What's So Special About the Turbine Hall?

The Turbine Hall is unique on many levels. It's size, though perhaps not so impressive compared to spaces in the US, is unparalleled in the UK. The incredibly high ceiling gives you a feeling similar to that which cathedrals and large churches do, that of awe and worship, but without the constraints of silence.
It's a place in which you don't have to switch off your phone, or speak in hushed whispers or only of intelligent observations. You can feel at home enough to scream and shout. Children can play, as can adults, they can touch the art and be a part of the art.
All the pieces are intended to create some sort of physical and emotional effect on the viewers through their interaction. They are not things you have to stand back from or walk around without touching. Perhaps it is this that makes it so successful. One can imagine what would happen if walls were just lined with canvases from one or many artists? It would be completely unimpressive.
Another reason for the popularity and success of the turbine hall is that most of the projects so far have been fun. The turbine hall seems to have become some sort of artistic and mature playground. It's taken art in a completely different direction from the stereotypical sombre, morbid, depressing etc etc art so rife in the scene these days.

Who's Next?

Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster will be the ninth Unilever Series artist for the turbine hall. She was "Chosen for her remarkable ability to create unique and immersive environments, we look forward to seeing how Gonzalez-Foerster's commission will transform our experience of the Turbine Hall," said Tate Modern director, Vicente Todoli.

She has been known to "summarise or exaggerate the nature of a space".
"Sometimes she presents large empty spaces with not very much in them".

Who? What? When?

1st. Louis Bourgeouis (12 May - 26 November 2000)



2nd. Juan Muñoz (12 June, 2001 - 10 March, 2002)



3rd. Anish Kapoor (9 October, 2002 - 6 April, 2003)



4th. Olafur Eliasson (16 October, 2003 - 21 March, 2004)



5th. Bruce Nauman (12 October, 2004 - 28 March, 2005)


(Sound Piece)

6th. Rachel Whiteread (11 October, 2005 - 1 May, 2006)



7th. Carsten Höller (10 October, 2006 - 9 April, 2007)



8th. Doris Salcedo (9 October, 2007 - 13 April, 2008)

What is it about? What is their aim?

This is what they have written:

The Unilever Series began in 2000 as part of a five-year, £1.25 million sponsorship by Unilever of an annual art commission for Tate Modern's Turbine Hall.

Broaden your perspective

In 2005, we renewed the sponsorship for a further three years, investing a further £1 million. Unlike most sponsorships, which fund exhibitions of existing works, The Unilever Series enables a leading artist to create a new work for the vast Turbine Hall every year. The public can enjoy the exhibition for free – and around thirteen million people have done that so far.

Vitality - quality of life

The Unilever Series fits with our mission to add vitality to life. We believe that vitality is about more than just looking and feeling good. It's about quality of life in its broadest sense – seeking out new experiences and stretching our minds. The Unilever Series epitomises that.

Alongside The Unilever Series, Unilever and Tate also run the Unilever International Schools Art Project, designed to promote the teaching and expression of creativity through art in children around the world.

Unilever Series

So what exactly is the 'Unilever' series? Like with many other galleries, it is just a series of exhibits by artists chosen by the Tate. In this case however, and unlike many other galleries who chose existing works by artists, the Unilever Series offers to the artist the vast space of the Turbine Hall in which to create a work of art, or in other words, the artist is commissioned to create something for that specific space.
'Unilever' is a company which produces various commercial hygiene products, such as Vaseline, Timotei Shampoo, Sure (deodorant products) etc. Due to their longstanding patronage and relationship to the Tate, they basically fund and enable the exhibitions in the Turbine Hall.
Here is what they say about their relationship with the arts:

Our commitment to the arts

Alongside our high-profile commitments to national organisations such as Tate Modern, The Royal Academy of Arts and The National Theatre, most of our arts expenditure goes to support the development of young talent, in line with our overall community programme.

Our 20-year programme of collecting contemporary art for our headquarters at Unilever House in Central London supports young and up-and-coming artists. A collection of modern art has also been established at our Home and Personal Care head office in Kingston. This is linked to a programme of employee development through creative workshops and community involvement, where members of staff volunteer to 'mentor' local arts organisations.

