There have been some distinctly sniffy and begrudging reviews of the Saatchi Gallery since it opened in its new space in October at the old Duke of York's headquarters off King's Road in west London.
The disapproval has been reserved for the art; the gallery itself has won almost universal approval. And it is impressive. Fourteen galleries, 70,000 square feet and all of it free thanks to sponsorship from auctioneer Phillips de Pury & Company.
The neo-classical Georgian exterior belies the pristine white cubes that are presented inside. Despite all the problems of converting what was a military barracks (the opening was much delayed because of technical difficulties) Saatchi has pulled off a near perfect archetypal contemporary art space. From the off-white walls to the muted ceiling lights and the stripped wood floors, nothing distracts the eye from the art.
It is the antithesis of County Hall, the gallery's previous home, which it was forced to leave in 2005 after a legal wrangle with the landlords. There the art had to compete with the wood-panelled rooms and awkward spaces of the former council chamber.
The fussy layout at Country Hall often left visitors doubling back on themselves out of sheer confusion, but the layout of the new gallery couldn't be simpler. Beautifully proportioned room follows beautifully proportioned room in an order so logical that you barely need to refer to the floorplan. (There is one exception to this - gallery 13, which for some unfathomable reason is in the basement.)
The lack of natural light in the galleries is more than compensated for in the central atrium that provides space for the lifts and stairs. Here, double-height glazed walls allow visitors to see the neatly manicured courtyards on either side. On the first floor large windows provide a view past the Doric columns on to the green space outside.
So the space works - what about the art? There has been a lukewarm critical response to the first show, The Revolution Continues: New Art from China. Commentators have suggested that Saatchi has missed the boat this time.
And it's true that after China Now - a year long celebration of Chinese culture in venues around the UK, from the V&A to the Graves Art Gallery in Sheffield - a display of Chinese contemporary art doesn't sound like the cutting edge that we have come to expect from Saatchi.
But it's worth thinking about whom the show is for. Saatchi clearly couldn't care less what the critics think - his whole raison d'etre has been to shake-up the art world establishment. The gallery's stated aim is to introduce contemporary art to new young audiences, and despite the undoubted success of China Now, Chinese contemporary art can still hold the shock of the new.
What this show achieves is a snapshot of some of the art being produced in China today. And it does what art does: some of it makes you laugh, some of it makes you think and some of it doesn't work.
The first gallery is dominated by a model cityscape by Liu Wei. Warped and decaying buildings, from Capitol Hill to the Colosseum, form an apocalyptic vision of the future. The translucent material gives the sculpture the appearance of being in a state of meltdown; how appropriate then to find it's made entirely from dog chews.
Looking for connections in the hang is a bit of a fruitless quest. Saatchi was responsible for what went where and says that the only rationale for the arrangement of the paintings is what shapes and colours go together.
On the whole this works well and the visitor is allowed to make the connections for themselves. Mao is a recurring theme and his iconic status is lampooned from several different angles. His desperation for his place in history to be acknowledged is satirised in Shi Xinning's Yalta, where Mao is seated in between Churchill and Roosevelt at the famous conference.
This Mao-ification of history continues in Mao and McCarthy and, hilariously, in Royal Coach, where the chairman is nestled cosily next to the Queen Mum.
Another discernible theme is a fascination with image and representation. So Gallery 6 is dedicated to large-scale portraiture, from Zhang Xiaogang's flat, out-of-focus faces to Feng Zhengjie's comic-book-style women. This is the least successful gallery, the only relief coming from Cang Xin's Communication - a life-size sculpture of the performance artist licking the ground.
Inevitably, the idea of protest informs many of the works. At first, Liu Wei's huge poo looks grotesquely witty but the dissent is in the detail; an army of tiny toy soldiers emerges from coils of excrement. Wang Guangyi takes a more direct approach in Materialist's Art and Porsche combining the poster style of Maoist propaganda with the language of advertising.
It's a mixed bag, but then most shows this size will inevitably contain a few turkeys, and there's always another gallery around the corner with the promise of something unexpected. Most often this promise is delivered on.
