The Serpentine Gallery definitely has a thing for mazes this summer. But unlike Michelangelo Pistoletto’s perception-bending Mirror Of Judgment (launched on 12 June), Peter Zumthor’s Summer Pavillion creation is a distinctly benign labyrinth.
It exterior is a foreboding and distinctly out of place in the gorgeous summer of Kensington Gardens, a severe black box radiating mystery.
I enter a box and find my self walking in darkness; the effect is not threatening in the least but peaceful and it’s refreshingly cool to be out of the summer sun.
I honestly don’t know what to expect as I walk down a long corridor. I turn a corner and my eyes, having adjusted to the dark, are now dazzled by light and colour. Zumthorn has worked with garden designer Piet Oudolf to create an oasis of calm.
This is the mystery at the heart of Zumthor’s black box: despite its appearance it is not a mausoleum at all but a sanctuary, an intimate place of safety and at its centre is not death but life.
Piet Oudolf’s secret garden
Piet Oudolf’s garden protected from the outside within the walls of the Summer Pavillion is a relaxing haven in the city, open to the sky. The traffic and sounds that form the white noise of the city are displaced, are elsewhere.
I sit down in this place of tranquillity and get started on my lunch, knowing that it is a temporary thing, knowing that I’ll have to go back to work eventually but not minding. Moments like this transcend and make London living so special.
To read more about the Serpentine Summer Pavillion and the artists involved, visit the website here.
Paul Lepper is the creative apprentice at Exhibition Road Cultural Group and is writing a blog about his South Kensington experience