Unilever's commitment of £2.25m over eight years with Tate Modern has been extended to 2012. Our relationship with Tate Modern has enabled them to commission a new installation for the Turbine Hall each year. The eighth and most recent commission is by Doris Salcedo and opened on 9 October 2007.

As one of the Tate's neighbours on the Thames, Unilever was keen to support this enhancement to London's urban environment. The gallery has made a vital contribution to economic and social renewal in Southwark, bringing annual economic benefits worth £50-£90m, and creating up to 2,400 jobs. Each sponsored commission has a community and educational programme associated with it.

Tate Extension

The Tate Modern shall be undergoing some changes in the near future. It shall receive an extension on the café entrance side. This is what the Tate website says about it:

"Posted in November 21st, 2007

Award-winning architects Herzog and de Meuron are designing a new building that will be created on the south side of the existing Tate Modern gallery. Planning permission has now been granted, and the project is aiming for completion in 2012. The total costs of the development are comparable to the costs of the original Tate Modern: £165 million at today’s prices, £215 million at outturn in 2012.

The success of Tate Modern makes the new development necessary as we have around 5 million visitors a year and the present building was designed for half that number. As well as providing more space for modern and contemporary art, which will enable Tate to explore new areas of visual culture; the new building will give Tate room to develop much better visitor facilities. This is where the Great Tate Mod Blog comes in as we invite people around the world to send us photographs of their favourite spaces and designs."

Turbine Hall

Tate Modern - The building (Tate Website)

Tate Modern was created in the year 2000 to display the national collection of international modern art (defined as art since 1900). This forms part of the Tate Collection which is the national collection of British art since 1500 and international modern art. The international modern art was formerly displayed alongside the British art at what was previously the Tate Gallery and is now Tate Britain.

By about 1990 it was clear that the Tate Collection had hugely outgrown the original Tate Gallery on Millbank. It was decided to create a new gallery in London to display the international modern component of the Tate Collection. For the first time London would have a dedicated museum of modern art. At the same time, the Tate building on Millbank would neatly revert to its original intended function as the national gallery of British art.

An immediate problem was whether the modern art gallery should be a new building or a conversion of an existing building, if a suitable one could be found. As a result of extensive consultations, particularly with artists, it was decided to search for a building to convert. When the building that is now Tate Modern presented itself, it appeared something of a miracle. It was a former power station that had closed in 1982, so it was available. It was a very striking and distinguished building in its own right, by the architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott. It offered all the space that was required. Not least, it was in an amazing location on the south bank of the River Thames opposite St Paul's Cathedral and the City of London. Plans were almost immediately formulated to build a footbridge to link the new gallery to the City. The fact that the original Tate Gallery was also on the river made a satisfactory symmetry, and meant that the two could be linked by a riverboat service.

An international architectural competition was held attracting entries from practices all over the world. The final choice was Herzog and De Meuron, a relatively small and then little known Swiss firm. A key factor in this choice was that their proposal retained much of the essential character of the building. One of the shortlisted architects had, for example, proposed demolishing the splendid ninety-nine metre high chimney, a central feature of the building.

The power station consisted of a huge turbine hall, thirty-five metres high and 152 metres long, with, parallel to it, the boiler house. The turbine hall became a dramatic entrance area, with ramped access, as well as a display space for very large sculptural projects. The boiler house became the galleries. These are on three levels running the full length of the building. The galleries are disposed in separate but linked blocks, known as suites, on either side of the central escalators. The Tate collection of modern art is displayed on two of the gallery floors, the third is devoted to temporary exhibitions. Above the original roofline of the power station Herzog and De Meuron added a two-storey glass penthouse, known as the lightbeam. The top level of this houses a café-restaurant with stunning views of the river and the City, and the lower a members room with terraces on both sides of the building, the river side one offering the same stunning views as the restaurant. The chimney was capped by a coloured light feature designed by the artist Michael Craig-Martin, known as the Swiss Light. At night, the penthouse lightbeam and the Swiss Light mark the presence of Tate Modern for many miles.