So after the disappointment of Gallery 6, Sun Yuan and Peng Yu lift the spirits with their Angel - which has literally fallen to earth in the next gallery. The sculpture in this show is generally more successful than the painting, none more so than Xiang Jing's Your Body. The huge life-like nude slumps on a bench with an unnerving air of hopelessness.
Around the corner a neat architectural trick allows the visitor to view Zhang Dali's Chinese Offspring from two angles. Visitors can either wander below the naked bodies suspended by their ankles from the ceiling or pop up to the mezzanine level for an eye-level view of the macabre sculptures.
This device is repeated in Gallery 13. The whole space is dedicated to Old Person's Home by Sun Yuan and Peng Yu. Geriatrics in electric wheelchairs traverse the space occasionally colliding and visitors can watch the balletic performance from above or go and mingle with the codgers (who look suspiciously like former world leaders) on the gallery floor. This day of the living dead is funny, engaging and will no doubt be one of the most popular pieces in the show.
Aside from the 13 galleries devoted to the temporary exhibition, there is also the Phillips de Pury & Company Gallery (the auctioneer has sponsored the free entry, after all) and a gallery project room where artists will be able to use the space as studio and showroom.
What's impressive about the new Saatchi Gallery is the holistic offer that has been developed, with an emphasis on making contemporary art accessible to younger audiences and getting people involved.
Membership of the gallery is free, with a small room and computer terminals devoted to getting visitors signed up and there is also a small gallery for the winners of the Art Prize for Schools (a generous £10,000 goes to the winning school).
The online offer is well publicised and worth a look. Although very poorly designed, it claims a ranking of 246 out of the world's top 50,000 websites and has international art news, blogs, and museum and gallery listings.
Will the new Saatchi Gallery succeed? It's setting, off one of the most upmarket roads in London, makes it slightly less accessible to the hordes than County Hall. The visitor profile was mixed when I visited; there were plenty of well-coiffed west-London ladies, but a good smattering of students in Ugg boots and skinny jeans. From a cultural perspective, the revolution continues.
The disapproval has been reserved for the art; the gallery itself has won almost universal approval. And it is impressive. Fourteen galleries, 70,000 square feet and all of it free thanks to sponsorship from auctioneer Phillips de Pury & Company.
The neo-classical Georgian exterior belies the pristine white cubes that are presented inside. Despite all the problems of converting what was a military barracks (the opening was much delayed because of technical difficulties) Saatchi has pulled off a near perfect archetypal contemporary art space. From the off-white walls to the muted ceiling lights and the stripped wood floors, nothing distracts the eye from the art.
It is the antithesis of County Hall, the gallery's previous home, which it was forced to leave in 2005 after a legal wrangle with the landlords. There the art had to compete with the wood-panelled rooms and awkward spaces of the former council chamber.
The fussy layout at Country Hall often left visitors doubling back on themselves out of sheer confusion, but the layout of the new gallery couldn't be simpler. Beautifully proportioned room follows beautifully proportioned room in an order so logical that you barely need to refer to the floorplan. (There is one exception to this - gallery 13, which for some unfathomable reason is in the basement.)
The lack of natural light in the galleries is more than compensated for in the central atrium that provides space for the lifts and stairs. Here, double-height glazed walls allow visitors to see the neatly manicured courtyards on either side. On the first floor large windows provide a view past the Doric columns on to the green space outside.
So the space works - what about the art? There has been a lukewarm critical response to the first show, The Revolution Continues: New Art from China. Commentators have suggested that Saatchi has missed the boat this time.
And it's true that after China Now - a year long celebration of Chinese culture in venues around the UK, from the V&A to the Graves Art Gallery in Sheffield - a display of Chinese contemporary art doesn't sound like the cutting edge that we have come to expect from Saatchi.
But it's worth thinking about whom the show is for. Saatchi clearly couldn't care less what the critics think - his whole raison d'etre has been to shake-up the art world establishment. The gallery's stated aim is to introduce contemporary art to new young audiences, and despite the undoubted success of China Now, Chinese contemporary art can still hold the shock of the new.
What this show achieves is a snapshot of some of the art being produced in China today. And it does what art does: some of it makes you laugh, some of it makes you think and some of it doesn't work.
