Earth Unearthed
Taipei Fine Arts Museum 2023 X-SITE Proposal, Finalist
Public Art, Concept
Taipei, Taiwan
2023
Taipei, Taiwan
2023
Design:
Y+Y Studio & OOIS
Team Members:
Yiran Zhang, Yalun Li, Liu Xinyi, Lin I-Hsin, Chen Ai, Fan Kuang-yu
Structure:
EC Taiwan
Model and images:
OOIS
Y+Y Studio & OOIS
Team Members:
Yiran Zhang, Yalun Li, Liu Xinyi, Lin I-Hsin, Chen Ai, Fan Kuang-yu
Structure:
EC Taiwan
Model and images:
OOIS
Earth Unearthed proposes an action: lifting.
Sited on the public plaza of the Taipei Fine Arts museum, near Yuanshan Archaeological Site, decades of development and construction work have erased mostly all ecological and archeological traces embedded in the terrain. By “lifting up” the paved surface of the museum plaza, this proposal performs an excavation and an erection simultaneously: an encrusted history of soil strata revealed, an alternative geological identity established. By suggesting the “unearthing” of thick layers of earth, Earth Unearthed offers a public, geological, and political gesture in response to the complex environmental realities of today.
Diagonally, a 15 by 15 meters structure steps up the corner facing the museum entrance. Its frontside features a flight of stairs as an extension of the stairs towards the plaza, gently curving inward to form an public amphitheater, and paved to match the green stone pavers of the plaza. On the backside, latex stone rubbings sampled from Taiwan’s coastline hang beneath, where soft dunes landscape offer shaded seating. The original ground is now split into ground plus and ground minus: Ground plus provides an open stage—a public topography where people linger, gather and rest. Ground minus, an undulating terrain, offers an artificial landscape for shade, play, and exploration.
Reference Image Stack:
1. Schematic Sequence of Sections, in Structure and Tectonic Evolution of Taiwan — Bruce H. T. Chai, American Journal of Science, May 1972
2. Rubbing of the Qing-dynasty stone inscription（嚴禁水沙連社丁首索詐碑記之古石碑拓印）
3. Geology of Taiwan
4. Topography and Geological Settings of the Taiwan Region — Y. M. Wu et al., Seismic Tomography of Taiwan
5. Yuanshan archaeological Site Plan, 1958（圆山遗址平面）
6. Salvage Excavation of Shi San Hang（搶救十三行考古發掘情況，中央研究院歷史語言研究所提供）
Sited on the public plaza of the Taipei Fine Arts museum, near Yuanshan Archaeological Site, decades of development and construction work have erased mostly all ecological and archeological traces embedded in the terrain. By “lifting up” the paved surface of the museum plaza, this proposal performs an excavation and an erection simultaneously: an encrusted history of soil strata revealed, an alternative geological identity established. By suggesting the “unearthing” of thick layers of earth, Earth Unearthed offers a public, geological, and political gesture in response to the complex environmental realities of today.
Diagonally, a 15 by 15 meters structure steps up the corner facing the museum entrance. Its frontside features a flight of stairs as an extension of the stairs towards the plaza, gently curving inward to form an public amphitheater, and paved to match the green stone pavers of the plaza. On the backside, latex stone rubbings sampled from Taiwan’s coastline hang beneath, where soft dunes landscape offer shaded seating. The original ground is now split into ground plus and ground minus: Ground plus provides an open stage—a public topography where people linger, gather and rest. Ground minus, an undulating terrain, offers an artificial landscape for shade, play, and exploration.
Reference Image Stack:
1. Schematic Sequence of Sections, in Structure and Tectonic Evolution of Taiwan — Bruce H. T. Chai, American Journal of Science, May 1972
2. Rubbing of the Qing-dynasty stone inscription（嚴禁水沙連社丁首索詐碑記之古石碑拓印）
3. Geology of Taiwan
4. Topography and Geological Settings of the Taiwan Region — Y. M. Wu et al., Seismic Tomography of Taiwan
5. Yuanshan archaeological Site Plan, 1958（圆山遗址平面）
6. Salvage Excavation of Shi San Hang（搶救十三行考古發掘情況，中央研究院歷史語言研究所提供）
方案设计:
咿呀工作室 & 兀一設計
团队成员:
张一然, 李雅伦, 劉忻怡, 林苡忻, 陳艾, 樊光矞
结构工程:
EC台灣
模型与照片:
兀一設計
咿呀工作室 & 兀一設計
团队成员:
张一然, 李雅伦, 劉忻怡, 林苡忻, 陳艾, 樊光矞
结构工程:
EC台灣
模型与照片:
兀一設計
Our team experimented with latex stone rubbings on various ground surfaces along the coast of Taiwan. The Taiwanese coastline, an undulating horizon that defines the island’s geo-identity, is symbolically displaced through these latex rubbings tiled on the underside of the structure. This immersive tactile experience calls for empathy with nature and further provokes public reflection on geographical and socio-political identity.
