Inside
The Mountain
Angela
Watkinson
MAU: Community Performance Centre
Mangere
mountain and lagoon form part of Auckland’s volcanic landscape punctuated with positive
and negative forms. This mountain and lagoon are the main reference points for
this design; the volcanic mountain theatre and its corresponding marae atea
lagoon.
Balance
& atmosphere
The
result is a careful balance. Between the human scale of the community centre and
the geological scale of the mountain theatre rising up of the mangrove seascape
and reclaiming this land as the mangroves have done over the past 50 years. Between
tapu and noa. Between the ancestral theatre of the whare nui and the mountain theatre
of MAU, mediated by the marae atea.
The goal inside
the theatre was to create a space encouraging a different reality and
awareness. A powerful but reverent place, a space of silence, absence of
distracting thought, and the darkness of creation – Tagaloa.
Philosophy
of place, genius loci, mutability
The community centre goal was to build a place where the people want to be, like a temple space – promoting relationships, creating, playing, being. Social concepts create attachment to a place – people create the energy associated with place, not the structure[1]. Using the philosopher Heideggers’ meaning of dwelling, they will be able to dwell in this place and ideally help create it; the whare nui will be a blank canvas to place carvings and internal decoration relevant to them, created or commissioned by them, created on site.
The pivotal
space
The main entry is mediated by the marae atea and
provides clues as to how to behave, protocols, links with the past, ancestors
and relationships to be acknowledged during powhiri. A path of choreographed
experiences, suggestions of what is to come, invitations to move in a certain
way.
The whare
nui leads directly off the sunken marae atea but only the front is addressed,
like a person[2] (the
back is not important, it is buried). The movements and symbolism which bring
life to the physical form of the marae atea resemble a circle[3]
and this marae atea expresses this concept using the Mangere lagoon contours.
It is a powerful space, like the malae. You cannot enter this space unnoticed
and you will leave a trace behind in the sand.
[1] Lefas, Pavlos. Dwelling and Architecture. From Heidegger to
Koolhaas. Jovis Verlag GmbH, 2009.
[2] McKay, Bill and
Antonia Walmsley. “Maori Time: Notions of Space, Time and Building Form in the
South Pacific.” Idea 1, (2005):
85-97.
[3] Durie, Mason. 'Marae
and implications for a modern Maori psychology', The Journal of Polynesian Society 108, no. 4 (1999): 351-366.
[1] Lefas, Pavlos. Dwelling and Architecture. From Heidegger to
Koolhaas. Jovis Verlag GmbH, 2009.
[2] McKay, Bill and
Antonia Walmsley. “Maori Time: Notions of Space, Time and Building Form in the
South Pacific.” Idea 1, (2005):
85-97.
[3] Durie, Mason. 'Marae
and implications for a modern Maori psychology', The Journal of Polynesian Society 108, no. 4 (1999): 351-366.
Design features:
- community access reason for choosing Norana Park
- the outdoor stage has direct access to the main stage, and also the MAU studio rehersal area; the island can form a visual focus behind.
- the theatre can be seen from the bridge, and at night will have a subtle volcanic glow
- walking to the theatre, visitors have to cross over bridges which span the open space between the foyer and theatre; the distinctive smells of the mangroves and the sounds of the wind will be apparent.
- designed so that from the wharenui you can see across to the inlet to the portage site, but also can see through the wharekai and points through the accomodation block.
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