Construction - Architects (Tate website)

To find the best architects for the project, Tate organised an international competition which attracted 148 entries. After a two stage short-listing process the eventual winners were the Swiss firm Herzog & de Meuron who are widely acknowledged as one of the leading practices among the younger generation in Europe.

Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron were both born in Basel, Switzerland, in 1950 and studied under Aldo Rossi and Dolf Schnelbi. The Herzog & de Meuron Architecture Studio was founded in Basel in 1978 and has been awarded many prizes including the prestigious Max Beckmann Award in 1996 and Shock prize in 1999. Two further partners Christine Binswanger and Harry Gugger joined the practice in the 1990s.

They have designed a number of widely admired buildings including the Goetz Gallery, Munich (1991-2), Ricola Europe Factory Building (1993), the Schüzenmattstrasse apartment building, Basel (1993) and the Railway Engine Depot and Signal Box Auf dem Wolf, Basel (1992-5).

In 1997 they were one of three architectural practices shortlisted for the expansion of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and in December 1997 were announced as the architects for the redevelopment of the Laban Centre London, a brand new state-of-the-art dance training school in Deptford, South-East London.

Construction - Funding (tate website)

The conversion of Bankside Power Station into Tate Modern has cost £134 million.

Tate Modern was designated a landmark project for London by the Millennium Commission, who contributed £50 million of lottery money towards the scheme.

English Partnerships, the government's urban regeneration agency, provided £12 million to purchase the site and pay for the removal of the machinery.

The Arts Council of England contributed £6.2 million of lottery money towards the conversion of Level 4 of the gallery into a temporary exhibitions space.

The London Borough of Southwark was a key initial investor, recognising the regeneration and employment potential the scheme offers the Bankside and Southwark areas.

The Gallery has also received significant donations from other public, private and charitable sources.

Founding Corporate Partner Scheme

The Founding Corporate Partner Scheme, launched in 1998, has so far raised almost £4 million for Tate. The money, which is used for both capital costs and revenue costs over the four Tate sites, has been essential to realising two new Tates for London. Part of the £4 million that has been raised by the Founding Coporate Partners has gone towards the building of Tate Modern.

The scheme involves a flexible range of benefits which can be structured to meet the specific needs of Founding Corporate Partners. Partners make a commitment lasting up to five years and in return for their investment, gain exclusive benefits including entertaining, employee education events, private views and special access behind the scenes.

Turbine Hall History - Construction (tate website)

The transformation of Bankside Power Station into Tate Modern began 1995 with the removal of all the power station machinery ('de-planting') by the previous owners, Magnox Electric plc. This left the building as a brick shell supported by a steel skeleton. During 1996 and 1997 further demolition and enabling works took place which prepared the building for the construction programme to produce a world class art gallery from a disused industrial building. This work included the removal of the roofs of both the old Boiler House and the Turbine Hall, the demolition of a number of out buildings and sandblasting and repainting of the remaining steelwork.

In December 1996 the Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron opened a UK office at Bankside Power Station staffed by a team of fourteen working full time on the project. During this period the detailed design was worked on under the supervision of Harry Gugger, one of four partners in the firm.

In order to build the new gallery the Construction Management method was employed. This process is now widely used for large complex building projects in preference to the traditional practice of employing a main contractor and sub-contractors. The building work is split into distinct packages, each of which is carried out by specialist Trade Contractors. The Construction Manager, in this case Schal, a division of Carillion plc, was responsible for the entire construction programme and co-ordination of the Trade Contractors who were in turn employed and paid by Tate.

Work on the first piece of construction, a vast concrete raft, forming a foundation on which the museum sits, commenced during October 1997. At this point, a Time Capsule containing plans, photographs and videos relating to the project along with drawings by local schoolchildren and a piece of Swiss Mountain crystal provided by the architects were buried in the foundations.

