The Reina Sofía Installations
Various contemporary artists, invited by the Museo Reina Sofía · Programme since the 1990s
Whatever is inside the pavilion when you visit, it will not be there next year. The Museo Reina Sofía uses the building for a rolling programme of installations by living artists, usually one at a time and usually made for this space. Artists are given the whole transparent hall and asked to respond to its light, its iron ribs, its views of trees and water and its peculiar acoustics. Some fill it, some leave it almost empty, and the best projects change how you see the building itself. Check the museum's website before you come to know what is on, and expect a short queue at the door when a popular show is running.
Over the years the pavilion has hosted some memorable works. Kimsooja hung the building with translucent film in 2006 so that the sunlight split into rainbows across the floor. Jaume Plensa suspended a huge glass head over the floor and Doris Salcedo laid out a field of white flowers that wilted over the course of the show. Cristina Iglesias, Jessica Stockholder, Federico Guzmán and many others have worked here, and there have been sound pieces, films, lamps, tents and living plants. Look at how each artist deals with the floor, the only surface in the building that is not glass, and with the dome, which pulls every visitor's gaze upward.
The pavilion has no climate control and closes in bad weather, so artists have to accept heat, cold, rain on the roof and the constant movement of visitors taking photographs. Many treat those conditions as part of the work. For the museum, the building is a chance to show contemporary art to people who might never enter its main galleries near Atocha, since the pavilion is free and lies on the route of every stroll through the park. A memorable detail is that the exhibition text is usually printed on a single panel by the door, so read it first and then let the space do the rest.
Did You Know? Installations here must survive without heating or air conditioning, and the pavilion closes to the public whenever the wind is strong enough to rattle the glass.
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