Culture Shock | Tempus Magazine

CULTURE SHOCK

Words: Lauren Jade Hill

From long-awaited tributes to ancient archaeology, underwater art galleries and haute horology, a celebration of local life is at the heart of the most significant new landmarks taking shape around the world. We pinpoint the hottest making their debut around the globe

THE MUSEUM OF UNDERWATER ART | QUEENSLAND, AUSTRALIA

The first two of four sites making up The Museum of Underwater Art (MOUA) — Ocean Siren and Coral Greenhouse, both in Townsville — made their debut in North Queensland earlier this year. The remaining two sites, which will be found at nearby Palm Island and Magnetic Island, will come to completion towards the end of 2020 and into 2021. Not only is MOUA the first site of its kind in Australia, with installations dotted across the Great Barrier Reef, it’s also a source of reef rehabilitation and a beacon for increased awareness of this threatened ecosystem.

The world-renowned underwater sculptor, Jason deCaires Taylor, is creating these art installations (pictured) in collaboration with local and indigenous artists. Working together, they aim to produce a series of artworks that reflect ocean conservation action, while also having a positive environmental impact on the reef and showcasing local indigenous culture. Start your exploration of these sites by seeking out the sculptor’s intertidal, solar-powered sculpture, Ocean Siren, then enlist a local dive operator to set out on a tour of the Coral Greenhouse installation on John Brewer Reef. »

moua.com.au

HAYY: CREATIVE HUB | JEDDAH, SAUDI ARABIA

This cultural site brought to fruition by the organisation supporting creative communities of the Middle East, Art Jameel, is slated for debut in 2021. Named ‘Hayy’ after the Arabic word meaning ‘living’ to refer to a neighbourhood, the creative site takes up a 17,000sqm expanse of the Al Muhammadiyah district in Jeddah. This creative community will provide a home for the Saudi Arabian port city’s burgeoning creative industries.

Altogether, Hayy: Creative Hub will provide space for 12 partnership organisations ranging from art and design galleries to cafes and performance venues, alongside a theatre, exhibitions, event spaces and artist studios. An Art Jameel-run arts centre will then curate and host additional local and international art showcases.

Art Jameel commissioned the design studio Waiwai to create an environment that will act as a major new cultural hub for Jeddah through a contemporary development of dynamic architecture featuring internal courtyards, shaded terraces and walkways. Ultimately, this will be a space where the creativity of Saudi Arabian artists, playwrights, filmmakers, designers and photographers is nurtured and given an audience.

artjameel.org/centres/hayy-jeddah

MUSÉE ATELIER AUDEMARS PIGUET | LE BRASSUS, SWITZERLAND

A trip to Le Brassus in the Vallée de Joux will now offer even greater insight into the world of Swiss watchmaking following this summer’s launch of the Musée Atelier Audemars Piguet.

This new architecturally impressive site invites guests into an immersive experience retracing more than 145 years of watchmaking history. Designed by Danish architect Bjarke Ingels, the structure is shaped like a coil to resemble a watch spring, linking the newly built space with the original house where Jules Louis Audemars and Edward Auguste Piguet set up their business in 1875.

Its interiors act as an exhibition space showcasing the watchmaking achievements of this prestigious Swiss brand. Visitors can tour an exhibition of 300 timepieces from more than 200 years of watchmaking history, including rare timepieces such as the Universelle, crafted in 1899 with 21 functions and 13 hands.

Take a tour to see watchmakers at work and, from next year, combine your visit with a stay at the Hotel des Horlogers –opening alongside the museum with a zigzagging ski slope on its roof.

museeatelier-audemarspiguet.com

WORLD OF WINE | PORTO, PORTUGAL

Proximity to swathes of vines and a long history in wine trade and port production has long assured Porto’s association with the wine world. As a result, travellers make the journey from across the globe to taste locally made port and step into the coastal city’s ancient cellars. Now, this particular heritage is being brought into the present with the creation of Porto’s new cultural district, World of Wine. The district officially opened on 31 July following a five-year, €105million development spearheaded by The Fladgate Partnership, owners of the port wine brands Taylor, Croft, Fonseca and Krohn, The Yeatman and Infante Sagres hotels in Porto and The Vintage House Hotel in the Douro Valley. Seeing the transformation of an area of Vila Nova de Gaia, the development, which in Portugal has been recognised as a Project of National Interest, has resulted in the renovation of 15,000 sq m of centuries-old wine cellars, along with the creation of a complex housing six immersive museum experiences, a collection of restaurants, cafes and bars, retail outlets and a wine school. Experiences designed to take you on a sensorial journey aim to demystify wine while laying bare Porto’s history, industries and traditions. All of this is designed around a square commanding views over Porto and its grapecultivating surroundings. »

Wow.pt

THE GRAND EGYPTIAN MUSEUM | CAIRO, EGYPT

Once completed in 2021, The Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) will be the world’s largest museum dedicated to the people, history and culture of Ancient Egypt.

Led by the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities of the Arab Republic of Egypt, this development, which began in 2012, now covers almost 500,000sqm, with exhibition spaces, a children’s museum, educational space, research centre and library, cinema, restaurants and shops. Even the gardens will display architectural elements from temples in Egypt among their native trees.

The museum’s vision is to preserve and display Egypt’s national heritage, with research and conservation work already under way in its stateof-the-art laboratories.

The theme of kingship will run throughout, starting in the Grand Hall with an exhibition on Kingship and Power and continuing up the Grand Stairs’ vertical gallery, which ends with panoramic views of the Giza pyramids.

Galleries will contain objects dating back several thousand years with technology to help you discover the wonders of Ancient Egypt through the most modern virtual reality.

gem.gov.eg

GES-2 | MOSCOW, RUSSIA

A disused Moscow power station, built in 1907 and which once supplied energy to the Kremlin, is about to enter a new era. The listed GES-2 power plant, owned by V-A-C – a foundation established in 2009 by billionaire Leonid Mikhelson and director Teresa Iarocci Mavica – is soon to become an exciting new contemporary arts hub.

The acclaimed architectural firm, Renzo Piano Building Workshop, is behind the 20,000sqm site’s high-energy transformation. Once complete, the complex will house an indoor amphitheatre-like stage, galleries, a glassfronted playhouse, library, learning centre and artist residency block, as well as café, restaurant and shop, with a pier at the front of the building for visitors to eventually access the site by boat.

The new site promises to embody the V-A-C foundation’s creative spirit through workshops, housed in former vodka warehouses, for creative practitioners covering disciplines from textiles and ceramics to 3D printing. GES-2 is on track to open in the first half of 2021.

v-a-c.org/en/ges-2