Tate Modern

Tate Modern
Surrey
Tate Modern (the Bankside Power Station)
Type:	Art gallery
Location
Grid reference:	TQ32008045
Location:	51°30’27"N, 0°5’58"W
History
	Built 1947 to 1963 (gallery from 2000)
	Art gallery
Information
Owned by:	Tate
Website:	tate.org.uk/modern

Tate Modern is a modern art gallery built within the converted Bankside Power Station on the south bank of the River Thames in Southwark in Surrey. It is Britain's national gallery of international modern art and forms part of the Tate group (together with Tate Britain, Tate Liverpool, Tate St Ives and Tate Online). It holds the national collection of British art from 1900 to the present day and international modern and contemporary art.

Tate Modern is one of the largest museums of modern and contemporary art in the world. As with the United Kingdom's other national galleries and museums, there is no admission charge for access to the collection displays, which take up the majority of the gallery space, while tickets must be purchased for the major temporary exhibitions.

History

Bankside Power Station

The Turbine Hall

The Bankside Power Station, which now houses Tate Modern, stands directly across the river from St Paul's Cathedral. It was originally built in Southwark by the City of London Electric Lighting Company Limited as a coal-fired power station providing electricity to the City of London and the Surrey town which hosted it. It was built at a wharf on the Thames in order to receive shipments of coal directly from barges.

The station was designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, the architect of Battersea Power Station, and built in two stages between 1947 and 1963. The power station closed in 1981.

Before redevelopment, the power station was a building 650 feet long, constructed of a steel frame, brick clad, with a substantial central chimney standing 325 feet high. The structure was roughly divided into three main areas each running east-west – the huge main Turbine Hall in the centre, with the boiler house to the north and the switch house to the south.

Initial redevelopment

For many years after closure Bankside Power station was at risk of being demolished by developers. Campaigners called for the building to be saved and put forward suggestions for possible new uses. An application to list the building was refused. In April 1994 the Tate Gallery announced that Bankside would be the home for the new Tate Modern. In July of the same year, an international competition was launched to select an architect for the new gallery. Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron of Herzog & de Meuron were announced as the winning architects in January 1995. The £134 million conversion to the Tate Modern started in June 1995 and completed in January 2000.

The most obvious external change was the two-story glass extension on one half of the roof. Much of the original internal structure remained, including the cavernous main turbine hall, which retained the overhead travelling crane. An electrical substation, taking up the Switch House in the southern third of the building, remained on-site and owned by the French power company EDF Energy while Tate took over the northern Boiler House for Tate Modern's main exhibition spaces.

View from Tate Modern balcony

Opening and initial reception

Tate Modern was opened by The Queen on 11 May 2000.

Tate Modern received 5.25 million visitors in its first year. The previous year the three existing Tate galleries had received 2.5 million visitors combined.

Extension project

Tate Modern had attracted more visitors than originally expected and plans to expand it had been in preparation since 2004. These plans focused on the south west of the building with the intention of providing 54,000 sq. ft of new display space, almost doubling the amount of display space.

The southern third of the building was retained by the French power company EDF Energy as an electrical substation. In 2006, the company released the western half of this holding and plans were made to replace the structure with a tower extension to the museum, initially planned to be completed in 2015. The tower was to be built over the old oil storage tanks, which would be converted to a performance art space. Structural, geotechnical, civil, and façade engineering and environmental consultancy was undertaken by Ramboll between 2008 and 2016.

This project was initially costed at £215 million. Of the money raised, £50 million came from the UK government; £7 million from the London Development Agency; £6 million from philanthropist John Studzinski; and donations from, among others, the Sultanate of Oman and Elisabeth Murdoch.

In June 2013, international shipping and property magnate Eyal Ofer pledged £10m to the extension project, making it to 85% of the required funds. Eyal Ofer, chairman of London-based Zodiac Maritime Agencies, said the donation made through his family foundation would enable "an iconic institution to enhance the experience and accessibility of contemporary art". The Tate director, Nicholas Serota, praised the donation saying it would help to make Tate Modern a "truly twenty-first-century museum".

The Tanks

The first phase of the expansion involved the conversion of three large, circular, underground oil tanks originally used by the power station into accessible display spaces and facilities areas. These opened on 18 July 2012 and closed on 28 October 2012 as work on the tower building continued directly above. They reopened following the completion of the Switch House extension on 17 June 2016.

Two of the Tanks are used to show live performance art and installations while the third provides utility space. Tate describes them as "the world's first museum galleries permanently dedicated to live art".

The Switch House

Exterior of the Switch House

A ten-storey tower, 213 feet high from ground level, was built above the oil tanks.

The original western half of the Switch House was demolished to make room for the tower and then rebuilt around it with large gallery spaces and access routes between the main building and the new tower on level 1 (ground level) and level 4. The new galleries on level 4 have natural top lighting. A bridge built across the turbine hall on level 4 to provides an upper access route.

The new building opened to the public on 17 June 2016.

The design, again by Herzog & de Meuron, has been controversial. It was originally designed with a glass stepped pyramid, but this was amended to incorporate a sloping façade in brick latticework (to match the original power-station building) despite planning consent to the original design having been previously granted by the supervising authority.

The extension provides 242,102 sq. feet of additional gross internal area for display and exhibition spaces, performance spaces, education facilities, offices, catering and retail facilities as well as a car parking and a new external public space.

