will co-curate the architecture room at this year’s Royal

Academy Summer Exhibition. Celebrated British sculptor Alison Wilding RA will co-ordinate the 254th exhibtion.

This year Wilding will explore the theme of Climate. “The theme of Summer Exhibition 2022 is

CLIMATE in all its manifestations. Whether it presents as crisis or opportunity, nightmare or

memories, or simply our everyday experience of weather, - CLIMATE is a huge all-embracing and

urgent subject.”

The Summer Exhibition is the world’s largest open submission contemporary art show which has

taken place every year without interruption since 1769. The members of the Summer Exhibition

Committee serve in rotation, ensuring that every year the exhibition has a distinctive character, with

each Royal Academician responsible for a particular gallery space. Works from all over the world are

judged democratically on merit and the final selection is made during the eight-day hang within the

galleries.

ATHLETES OCCUPY OLYMPIC HOUSING

AUGUST 2012

In the run up to the London Olympics, the Athletes’ Village housing block N15, is now occupied with athletes’ preparing for the games. Niall McLaughlin Architects have designed the external skin of the housing block on a ‘chassis’ designed by Glen Howells. The facade samples fragments of the Elgin Marbles, scanned from the British Museum and converted into 3D pre-cast panels depicting galloping horses from the Parthenon Frieze.

Niall McLaughlin commented on the practice’s approach to the unusual commission in Building Design. ‘I was very interested in the principle of the facade being delaminated from the building’s core form. Usually it’s something one tries to swim against to retain a sense of ‘authenticity’, but here we decided to embrace it….I like the idea of setting Ruskin’s conception of the craftsman against the absolute Taylorism of the construction process. Through digital reproduction, these deracinated stones are now doubly lost.’ (Building Design 27.01.2012)