Team Lab's sinuous immersive gallery completes on Saadiyat Island

Japanese art collective TeamLab has collaborated with architecture studio MZ Architects to create a permanent venue for its immersive artworks on Saadiyat Island, Abu Dhabi.

Set alongside the recently completed Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi by Mecanoo, Team Lab Phenomena Abu Dhabi joins Foster+Partners' Zayed National Museum and Jean Nouvel's Louvre Abu Dhabi as one of the cultural anchors of the Saadiyat Island development to the east of the city.

The almost windowless building is covered in a continuous white facade made from glass fibre-reinforced concrete, created in collaboration with Abu Dhabi-based MZ Architects.

It encloses a 17,000-square-metre reinforced-concrete structure containing numerous drum-like gallery spaces that display TeamLab's artworks. The shape of these galleries determined the building's exterior form.

Breaking the continuous facade is an arched opening that acts as the main entrance.

A ceremonial staircase on the exterior of the museum leads to a raised plaza and viewing platform on the roof, while a small plaza on the waterfront side of the building contains a waterfall-like feature integrated into the facade.

Within the museum, which is operated by Miral, is a series of immersive artworks designed by TeamLab – a collective known for its digital art displays, including a gallery in Tokyo.

Each of the artworks was created to work within Team Lab Phenomena Abu Dhabi's dedicated galleries and the pieces will be regularly updated.

"At teamLab Phenomena Abu Dhabi, visitors will be immersed into a world that organically changes and evolves through the participation and actions of the people in it, and it is precisely this physical experience that can expand our senses of value," said TeamLab founder Toshiyuki Inoko when the project was announced.

"The future is built upon the grand sum of people's creations," he said.

The development of Saadiyat Island was initially announced in 2007 with cultural buildings set to be designed by Nouvel, Tadao Ando and Zaha Hadid, although the latter two didn't come to fruition.

Along with the Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi, Zayed National Museum and the Louvre Abu Dhabi, Team Lab Phenomena Abu Dhabi will be joined on Saadiyat Island by Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, which is nearing completion.

The photography is by Lizzie Crook.

The post Team Lab's sinuous immersive gallery completes on Saadiyat Island appeared first on Dezeen.