Licht Kunst Licht AG
Museums & Exhibitions / Daylight

Ahrenshoop Museum of Art

Ahrenshoop, Germany
Architects
Staab Architekten GmbH, Berlin
Client
Kunstmuseum Ahrenshoop e.V.
Project size
900 sqm
Photos
Stefan Müller
Completion
2013
Overall building budget
6.4 million euros
Lighting budget
0.1 million euros
Awards
5

Immersed in Landscape and Tradition – A Modern Museum for the Ahrenshoop Artists’ Colony

At the core of the building arrangement is the pictorial perception of the thatched roof houses that are only a stone’s throw away from the museum location. Grouped around a central lobby is an ensemble of five joined one-room buildings that contain the actual exhibition. Four exhibition houses are dedicated to permanent and temporary exhibitions of the artists’ community Ahrenshoop. In the fifth house is the cabinet located, which is used as a seminar and meeting room.

Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG
Licht Kunst Licht AG

The daylight strategy in the skylight spaces of the Art Museum Ahrenshoop has been gathered in a close dialogue with the architectural development. The exhibition spaces are fitted with longitudinal horizontal daylight openings. To generate a spatial light distribution that is perceived as mostly shadow-free, prisms were integrated in the skylight construction. The artificial illumination was to be similar to the daylight situation in that the light enters the room through the same aperture. For this purpose, light profiles have been mounted at the openings’ aprons. These light profiles emit their light into the space in an omnidirectional fashion. For an accentuated illumination a 3-phase track is installed below the lighting profile, allowing for an adaptation of projectors.

The lobby is predominantly illuminated by downlights and wallwashers highlighting the wall surfaces. Through the emphasis of walls the spatial confines are illuminated and made visible thus creating an agreeable room experience. Beyond that, the homogenous wall illumination yields an additional display surface for art exhibits. In dimming the luminaires, these art works can be emphasized in an appropriate intensity. The narrow area at the window between House IV and House V is served by three projectors allowing for a directional, intense orchestration of sculptures. Lighting profiles, identical with the ones in the exhibition rooms, are located in the skylight above the reception counter thus creating sufficient brightness in this area. The shelves at the shop and the cloakroom are appropriately illuminated by a concealed, furniture-integrated luminous strip profile.