The Sainsbury Centre is an
art gallery
An art gallery is a room or a building in which visual art is displayed. In Western cultures from the mid-15th century, a gallery was any long, narrow covered passage along a wall, first used in the sense of a place for art in the 1590s. The lon ...
and
museum located on the
campus
A campus is traditionally the land on which a college or university and related institutional buildings are situated. Usually a college campus includes libraries, lecture halls, residence halls, student centers or dining halls, and park-like se ...
of the
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a public research university in Norwich, England. Established in 1963 on a campus west of the city centre, the university has four faculties and 26 schools of study. The annual income of the institution f ...
,
Norwich,
England. The building, which contains a collection of world art, was one of the first major public buildings to be designed by the
architect
An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
s
Norman Foster and
Wendy Cheesman, completed in 1978.
[ The building became grade II* ]listed
Listed may refer to:
* Listed, Bornholm, a fishing village on the Danish island of Bornholm
* Listed (MMM program), a television show on MuchMoreMusic
* Endangered species in biology
* Listed building, in architecture, designation of a historicall ...
in December 2012.
Design
The Sainsbury Centre building was opened in 1978. It was designed between 1974 and 1976 by the then relatively unknown architect Foster (now Lord Foster). According to Chris Abel, the building exemplifies Foster's early work of "a regular structure embracing all functions within a single, flexible enclosure, or 'universal space'" where "the design is all about allowing for change, internally and externally." The Sainsbury Centre also demonstrates Foster's characteristic work methods of "design development", or "integrated design".[ It is situated on the western edge of the university's campus, beside the ]River Yare
The River Yare is a river in the English county of Norfolk. In its lower reaches it is one of the principal navigable waterways of The Broads and connects with the rest of the network.
The river rises south of Dereham to the west to the v ...
, and also houses the School of World Art Studies and Museology. Foster said of the building "A building is only as good as its client and the architecture of the Sainsbury Centre is inseparable from the enlightenment and the driving force of the Sainsburys themselves and the support of the University of East Anglia."
The main building is sited on sloping, turfed ground, and consists of a large cuboid
In geometry, a cuboid is a hexahedron, a six-faced solid. Its faces are quadrilaterals. Cuboid means "like a cube", in the sense that by adjusting the length of the edges or the angles between edges and faces a cuboid can be transformed into a cub ...
, clad
Cladding is an outer layer of material covering another. It may refer to the following:
* Cladding (boiler), the layer of insulation and outer wrapping around a boiler shell
*Cladding (construction), materials applied to the exterior of buildings ...
steel structure. One face is almost entirely glazed, with the prefabricated skeleton clearly visible. Internally, the museum gives the impression of being one vast open space, lacking any internal divisions to interfere with the interplay of natural and artificial light. Services, lighting, toilets and maintenance access are housed in triangular towers and trusses, and between the external cladding and internal aluminium
Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. It has ...
louvres.
In 1988, ten years after its opening, the entire cladding had to be replaced, the aluminum panels having deteriorated beyond repair.
By the late 1980s, the collection had outgrown its accommodation, and Foster was asked to design an extension. Rather than simply extending the existing structure as had been envisaged 15 years earlier, it was decided to look below ground. The sloping site allowed for an enlarged basement
A basement or cellar is one or more floors of a building that are completely or partly below the ground floor. It generally is used as a utility space for a building, where such items as the furnace, water heater, breaker panel or fuse box ...
to emerge at a curved glass frontage overlooking a man-made lake (an echo of the nearby 13th century Norfolk Broads
Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North ...
). There is little clue of the extent of the new wing, except when viewed from the position of the lake. The crescent wing was built by Anthony Hunt Associates
Anthony James Hunt (22 June 1932 – 16 August 2022), familiarly known as Tony Hunt, was a British structural engineer of numerous world-renowned buildings, with a career spanning from the 1950s until his retirement in 2002. As a leading propo ...
and opened in 1991.
Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Collection
In 1973, Sir Robert Sainsbury
Sir Robert James Sainsbury (24 October 19062 April 2000), was the son of John Benjamin Sainsbury (the eldest son of John James Sainsbury, the founder of Sainsbury's supermarkets) and along with his wife Lisa began the collection of modern and t ...
and Lady Lisa Sainsbury donated to the university their collection of over 300 artworks and objects, which they had been accumulating since the 1930s. The collection has since increased in size to several thousand works spanning over 5,000 years of human endeavour, including pieces by Jacob Epstein, Henry Moore (numerous sculptures can be found dotted around the grounds of the university), Alberto Giacometti
Alberto Giacometti (, , ; 10 October 1901 – 11 January 1966) was a Swiss sculptor, painter, Drafter, draftsman and Printmaking, printmaker. Beginning in 1922, he lived and worked mainly in Paris but regularly visited his hometown Borgonovo, ...
, and Francis Bacon, alongside art from Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
(including a 'Fang Reliquary Head' from Gabon and the Nigerian 'Head of an Oba'), Asia
Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...
, North
North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography.
Etymology
The word ''north'' is ...
and South America, the Pacific region, medieval Europe and the ancient Mediterranean.
Filming Location
In June 2014, the centre was used for filming several scenes of the 2015 motion pictures '' Avengers: Age of Ultron''"Avengers: Age of Ultron being filmed at UEA"
'' Norwich Evening News'', 13 June 2014. and ''Ant-Man
Ant-Man is the name of several superheroes appearing in books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Stan Lee, Larry Lieber and Jack Kirby, Ant-Man's first appearance was in '' Tales to Astonish'' #27 (January 1962) but first appeared in costum ...
''.
References
Bibliography
* Hooper, Steven (ed.), with photography by James Austin James Austin may refer to:
Sports
* Jim Austin (baseball) (born 1963), former baseball pitcher
* Jim Austin (rugby league), New Zealand rugby league player
* James Austin (judoka) (born 1983), English judoka
* James Austin (American football) ( ...
(1997).
Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Collection
' (3 vols.). New Haven and London: Yale University Press
External links
*
Architect Foster and Partners web page about the building
{{authority control
Buildings and structures completed in 1978
Museums in Norwich
Musical instrument museums
University of East Anglia
University museums in the United Kingdom
Art museums and galleries in Norfolk
Foster and Partners buildings
Art museums established in 1978
1978 establishments in England
Asian art museums in the United Kingdom