In May 2017 the Switch House was formally renamed the Blavatnik Building, after British-Ukrainian billionaire Sir Leonard Blavatnik, who contributed a "substantial" amount of the £260m cost of the extension. Sir Nicholas Serota commented "Len Blavatnik's enthusiastic support ensured the successful realisation of the project and I am delighted that the new building now bears his name".

Galleries

The collections in Tate Modern consist of works of international modern and contemporary art dating from 1900 until today.

Levels 2, 3 and 4 contain gallery space. Each of those floors is split into a large east and west wing with at least 11 rooms in each. Space between these wings is also used for smaller galleries on levels 2 and 4. The Boiler House shows art from 1900 to the present day.

The Switch House has eleven floors, numbered 0 to 10. Levels 0, 2, 3 and 4 contain gallery space. Level 0 consists of the Tanks, spaces converted from the power station's original fuel oil tanks, while all other levels are housed in the tower extension building constructed above them. The Switch House shows art from 1960 to the present day.

The Turbine Hall is a single large space running the whole length of the building between the Boiler House and the Switch House. At six stories tall it represents the full height of the original power station building. It is cut by bridges between the Boiler House and the Switch House on levels 1 and 4 but the space is otherwise undivided. The western end consists of a gentle ramp down from the entrance and provides access to both sides on level 0. The eastern end provides a very large space that can be used to show exceptionally large artworks due its unusual height.

Exhibitions

Collection exhibitions

A gallery at Tate Modern

The main collection displays consist of eight areas with a named theme or subject. Within each area there are some rooms that change periodically showing different works in keeping with the overall theme or subject. The themes are changed less frequently. There is no admission charge for these areas.

As of June 2016 the themed areas were:

• Start Display: A three-room display of works by major artists to introduce the basic ideas of modern art.
• Artist and Society
• In The Studio
• Materials and Objects
• Media Networks
• Between Object and Architecture
• Performer and Participant
• Living Cities

There is also an area dedicated to displaying works from the Artist Rooms collection.

History of the collection exhibitions

Chimney of Tate Modern, with the Swiss Light dismantled in 2008

Since the Tate Modern first opened in 2000, the collections have not been displayed in chronological order but have been arranged thematically into broad groups. Prior to the opening of the Switch House there were four of these groupings at a time, each allocated a wing on levels 3 and 5 (now levels 2 and 4).

The initial hanging from 2000 to 2006:

• History/Memory/Society
• Nude/Action/Body
• Landscape/Matter/Environment
• Still Life/Object/Real Life

The first rehang at Tate Modern opened in May 2006, eschewing the thematic groupings in favour of focusing on pivotal moments of twentieth-century art. It also introduced spaces for shorter exhibitions in between the wings:

• Material Gestures
• Poetry and Dream
• Energy and Process
• States of Flux

In 2012 there was a partial third rehang:

• Poetry and Dream
• Structure and Clarity
• Transformed Visions
• Energy and Process
• Setting the Scene – A smaller section, located between wings, covering installations with theatrical or fictional themes.

Temporary exhibitions

The Turbine Hall

Ólafur Elíasson, The Weather Project (2004)

Rachel Whiteread, EMBANKMENT (2005)

The Turbine hall, which once housed the electricity generators of the old power station, is five storeys tall with 36,600 sq. ft of floorspace. It is used to display large specially-commissioned works by contemporary artists, between October and March each year.

Major temporary exhibitions

Two wings of the Boiler House are used to stage the major temporary exhibitions for which an entry fee is charged. These exhibitions normally run for three or four months. When they were located on a single floor, the two exhibition areas could be combined to host a single exhibition. This was done for the Gilbert and George retrospective due to the size and number of the works. Currently the two wings used are on level 3. It is not known if this arrangement is permanent. Each major exhibition has a dedicated mini-shop selling books and merchandise relevant to the exhibition.

The Tanks

The Tanks, located on level 0, are three large underground oil tanks, connecting spaces and side rooms originally used by the power station and refurbished for use by the gallery. One tank is used to display installation and video art specially commissioned for the space while smaller areas are used to show installation and video art from the collection. The Tanks have also been used as a venue for live music.

Project Space

The Project Space (formerly known as the Level 2 Gallery) was a smaller gallery located on the north side of the Boiler House on level 1 which housed exhibitions of contemporary art in collaboration with other international art organisations. Its exhibitions typically ran for 2–3 months and then travelled to the collaborating institution for display there. The space was only accessible by leaving the building and re-entering using a dedicated entrance. It is no longer used as gallery space.

Other areas

Works are also sometimes shown in the restaurants and members' rooms. Other locations that have been used in the past include the mezzanine on Level 1 and the north facing exterior of the Boiler House building.

Other facilities

In addition to exhibition space there are a number of other facilities:

• A large performance space in one of the tanks on level 0 used to show a changing programme of performance works for which there is sometimes an entrance charge.
• The Starr Auditorium and a seminar room on level 1 which are used to show films and host events for which there is usually an entrance charge.
• The Clore Education Centre, Clore Information Room and McAulay Studios on level 0 which are facilities for use by visiting educational institutions.
• One large and several small shops selling books, prints and merchandise.
• A café, an espresso bar, a restaurant and bar and a members' room.
• Tate Modern community garden, co-managed with Bankside Open Spaces Trust

Tate Modern on the opening day of the Millennium Bridge in 2000

Outside links

("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Tate Modern)

• Tate: Modern
• Inside Bankside Power Station with Antony Gormley 1991 - YouTube
• Extension project description

References

• 'The Tate Modern and the Battle for London's Soul': Reif Larsen in The New York Times, 18 July 2017 (ISSN 0362-4331)