This was followed by the fabrication of the structural steel framework in the former boiler house, creating the seven floors and effectively forming a new building within the walls of the old. This was followed by the creation of the seven gallery floors. During this process the original boiler house trusses were removed, allowing the new floors to fully support the existing brick façade. In May 1998, the steelwork for the new two storey glass roof structure, known as 'the lightbeam' began. Once the glass of the lightbeam was in place and the roof to the Turbine Hall replaced in the autumn of 1998, the building was watertight, which allowed more detailed fit-out of the space to commence.

In early 1999, escalators and stairs were located in their final positions and work began on fitting out the auditorium. The galleries were fitted with environmental controls and the timber floors on all levels were installed. By August 1999, there was permanent lighting on in most areas of the building and the basic building works were completed.

By the end of 1999, Tate Modern staff had moved into their permanent offices on the eastern wing of the building and many areas of the building were complete. In January 2000, the site was officially handed over to the Tate Gallery from construction managers, Schal and the installation of the displays of the Tate Collection began.

Tate Modern opened to the public on 12 May 2000.

Does Tate's Turbine choice make you tick?

The choice of Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster for the next Turbine Hall commission is predictably tasteful and restrained. What a shame there's no adventure ...

March 12, 2008 9:00 AM

I like to be mystified and that's why I like art. I know that if I went to the National Gallery every day I would still never fully understand Cézanne or Piero della Francesca, because when you encounter great art, knowledge becomes mere background information. Later this year, Tate Modern in London will show the extraordinary work of Mark Rothko - an artist you can also never explain or get to the end of. The Rothko room at Tate Modern is its greatest treasure, one of the supreme places on Earth to confront painting. I wish the museum's curators would take inspiration from it when they are next planning a commission for the Turbine Hall.

Today it was announced that Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster will be the ninth artist in the Unilever series. Once again you can see the commission ticking boxes.

Free from macho tendencies? Tick. French artist Gonzalez-Foerster makes melancholy films that passively observe city life. Her art is consciously slight and the character she adopts is that of the "flaneur", the artist as sophisticated urban observer, an idea invented by the 19th-century poet and critic Charles Baudelaire. In other words there is no chance of her filling the Turbine Hall with, say, a massive slab of steel. Her contribution will, like those previous classics the crack and the slides, reject grandiosity in favour of the witty and ephemeral. That's a relief - I was scared they might commission a colossal statue of George Bush. But then again Foerster is also ...

Free from north-American tendencies - another box ticked. Apart from Bruce Nauman who's a sort of honorary non-American, the Turbine Hall commissioners strikingly avoid inviting some rather obvious US candidates. It is precisely in the US that artists tend to work naturally, and brilliantly on this scale - but we have to wait a bit longer, it seems, to see a torqued steel creation by Richard Serra in Tate Modern, or a Jeff Koons inflated toy, or a Claes Oldenburg penknife. "Americanness" seems to be one of the vices the series strains to avoid, perhaps in the curators' minds being a synonym for masculine arrogance.

Free from bad taste - tick. The appeal of the slight, Baudelairean gesture, and the minimal aesthetic, is that it is remarkably tasteful. The kind of art that gets selected for Tate Modern is guaranteed not to make you feel daft or silly for liking it - for all its modernity this art has a decorous style. In other words, it will not give critics anything to mock or audiences anything to be embarrassed by.

In the 1960s the French artist Nikki de St Phalle created a giant recumbent woman for an art museum, with a door between her legs. You can guarantee you will never see that in the Turbine Hall. Nor will you see the bad taste genius of Damien Hirst on display here - that would be ... so vulgar.

So what is the highly popular Turbine Hall series all about? It is interesting that you can so easily define its rules negatively. I don't feel this is truly passionate or adventurous commissioning. All the artists invited to work in this prestigious space are established, known quantities. This means visitors can learn tenth hand about what's hot in the world of art while enjoying an apparently adventurous, but actually safe and cautious, dose of the 21st-century. Exclusions, negative preferences, restraint - these are not the stuff of great art but of middle of the road taste. The Turbine Hall commissions are nothing more or less than monuments to what it means to be middle class in modern Britain.