Japanese architect Kengo Kuma and Australian artist Geoff Nees have created a tactile, circular pavilion using timber collected from Melbourne's Royal Botanic Gardens.
Botanical Pavilion slots together like a puzzle without the need for metal supports.
Kuma and Nees's design was commissioned for the NGV Triennial in response to Korean artist Lee Ufan's 2017 painting named Dialogue.
The softly curving pavilion sits in front of the painting, framing it through its openings at both ends.
Top image: the wooden pavilion at the National Gallery of Victoria. Above: the Botanical Pavilion frames Lee Ufan's painting Dialogue, 2017
Botanical Pavilion was made in the Japanese tradition of wooden architecture and features the kind of organic shape that Kuma has often returned to. "In nature most of the shapes are organic, and since the pavilions I make are made of natural materials such as wood, I think organic and curved shapes help to better connect and blend the architecture in the natural world," Kuma told Dezeen.
"Another reason comes from the fact that many of my installations are made by assembling smaller elements together to form larger structures."
Curved structures are an efficient way to achieve a structure with minimal material use
"Curved structures like arches and domes are the most efficient way of achieving a structure with minimum materials," he added.
The aim of the pavilion was to give new life to the "beautiful but unused wood&qu...