KIASMA MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART (Helsinki, Finland)

Architects: Steven Holl Architects

Year: 1998
Photographs: Ari Palm, Pirje Mykkaenen, Petri Virtanen
Manufacturers: Rheinzink

The very concept of an art gallery implies an inward focus. While the
need to showcase the cultural treasures contained within is self-
evident, the need to connect these sheltered exhibition spaces to the
outside world is less so, and in some cases is overlooked entirely. Even
monumental design that turns the museum itself into a sculptural
element may fail to make a reference to its particular surroundings.
This sense of 'placelessness' is what Steven Holl sought to avoid in his
design for an art museum at the heart of Helsinki, Kiasma – a museum
whose carefully choreographed outward views, formally irregular
gallery spaces,, and indeed its very name speak to the ideal of
connection.

Demand for a contemporary art museum in Helsinki arose as early as

the 1960s, although debates on just how to create one delayed
decisive action for three decades. It wasn’t until 1990 that the Museum
of Contemporary Art opened to the public, and even then it was in a
temporary setting. A design competition for a new, permanent museum
launched in the autumn of 1992; the following year, Steven Holl’s entry,
entitled “Chiasma,” was selected from over 515 other proposals.[1]

Webster’s Dictionary defines chiasma as “an anatomical intersection.”

Kiasma is, as its name implies, a design of intersections. Its site in the
center of Helsinki is a focal point between several notable structures:
the Finnish Parliament building is directly adjacent to the museum’s
west, Alvar Aalto’s Finlandia Hall lies to the south, and Eliel
Saarinen’s Helsinki Station can be found to the east. The northern
face of the museum. meanwhile, is bounded by Töölö Bay.[2]
These features served as driving forces to determine the form of the
building: a curved “cultural line” links Kiasma to Finlandia Hall, while a
straight “natural line” connects it to the landscape and the bay.[3] The
result of this site synthesis is a structure comprising three main
elements: two building components and water. The eastern building
volume is a twisted, curving mass whose southern and eastern faces
are truncated where they meet the urban fabric. Its western
counterpart, meanwhile, is a more typical orthogonal extrusion. The
two forms meet at the northern end of the site, where they intersect
with the waters of a reflecting pool that calls out Holl’s proposed
southward extension of Töölö Bay.[4]

Visitors enter the museum through a spacious lobby with a glazed

ceiling. This lobby serves as the starting point for stairways, ramp, and
corridors that curve off to lead into the rest of the building.[5] The
gallery spaces are characterized by the architect as “almost
rectangular,” each containing one curved wall. This irregularity
differentiates each successive space, creating a complex visual and
spatial experience as visitors pass through the museum galleries.[6]
The initial impression is that of the typical closed-in, placeless
museum interior; however, it is only by moving through each space that
one discovers various unexpected views to the outside. This
choreographed outward focus, combined with the irregular forms of the
interior, creates what Holl called “a variety of spatial experiences.”[7]

This variety was, in Holl’s reckoning, essential to the function of

Kiasma. Contemporary artists produce an endless stream of unique
works, and so a museum that showcases them must be able to
anticipate and provide for anything ranging from the subtle and
restrained to the grandiose and unpredictable. The irregular, subtly
differentiated spaces of the museum serve as exhibition halls that Holl
describes as a “silent, yet dramatic backdrop” for the display of equally
variegated art.[8]
Holl worked with more than pure massing and windows to give each
space its own unique character. Natural light was an important
consideration – Holl was fascinated by the constantly changing
character of Finland’s daylight.[9] Many of the windows in Kiasma are
composed of translucent glazing, which diffuses the Scandinavian
sunlight as it enters the interior. The staccato rhythm of city views is
achieved by the occasional inclusion of fully transparent glass – both
as a narrow crescent that allows a view to Helsinki Station and as full
curtain-wall facades at the north and south ends of the building’s
volumes.[10]

Light also permeates Kiasma through an abundance of skylights. More

than simple punctures in the ceiling, the skylights work with the
curving, irregular lines of the building to turn light into a sculptural
element in itself. Horizontal ‘light-catching’ sections along the ceilings
and upper walls deflect and diffuse light from skylights and clerestory
windows down into the museum spaces; this system allows natural
light from a single roof opening to penetrate through and illuminate
multiple levels.[11]

References
[1] "The Story of Kiasma." Kiasma. Accessed March 23, 2016.
http://www.kiasma.fi/en/kiasma/story-of-kiasma/.
[2] "Kiasma, Museum of Contemporary Art." Arcspace. November 11,
2012. Accessed March 23, 2016.
http://www.arcspace.com/features/steven-holl-architects/kiasma-
museum-of-contemporary-art/.
[3] "Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art." Steven Holl Architects.
Accessed March 23, 2016. http://www.stevenholl.com/projects/kiasma-
museum.
[4] Lecuyer, Annette. "Art Museum, Steven Holl Architects."
Architectural Review, August 1998. September 21, 2011. Accessed
March 23, 2016. http://www.architectural-review.com/buildings/1998-
august-art-museum-steven-holl-architects-helsinki-
finland/8618907.fullarticle.
[5] "Architecture." Kiasma. Accessed March 22, 2016.
http://www.kiasma.fi/en/kiasma/architecture/.
[6] “Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art.”
[7] Bianchini, Ricardo. "Overview of Kiasma Museum." Inexhibit.
December 12, 2014. http://www.inexhibit.com/case-studies/helsinki-
glance-kiasma-museum-steven-holl/.
[8] “Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art.”
[9] “Architecture.”
[10] Lecuyer.
[11] “Kiasma, Museum of Contemporary Art.”
[12] Bianchini.