Hadid at the Serpentine

Conceived as Zaha Hadid’s manifesto of a utopian world, the show at the Serpentine Gallery reveals her all-encompassing visions of arranging space and interpreting realities.

“I have always been interested in the concept of fragmentation and with ideas of abstraction and explosion, de-constructing ideas of repetitiveness and mass production. My work first engaged with the early Russian avant-garde; in particular with the work of Kasimir Malevich – he was an early influence for me as a representative of the modern avant-garde intersection between art and design. Malevich discovered abstraction as an experimental principle that can propel creative work to previously unheard levels of invention; this abstract work allowed much greater levels of creativity.” Zaha Hadid, 2007

Zaha Hadid, Vision for Madrid, Spain, 1992. © Zaha Hadid Architects

Zaha Hadid, Wireframe Sculpture Perspective – 2010, Victoria City Aerial, Berlin, Germany, 1988. © Zaha Hadid Architects

Zaha Hadid, Hafenstrasse Development, Hamburg, Germany, 1989. © Zaha Hadid Architects

The Serpentine presents an exhibition of paintings and drawings by Zaha Hadid (1950–2016), widely regarded as a pioneering and visionary architect whose contribution to the world of architecture was ground-breaking and innovative. The Serpentine presentation, first conceived with Hadid herself, reveals her as an artist with drawing at the very heart of her work and will include the architect’s calligraphic drawings and rarely seen private notebooks with sketches that reveal her complex thoughts about architectural forms and their relationships. The show will focus on Hadid’s early works before her first building was erected in 1993 (Vitra Fire Station in Germany) and present her paintings and drawings from the 1970s to the early 1990s.

Drawing and painting were fundamental to Hadid’s practice. Influenced by Malevich, Tatlin and Rodchenko, she used calligraphic drawings as the main method for visualising her architectural ideas. For Hadid, painting was a design tool, and abstraction an investigative structure for imagining architecture and its relationship to the world we live in. These works on paper and canvas unravel an architecture that Hadid was determined to realise in built structures and is seen in the characteristic lightness and weightlessness of her buildings. Conceived as Hadid’s manifesto of a utopian world, the show reveals her all-encompassing visions of arranging space and interpreting realities.

8 December 2016 – 12 February 2017
Zaha Hadid: Early Paintings and Drawings
Serpentine Sackler Gallery
West Carriage Drive, Kensington Gardens, London

Hadid at the Serpentine

Conceived as Zaha Hadid’s manifesto of a utopian world, the show at the Serpentine Gallery reveals her all-encompassing visions of arranging space and interpreting realities.

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