Natalia Fedotova
Moscow State Stroganov Academy of Industrial and Applied Arts, Russia
The architecture of museum building represents outstanding historic architecture, styles and concepts of art throughout the entire age of the museum. Thus we can follow the development of museum architecture over the long years.
There is no universal approach to the modernisation of museum building; but we can try to define some key principles of interaction between historic and contemporary architecture and examine the most widely accepted forms.
The first (“harmonious”) principle represents the consonance of various architecture styles that do not break the uniform architectural image of the museum. This principle of modernization does not mean a duplication of the historic building, it is about using the same stylistic frame.
The second (“neutral”) principle is about introducing into the museum complex a new premise with no architectural message or individual style, which will not interfere with the ancient main building; it can also be a separate building of mere functional character.
The third (“contrasting”) principle is the most outstanding one because it represents the artistic spirit of the contemporaneity. The architecture of the new building or museum site represents a style contrastively juxtaposed to the historic premises.
The synthesis of styles can make an architectural image exceptionally expressive in the contemporary world of globalization and technical progress. Therefore, historic architecture still survives, whereas modern architecture serves to face the multiple challenges of the new age.