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Every year, the Serpentine Pavilion shows up to herald the start of summer, and it’s back again for 2022, designed this time by American artist Theaster Gates. But put away your sunscreen and ice creams, because this isn’t the pavilion of classic idyllic English summers, of Pimm’s and strawberries and bucolic frolicking in Hyde Park. This is a serious, stark, austere business.
That’s because Gates doesn’t deal in frivolous fun; he deals in big topics. Through sculpture, installation and film, his work tackles subjects like housing inequality, structural racism and the concept of Blackness. Previous works have seen him building community centres in his native Chicago and creating exhibitions that function as critical histories of clay. The ‘Black Chapel’, his imposing, cylindrical Serpentine Pavilion, doesn’t stray too far from that path.
The inspiration at the heart of the work is the Rothko Chapel, a prayer space in Texas, with art by abstract expressionist master Mark Rothko. Gates’s building follows a similarly meditative template, creating a space for quiet contemplation, like being inside a giant vase, but in a very very relaxed way.
At the entrance is a functioning bronze bell, salvaged from a church in Chicago, and inside are tar paintings by Gates – a nod to his recently deceased father, who worked for years as a roofer. The design references ‘the bottle kilns of Stoke-on-Trent in England, the beehive kilns of the western United States, San Pietro and the Roman tempiettos and traditional African building structures such as the Musgum mud huts of Cameroon and the Kasabi Tombs of Kampala, Uganda’. The result feels both ancient and modern, western and African.
It might all be serious and contemplative, but it won’t be quiet. Over the course of the summer, the pavilion will host a series of concerts – including performances by jazz drummer Moses Boyd and the London Oratory Choir, who will be doing some Gregorian chanting, apparently – as well as tea ceremonies and clay workshops.
It might not have the fun and interaction of previous summer pavilions, but it’s the perfect place if you’re someone who has always longed to find zen inside an enormous pot.
The Serpentine Pavilion by Theaster Gates, Jun 10-Oct 16. Free. More details here.
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