The first gallery is dominated by a model cityscape by Liu Wei. Warped and decaying buildings, from Capitol Hill to the Colosseum, form an apocalyptic vision of the future. The translucent material gives the sculpture the appearance of being in a state of meltdown; how appropriate then to find it's made entirely from dog chews.
Looking for connections in the hang is a bit of a fruitless quest. Saatchi was responsible for what went where and says that the only rationale for the arrangement of the paintings is what shapes and colours go together.
On the whole this works well and the visitor is allowed to make the connections for themselves. Mao is a recurring theme and his iconic status is lampooned from several different angles. His desperation for his place in history to be acknowledged is satirised in Shi Xinning's Yalta, where Mao is seated in between Churchill and Roosevelt at the famous conference.
This Mao-ification of history continues in Mao and McCarthy and, hilariously, in Royal Coach, where the chairman is nestled cosily next to the Queen Mum.
Another discernible theme is a fascination with image and representation. So Gallery 6 is dedicated to large-scale portraiture, from Zhang Xiaogang's flat, out-of-focus faces to Feng Zhengjie's comic-book-style women. This is the least successful gallery, the only relief coming from Cang Xin's Communication - a life-size sculpture of the performance artist licking the ground.
Inevitably, the idea of protest informs many of the works. At first, Liu Wei's huge poo looks grotesquely witty but the dissent is in the detail; an army of tiny toy soldiers emerges from coils of excrement. Wang Guangyi takes a more direct approach in Materialist's Art and Porsche combining the poster style of Maoist propaganda with the language of advertising.
It's a mixed bag, but then most shows this size will inevitably contain a few turkeys, and there's always another gallery around the corner with the promise of something unexpected. Most often this promise is delivered on.
So after the disappointment of Gallery 6, Sun Yuan and Peng Yu lift the spirits with their Angel - which has literally fallen to earth in the next gallery. The sculpture in this show is generally more successful than the painting, none more so than Xiang Jing's Your Body. The huge life-like nude slumps on a bench with an unnerving air of hopelessness.
Around the corner a neat architectural trick allows the visitor to view Zhang Dali's Chinese Offspring from two angles. Visitors can either wander below the naked bodies suspended by their ankles from the ceiling or pop up to the mezzanine level for an eye-level view of the macabre sculptures.
This device is repeated in Gallery 13. The whole space is dedicated to Old Person's Home by Sun Yuan and Peng Yu. Geriatrics in electric wheelchairs traverse the space occasionally colliding and visitors can watch the balletic performance from above or go and mingle with the codgers (who look suspiciously like former world leaders) on the gallery floor. This day of the living dead is funny, engaging and will no doubt be one of the most popular pieces in the show.
Aside from the 13 galleries devoted to the temporary exhibition, there is also the Phillips de Pury & Company Gallery (the auctioneer has sponsored the free entry, after all) and a gallery project room where artists will be able to use the space as studio and showroom.
What's impressive about the new Saatchi Gallery is the holistic offer that has been developed, with an emphasis on making contemporary art accessible to younger audiences and getting people involved.
Membership of the gallery is free, with a small room and computer terminals devoted to getting visitors signed up and there is also a small gallery for the winners of the Art Prize for Schools (a generous £10,000 goes to the winning school).
The online offer is well publicised and worth a look. Although very poorly designed, it claims a ranking of 246 out of the world's top 50,000 websites and has international art news, blogs, and museum and gallery listings.
Will the new Saatchi Gallery succeed? It's setting, off one of the most upmarket roads in London, makes it slightly less accessible to the hordes than County Hall. The visitor profile was mixed when I visited; there were plenty of well-coiffed west-London ladies, but a good smattering of students in Ugg boots and skinny jeans. From a cultural perspective, the revolution continues.
Project data
Cost Undisclosed
Main funder Phillips de Pury & Company (to support free entry)
Architect Allford Hall Monaghan Morris
Exhibition ends 25 January 2009
Cost Undisclosed
Main funder Phillips de Pury & Company (to support free entry)
Architect Allford Hall Monaghan Morris
Exhibition ends 25 January 2009
