Award-winning new building to store and display renowned Besen art collection at TarraWarra

The art collection of the late Eva and Marc Besen is so large it required a dedicated new space to store it – and display it.

Collected at the TarraWarra Museum of Art outside Healesville, Victoria – in a building designed by the late architect Alan Powell, and a testimony to the Besen family’s philanthropy – are works by Arthur Boyd, William Smart and Fred Williams, along with sculpture by Britain’s Antony Gormley.

Kerstin Thompson Architects designed the Eva and Marc Besen Centre for the couple’s extensive art collection.Credit: Leo Shoewell 

But only about 5 per cent of the couple’s collection can be displayed there at any time – a common problem for museums, said architect Kerstin Thompson.

“Galleries and museums around the world are facing similar challenges in terms of storage and display of art, so combining the two functions is becoming more prevalent,” Thompson said.

On the TarraWarra property, 45 minutes’ drive from Melbourne, there are also other notable buildings: a winery by architect Graeme Gunn and a cellar door designed by Thompson’s firm, Kerstin Thompson Architects (KTA).

The building won the prestigious William Wardell Award for Public Architecture.Credit: Leo Shoewell 

More recently, KTA has designed the Eva and Marc Besen Centre for the family’s extensive art collection. This week, the building won the prestigious William Wardell Award for Public Architecture, as well as an award in the category of interior architecture.

KTA is not only familiar with TarraWarra, but with galleries and art museums in the broader sense. The firm designed the Melbourne Holocaust Museum; the Bundanon Museum in Illaroo, NSW; the Monash University Museum of Art; and an art gallery for the Victorian College of the Arts – all of which garnered architecture awards.

“There was some storage in Alan Powell’s building [at TarraWarra], but not nearly sufficient for the Besens’ art and sculpture collection,” said Thompson, whose brief for the centre included educational and performance spaces, and extra office space.

With a relatively small part of the collection shown in the main museum, the centre was conceived as both a storage facility and an additional gallery.

Given the calibre of art and sculpture in the Besen collection, security, protection and climate control were paramount. So the curvaceous new centre, located below a new car park, is almost buried into the hilly site.

A new sculpture walk between the existing museum and the new centre allows people to engage with the art before they even step foot in the new building.Credit: Leo Shoewell 

KTA chose fixed, meshed screens that create a “veil” for the glass walls, allowing visibility into and out of the building while eliminating direct sunlight. It also positioned the main art storage area to the rear of the 2200-square-metre centre to further increase protection from the elements.

Although not conscious of the connection when designing the stainless-steel mesh screens, Thompson enjoyed seeing nets placed over the nearby grapevines when the screens were installed.

The architects found inspiration in other buildings on the property for the circular concrete lift and stairwell that greet visitors who park above the gallery.

“There’s obviously a synergy with Alan Powell’s circular glass tower above the TarraWarra Museum, as well as the circular terrace for his winery. We also designed a curved entry sequence for our cellar door,” said Thompson, who worked closely with landscape architects Oculus and Wurundjeri horticulturalist and artist Craig Murphy-Wandin.

Murphy-Wandin’s sculptured rock placed below the cantilevered water duct that forms part of the new car park is truly poetic and well-placed, given that TarraWarra means “slow waters”.

While the new gallery provides an important home for the art, a new sculpture walk connecting the existing museum with the centre allows people to engage with sculpture before they even step foot in the new building.

KTA was also mindful of retaining the existing poplars that border the walk, trees that held a special meaning for the Besens, given their European heritage. The personal touch goes further. In the gallery, portraits of Eva and Marc and some of their favourite paintings are arranged as they were in their Melbourne home.

Kerstin Thompson Architects was mindful of retaining the existing poplars that border the new walk.Credit: Leo Shoewell 

Thompson, along with her team, has always thought of museums and galleries as important places for people to connect.

“Art should be accessible for everyone. People should not be intimidated by galleries or museums. They should be welcoming and comfortable places to be in,” she said.

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